or “hearing” and “sight,” or “the All-Hearing” and “the All-Seeing,” or “power” and “the All-Powerful.” The shared element is an absolute, universal concept that belongs to neither of them in particular; therefore, there is no overlap between them in what is unique to a contingent, originated being, nor in what is unique to the Necessary, Eternal One, for whatever is exclusive to one of them cannot possibly be shared by the other.

Accordingly, when the common property in which they participate is an attribute of perfection—such as existence, life, knowledge, or power—and that property carries no indication whatsoever of the peculiar features of created beings, just as it carries no indication of the peculiar features of the Creator, then affirming it poses no problem at all. Indeed, affirming it is required by the very fact of existence: any two existent things must have such a point of commonality, and whoever denies this is committed to negating the existence of every existent.

For this reason, when the leading scholars perceived that this was in reality the doctrine of the Jahmites, they labeled them