all directions, while others say that it is finite only in the direction of the Throne, but infinite in every other direction.

Al-Ashʿarī reported these and other views from various groups in his Maqālāt. Among those who expressed this view were the Karrāmiyyah and some followers of the imams, such as Judge Abū Yaʿlā and others. Some of these hold that past events are finite, while also affirming the existence of an infinite magnitude in the present.

Likewise, Muʿammar and his followers, the proponents of the theory of maʿānī, affirm that infinitely many maʿānī exist at a single instant, while holding that a succession of events without a beginning is impossible. Thus, some people hold that finitude is possible in both past events and dimensions, while others hold that it is possible in dimensions but not in events. These are three positions.

The fourth position is that infinity is impossible in anything that has entered into existence, whether in the past or the present, but possible in what has not yet come into existence—that is, future things. This is the position of many speculative thinkers.

The fifth position is that infinity is possible in the past and the future, but not in things existing at a single instant, whether dimensions, souls, or maʿānī. This is Ibn Rushd’s position, which he also attributed to the philosophers. He claimed that human souls are one after their separation from bodies, just as he claimed that they were one before that separation.