(Q 2:255)

Likewise, when it is said of a created being that he possesses power and knowledge, that power and knowledge are neither identical with, nor even comparable to, the power and knowledge of the Creator. The Lord has power and knowledge that are His alone, and the servant has power and knowledge that are his alone. Even though they share, in an unqualified sense, the common designation of “power” and “knowledge,” this in no way obliges us to regard one as the very same as the other or even as resembling it.

Indeed, when it is said of the celestial sphere that it is an entity subsisting in itself, and of a wooden plank that it is likewise an entity subsisting in itself, it by no means follows that the two are identical or even alike. And when it is said of the sky’s color that it is an accident inhering in something else, and of the apple’s taste that it is an accident inhering in something else, it is not thereby necessary that the one be the other or resemble it.

Hence, the fact that two things share a general name does not entail that the attribute predicated of one under that name is identical to, or even similar to, what is predicated of the other. The terms that some people call mushakkik (graded or “analogous” terms) are a subset of univocal terms in the broad sense; they belong to the class of general nouns the grammarians label ism jins, and whose meanings the logicians refer to as universals.

A second answer to this claimant is to say: You yourself wrote at the very beginning of the preface to your book:

“Praise be to Allah, the One worshiped without … or …—the One whose radiant majesty sparkles in the hearts of His friends, manifest after the declaration that there is no deity but [Allah], as the Originator, the Bountiful, the All-Forgiving, the Most Merciful.”

And you said: “I bear witness that there is no deity except Allah alone, without partner—a testimony that negates from Him every asserted affirmation.”