—for that attribute, once it is said to have indwelled, to become an operative cause like fire, the sun, or the human soul. Yet you have asserted that the Word and the Life have indwelled someone other than Allah, and you have made the being in whom they supposedly indwell a god, a creator—indeed, the God, the Creator Himself. It is self-evident to any rational person that the object in which fire’s light is seen does not thereby become fire itself, nor does whatever receives the sun’s rays become the sun, nor does the body in which Zayd’s speech and knowledge occur become Zayd himself. Your claim that the Messiah is the Creator of the universe therefore contradicts the very analogy you advance.

From this it is clear that nothing in the examples you cite actually corresponds to what you describe. Your conception is wholly false, internally contradictory, and impossible in reality; no existing, observable entity can serve as a true analogy for it—only an analogy that fails to match.

Hence you sometimes liken indwelling and union—hulul and ittihad—to water filling a vessel, sometimes to fire penetrating iron, sometimes to soul and body, and sometimes you say they are one substance blended like water and milk. Every one of these analogies you coin for Allah is invalid. The water in a vessel—or any other container—depends on its receptacle; if the container were pierced the water would disperse, and the vessel surrounds it, yet the vessel acquires none of the properties of water. The Lord, exalted is He, is far above needing any of His creatures—neither the Throne nor anything else—nor can any existing thing encompass Him, for He is the Manifest, so nothing is above Him.

As is authentically reported, the Prophet—peace and blessings be upon him—said:

“You are the First; nothing precedes You. You are the Last; nothing comes after You. …”