in the general sense. Thus, if excluding the species is impossible, excluding the genus is all the more impossible.

This is not the place to discuss these positions. Rather, we shall give a general answer: His being above the Throne is established by mass-transmitted scriptural evidence and the consensus of the early generations of this community. Reason also indicates, both self-evidently and through inference, that He is outside the world. Given this, either He must necessarily be in contact with it or separate from it, or neither is necessary. If either necessarily follows, it follows from the truth, and whatever necessarily follows from the truth is itself true.

His being in contact with the Throne or the like entails none of the objectionable implications involved in His being in contact with every created thing, including impurities, devils, and so forth. For we have only affirmed His transcendence above such contact because those things must be far removed from Him and because they are accursed and banished—not because contact is impossible for Him. Those grounds do not apply to His being in contact with the Throne or the like, as in the reports concerning His touching Adam and others. This is the answer given by the majority of hadith scholars and many speculative theologians.

If His being above the Throne does not necessarily entail His being either in contact with it or separate from it, then the objection has been answered. This answer is therefore decisive here, without any need to alter the correct position on this matter. And [as for] those who say that He is above the Throne, neither