and those who say that it is brought into being, such as Zuhayr, and those who say that it is an occurrence, such as Abū Mu‘ādh al-Tūmanī—all say that the Quran is neither a body nor an accident.”

As for the argument al-Rāzī advanced in support of the proponents of negation, it too is weak in several respects.

First, the premise on which he relies is his statement: “Anything lacking a perfection that it can possess is deficient.”

The reply is this: it is well known that successive occurrences cannot characterize Him in beginningless eternity, just as they cannot exist in beginningless eternity. For anything whose existence depends upon a preceding occurrence cannot possibly exist before that condition exists. Accordingly, the absence of these occurrences in beginningless eternity does not amount to lacking something that He could possess. Whatever lacks something it cannot possess is not deficient.

Second, he has not established the impossibility of the deficiency he mentions through a rational proof or a text from the Quran or Sunnah. Rather, he has established it only through his claim of consensus.

This is his approach, as it was that of Abū al-Ma‘ālī before him and of those who agree with them. They say that the impossibility of deficiency in Allah Most High is known only through consensus, not through revelation or reason. If that is so, then those who dispute whether He can be characterized by such things are themselves among those whose agreement constitutes consensus. How, then, can consensus be invoked as proof in disputed matters?