Mosul, used to attribute to him statements he had never made. Al-Samnānī is also said to have been lax in his judgments and statements.

The point here is that whatever is not authentically established from the Messenger need not be included in this discussion, whether it requires interpretation or not.

The report, “The Black Stone is Allah’s right hand on earth,” is well known as a statement of Ibn ʿAbbās. It has also been transmitted as a statement traced back to the Prophet, but that attribution is questionable. The wording of the report is:

“The Black Stone is Allah’s right hand on earth. Whoever shakes hands with it or kisses it is as though he has shaken hands with Allah and kissed His right hand.”

The wording of this report states that it is Allah’s right hand on earth, and that whoever shakes hands with it is as though he has shaken hands with Allah and kissed His right hand. It is well known that the thing being likened is not the thing to which it is likened. This therefore explicitly establishes that it is not Allah’s attribute itself. Thus, no one can produce an authentic, explicit text indicating a corrupt meaning without the text providing any clarification whatsoever. Praise be to Allah, who has preserved His words and the words of His Messenger from every deficiency and flaw.

“Glory be to your Lord, the Lord of Might, far above what they ascribe to Him! And peace be upon the messengers,”

for what they have said is free of deficiency and flaw.

“And praise be to Allah, Lord of the worlds.”

As for the second error, they turn to authentic texts whose meanings are clear—indeed, explicit and conclusive—such as the hadiths concerning seeing Allah and similar reports affirming His attributes. They then say, “These require interpretation just as those do.” Yet it has become clear that neither category requires distortion, and that the explanation through which the correct meaning is known