rightly guided, much less endowed with that higher form of guidance—“an enlightening Book.” In fact, they possess no enlightening Book at all.

Had you but spoken differently and said, “We do not grasp its meaning,” or, “Its outward sense is false and therefore calls for an acceptable interpretation,” as you claim is the position of those Muslims whose method you imitate with respect to the divine attributes, that would at least have been nearer to sound reasoning.

Yet how can this stand when the reality is the very opposite of what you allege?

Ninth argument: Your misguidance stems from turning away from the prophets’ plain and explicit words to the strained interpretations you have imposed—interpretations for which the wording itself gives no support, neither explicitly nor implicitly. You abandoned the clear verses and clung to the ambiguous ones, seeking discord and forcing an interpretation upon them.

Had you held fast to the outward sense of these words you would not have gone astray. In the speech of the prophets, “the Son” in its obvious sense never denotes one of Allah’s attributes; it refers instead to His ally, His beloved, and the like. Likewise, “the Holy Spirit” does not signify an attribute of His, but rather His revelation, His angel, and similar meanings. You therefore left the apparent wording and its understood meaning for a sense to which the words give absolutely no indication. How, then, can you claim that you have followed the prophets’ texts?

Tenth argument: You have carried your disparagement of the Messiah and his Gospel to extremes, just as you have taken to extremes in reviling Allah—though you are unaware that this is disparagement. You were not content to make the plain sense of the Messiah’s words the very unbelief you profess; you went further and claimed that their plain sense is a kind of unbelief you yourselves repudiate: three gods, whether united or separated; three compounded bodies; three disparate parts; or three composite persons. This, and the like of it, is what you allege to be the outward meaning of the Messiah’s words—peace be upon him.