The same applies to the statement:
“Whatever comes into existence has an originator.”
Whenever someone knows that a thing has come into existence, he also knows that it has an originator, just as he knows that another such thing has been brought into existence. Yet knowing that an originated thing has an originator is general, universal knowledge; it contains no knowledge of any particular being. This is not knowledge of Allah Most High.
A sign, by contrast, is specific to Him; no other shares it with Him. Thus, a human being and the other signs point to Him Himself, not to a kind considered in general. For a proof necessarily entails what it proves, and these proofs necessarily entail Him in particular because they depend upon Him. They do not entail some unrestricted universal, since an unrestricted universal has no existence in external reality.
The person reasoning from these signs, however, may not initially know that they necessarily entail Him Himself. Rather, he first recognizes what is shared, then what is distinctive. This is like someone who sees a person from afar and knows that he is a body; then sees him moving towards him and knows that he is an animal; then sees him standing upright and knows that he is human; then sees him clearly and knows that he is Zayd, for example. His knowledge of that particular individual thus develops according to the evidence available to him.
The Lord Most High is distinguished from all others by all His exclusive attributes. People have discussed which attribute is most distinctive of Him.
Some of the Muʿtazilites said: “It is His being without beginning.”
Al-Ashʿarī and others said: “It is the power to bring things into existence.”
Some philosophers said: “It is necessary existence.”
The truth is that each of these attributes is exclusive to Him. Among His exclusive attributes are that He knows all things, that He has power over all things, that He is Allah, besides whom there is no god, and that He is the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful.
Every name by which none other is named—such as Allah, the Pre-eternal and Beginningless One, the Lord of all worlds, the Master of the Day of Judgment, and the like—has a meaning exclusive to Him.