—many times over—as we have explained in other works. Accordingly, the response to this argument and others like it rests on two positions.

The first is the position of those who say that Allah Himself, exalted is He, is above the Throne, while also saying that He is neither a body nor something occupying a spatial region. This is the position of Ibn Kullāb, al-Ash‘arī, and many who affirm the divine attributes, including their jurists, hadith scholars, and Sufis. This view is common among them, openly professed and widespread.

Those who dispute their affirmation that He is above the Throne—such as al-Rāzī, the later Ash‘arīs, and the Mu‘tazilah—claim that this is a contradiction contrary to necessary rational truths. We have already discussed the dispute between the two groups in a way that draws attention to the reality of the matter. It has become clear that the former depart much further from necessary rational truths and are far more self-contradictory than these. Nor can any of these, whether in his own reasoning or in debate, agree with those others in the course of negation they have pursued, seeking thereby to escape the contradiction they charge him with. For he would be like someone seeking refuge from scorching ground in fire, so that what he falls into, in terms of