al-Nu‘mān, who said that he heard ‘Abd Allāh ibn Nāfi‘ al-Sā’igh say that he heard Mālik ibn Anas say: ‘Allah is in heaven, and His knowledge is everywhere.’”

Makkī, the preacher of Cordoba, also related these words of Mālik in his compilation of Mālik’s own Quranic commentary. All these chains of transmission are authentic.

[The words of Abū Bakr al-Bayhaqī in al-Asmā’ wa-l-Sifāt (The Names and Attributes)]

Abū Bakr al-Bayhaqī related through an authentic chain of transmission that al-Awzā‘ī said:

“We used to say, while the Successors were still numerous: ‘Allah Most High is above the Throne,’ and we believe in His attributes as reported in the Sunnah.”

Al-Awzā‘ī thus affirmed this. He was one of the imams in the generation of the Successors’ successors, alongside Mālik, Ibn al-Mājishūn, Ibn Abī Dhi’b and others, the imams of the people of the Hijaz; al-Layth ibn Sa‘d and others, the imams of the people of Egypt; al-Thawrī, Ibn Abī Laylā, Abū Hanīfah and others, the imams of the people of Kufa; and Hammād ibn Zayd, Hammād ibn Salamah and others, the imams of the people of Basra. These and their peers were the imams of Islam throughout the East and West at that time.

Al-Awzā‘ī reported that this belief was widely professed during the time of the Successors. They, too, were in agreement with the position held by the Successors, as we have mentioned in citing the statements of Mālik, Hammād ibn Zayd and others.