the Most Merciful. This is an attribute of His Essence; neither its modality nor what it is like is known. The same applies to Allah’s calling His servants, while they lie dead in the earth, to come forth from it, whereupon they come forth. All these are attributes of His Essence, without specifying their modality or likening them to anything else.”

He said: “As for the hadith concerning kinship and the waist, it is an authentic hadith cited by al-Bukhārī. Our imam was asked about it and affirmed it, saying, ‘Let the hadith stand as it has been transmitted.’ As for the hadith concerning His kanaf, it is an established hadith transmitted by the imams Ahmad ibn Hanbal, Ibn Maʿīn, Ibn al-Madīnī