His statement, then, that space and direction exist independently of whatever occupies and rests within them is a general proposition used to draw a comparison in a syllogistic argument. Yet his only basis for this is to liken the Creator to a weak, needy creature, even one of a lowly kind. These Jahmiyyah constantly associate partners with Allah, set others as His equals, and compare Him to the most contemptible created things—indeed, even to nonexistent things—as we have repeatedly pointed out above.

When they saw that someone settled upon a ship, a mount, or a couch has no need of his place, they said that Allah, too, must have no need of His place, thereby likening Him to this helpless, weak creature. And when they saw that the space and place occupied by stones, clods of earth, trees, females, and males have no need of them, they said that the Lord of all beings resembles these spatially located things in His dependence upon that which has no need of Him. Exalted is He, far above what the wrongdoers say!

Then, in the twelfth response, he may be told: Much of what is called a human being’s place, space, or direction depends upon him. Indeed, this also applies to beings other than humans. Thus, whoever says that place is the inner surface of the containing body