The cause of this misguidance is that the terms “likeness” and “composition” are ambiguous.

These very people—along with the great majority of rational people—know that any two things have something in common. Denying this common element is not itself the equivalence and likeness that rational and revealed evidence establishes must be denied. Rather, the likeness that the evidence establishes must be denied is whatever entails attributing to Allah, glorified and exalted be He, any characteristic peculiar to created beings. For He, glorified be He, says:

“There is nothing like Him” [al-Shūrā: 11].

This applies to His essence, His attributes, and His actions.

For this reason, all Muslim groups, as well as others, have agreed in refuting these heretics and explaining that whenever two things share something, this does not necessarily mean that one is equivalent to the other. Nor may everything in which the Creator, glorified be He, shares some meaning with another be denied of Him, for this would entail denying His existence altogether, as these heretics have done. Indeed, it would entail denying both His existence and His nonexistence—the utmost contradiction, heresy, unbelief, and ignorance.

The same applies to the term “composition.” The affirmation of attributes belonging to Allah Most High is not something that evidence rules out. Nor does the fact that these attributes are inseparable from His essence, and that He cannot be without them, constitute a composition that either reason or revelation rules out. Rather, this is indispensable, as has been explained at length in many places.

These and similar arguments are the unsound rational arguments through which the proponents of heresy have gained an opening. The same applies to their rejection of the evidence of revelation whenever, in their judgment, it conflicts with what they consider