Their words corroborate one another. When the Jahmiyyah and the Muʿtazilah appeared—claiming that the Qur’an is a created thing fashioned apart from Him—the early scholars spoke plainly: “The Qur’an is the Speech of God, uncreated.” They also said, “From Him it originates and to Him it returns,” for those people alleged that it does not begin with Him but rather with the created locus in which He produced it.

Thus the Salaf declared, “From Him it began,” rebutting them. They argued that if it were a created entity detached from Him, it would not truly be His speech; it would instead belong to the place in which it was created. The Lord is not characterized by what He brings into existence within something else; it does not subsist in Him—just as He is not described by the colors, tastes, or motions He creates in others.

Attribution to Him is of two kinds: the attribution of an attribute and the attribution of servitude. The first covers things that cannot subsist independently, such as knowledge and speech; the second covers things that do subsist independently, such as the servant, the spirit, the House, the she-camel, the earth, and the like. As for concrete entities, their attribution to Him takes two forms: a mere attribution of ownership and an attribution of special distinction—because worship is performed there, or for another reason—such as His she-camel or His mosque.

For this reason the Salaf said, “The Speech of God is from God, and nothing that is from God is created,” and they said, “His Speech is from Him and is not separate from Him.” All of this was said to refute those innovators. None of them ever claimed that speech is a single, self-subsisting meaning that is the very meaning of the Torah and the Gospel, nor did any of them assert that the sounds with which God spoke all exist simultaneously, without succession, eternally pre-existent, so that the sound heard by Moses would itself be eternal, without beginning or end.