it is said: ‘He is not nonexistent.’ Likewise, He is not described as powerful, knowing, or living; rather, it is said: ‘He is neither powerless, nor ignorant, nor dead.’”

He said: “This is the doctrine of the philosophers and the Bātiniyyah. As for those who went to extremes in affirmation, they held beliefs that necessarily committed them to asserting that the Eternal One resembles created things.”

[Ibn Taymiyyah’s commentary]

I say:

All the groups agree with Abū al-Ma‘ālī on the importance of attending to this foundational principle.

The position he attributed to those who deny the attributes is the doctrine of the Jahmiyyah described by Imam Ahmad. Thus, it is reported that Jahm would not call Allah a ‘thing.’ It is also reported that he would not call Him by any name used for created beings, such as the Living, the Knowing, the All-Hearing, or the All-Seeing. Rather, he called Him Powerful and Creator, because, in his view, the servant has no power, as he was the leader of the Jahmiyyah who advocated compulsion.

And since any two existent beings must agree in some