the resemblance you yourselves dread, according to your own principle.

Next we say: your affirmation of the will to reward—or of the reward itself—necessarily entails love for the deed that is being rewarded. Had there been no love for the deed, its doer would not be rewarded. Thus your interpretation inevitably leads back to the very thing you sought to deny. If you affirm that love in a manner identical to the creature’s, you fall into likening the Creator to His creation; but if you affirm it in a way unique to Allah and befitting Him, you are correct—and you must then affirm all the other attributes in the same manner.

Fifth: Their statement about the attributes they reject, namely, “Affirming them entails resemblance,” is invalid. Sharing a name or an attribute does not mean that the underlying realities or the beings described are identical, as has already been explained. Their principle is also refuted by the very attributes they themselves affirm for Allah, for they affirm for Him life, knowledge, power, will, speech, hearing, and sight, while the creature is likewise described with these. By their own standard, affirming those attributes for Allah would also entail resemblance.

If they say, “We affirm these attributes for Allah in a manner unique to Him, unlike how they exist in the creature,” we reply: that is an excellent and sound answer. Why, then, do you not apply the same answer to the attributes you have denied, affirming them for Allah in a manner unique to Him and unlike what exists in the creature?

If they say, “What we have affirmed is required by reason, hence we had to affirm it,” we offer three replies:

First, it is impermissible to rely on reason alone in this matter, as has already been clarified.

Second, it is equally possible to establish—by rational proof—those very attributes you have denied; indeed, in some cases the rational evidence for them is clearer than the arguments you advance for the attributes you affirm.