is diverse and distinct. Likewise, the things commanded and forbidden also differ. Thus, it is inconceivable that the report of what happened to Moses should be the very same report as that of what happened to Jesus; that the command to pray should be the very same command as that to pay zakāh, and so forth; that what relates to Zayd should be identical to what relates to ‘Amr; or that what is called a report should be identical to what is called a command. A command is a request, whereas a report contains no request; rather, it is a judgment affirming or denying a relation between one simple term and another. It is therefore established that speech comprises different categories, and that speech is common to them all, serving as their genus.

“We reply: We have already explained that speech is a single proposition and a single object of knowledge subsisting within the self, and that the expressions conveying it differ because its relations and the things to which it relates differ. This kind of difference does not pertain to the most distinctive characteristic of speech, but to something external to it. Accordingly, we say that, if its external relations and the things to which it relates are left out of consideration, no difference whatsoever can be conceived in internal speech. This does not entail that speech itself ceases to exist or loses its essential reality.