Those (1) who maintain that the Qur’an is the speech of Allah, uncreated, and who at the same time insist that speech consists solely of letters and sounds, do indeed concur with the Muʿtazilah concerning the very denotation of the word “speech.” Yet they still affirm that the meaning of speech—whether that meaning be knowledge and will, or some other (2) reality subsisting in the Essence of Allah—truly exists.
By contrast, the Jahmiyyah drawn from the Muʿtazilah and those akin to them do not acknowledge any meaning that subsists in Allah at all. They merely say that the speech made up of letters itself subsists in the Divine Essence. Their agreement with the Muʿtazilah, therefore, is far slighter than that of the first group.
The correct position, upheld by the early generations of the ummah and its leading imams, is that speech is a term covering both letters and meanings (3); hence both wording and meaning are included (4) in what the word “speech” denotes.
The opinions on the matter are four:
- Speech is literal with respect to wording and figurative (5) with respect to meaning; this is the view of the second faction.
- Speech is literal with respect to meaning and figurative with respect to wording; this is the position of the majority within the first faction.
- The term is homonymous, applying equally to both, as asserted by some of the first faction.
- Speech is literal only when the two—wording and meaning—are taken together; if one of them is meant without the other, a contextual indicator is required. This is the view of Ahl al-Jamaʿah. (6)
At times the members of the first faction report that the others say, “The Qur’an is eternal …”