things while being above the Throne,” your opponent will reject your dialectical premise and say: “We do not concede that He cannot then be described as being below in a hypothetical, relative sense that does not conflict with His being above.”

If you say that this does not entail being below in any real or existing relative sense, but only in a hypothetical relative sense, that poses no problem. For the hypothetical judgment depends on a condition, and a conditional judgment does not apply when its condition is absent. This is as in the hadith: “If one of you were to lower his bucket, it would descend upon Allah.” It is known that lowering anything in that direction is impossible; therefore, anything descending upon Allah is impossible, and Allah’s being below anything is impossible. The sole purpose of this impossible supposition is to demonstrate that He encompasses all things from every direction. This reinforces His being above the heavens, upon the Throne, rather than contradicting it.

This argument, besides displaying the utmost fairness in debate, also contains