or that it is made up of disparate realities(1) is something the intellect itself recognises as impossible; consequently it can be affirmed neither for Allah nor for anything else.

If, when you say that it is “unlike the speech of originated beings,” you intend something else—namely, that its being a meaning subsisting in the Divine Self, or its being neither letter nor sound, is what sets it apart from created speech—then that is not the case according to your own principles, for in your view the eternal and the contingent share this very description.

And if what you really mean is that it is one, whereas the speech of creatures is not one, we reply: this is precisely the point in dispute. Produce, then, a proof that shows how it differs from originated speech in this respect.

Forty-third angle: Speech, knowledge, power, and all the other attributes are, in the judgment of these theologians and others,(2)(3) akin to created attributes from one perspective and distinct from them from another—just as existence that is pre-eternal, necessary, self-subsistent, and creating may be compared with possible, created existence from one angle and set apart from it from another. Hence they treat both the visible and the unseen alike when they discuss definitions, proofs, causes, and conditions. They will say: “The definition of an ʿālim is: the one in whom knowledge subsists; realities do not vary whether in the seen world or the unseen; knowledge and power are conditioned(4) upon life in both realms; and judgments are an indication of knowledge in the seen and the unseen alike.” And those among them who affirm aḥwāl declare(5)(6): knowledge necessitates