That being so, consider those who say that He is everywhere in His very essence but is not outside the world; or that He also extends beyond the world to a finite distance; or that He has no limit—whether they say He is a body or is not a body—or who say that He is neither inside the world nor outside it. These seven positions oppose one another, as you can see. As Imam Ahmad said, they are divided over the Book, opposed to the Book, and united in departing from the Book.

Yet they must also say that He differs from the world in His reality—that His reality is not like the reality of the world—as noted earlier, and that He precedes it in time as well. Thus, they affirm separation in reality and time, but none of them affirms spatial separation, though some of them