they openly professed what they kept concealed, for they understood the underlying premise of their doctrine: they denied that Allah could be seen and that He truly speaks only because His being seen and His speaking entail His being above the world. If they acknowledged His speech, His being seen, and other such attributes, they would have to acknowledge that He is above the Throne. If they denied these things and others agreed with them, they used this as a means of denying His being above the Throne and other attributes. For it is argued: if He were above the Throne, it would be possible to see Him, and He would speak; whatever cannot be seen cannot be above the Throne.

Since the question of Allah’s being above creation is in itself more momentous, its proofs stronger and more numerous, and those who affirm it far more numerous among the early generations, the leading scholars, and ordinary Muslims, the approach taken by those who affirm the divine attributes is stronger on this question than their approach to the question of seeing Allah.

To explain: the innate disposition recognizes that Allah is above the world more firmly than it recognizes that He can be seen. The evidence for this in the Quran, the Sunnah, and the consensus of the early generations of the Muslim community is stronger than the evidence these sources provide for seeing Allah Most High. Hearts more firmly recognize that whatever is neither within the world nor outside it can only be nonexistent than they recognize that whatever cannot be seen can only be nonexistent. Their immediate and necessary knowledge of the former is greater than their necessary and immediate knowledge of the latter. Likewise, their immediate and necessary recognition that any two existent things must be separate from one another