“Such-and-such results from this matter”; “This generates such-and-such”; and “This or that has resulted from that matter”—speaking of any cause that produces an effect in speech and action. Even natural philosophers speak of “the elements and generated things,” meaning the minerals, plants, and animals generated from the four basic elements: earth, water, air, and fire.
Thus, His denial—glorified be He—that He begets anything entails that nothing is generated from Him. His denial that He takes a child entails that He has not done so with any of His creatures as a mark of honour, and that it is not fitting for Him to accord any of His servants the status of a child.
This refutes the claims of those who assert such things concerning the Messiah and others, those who say:
“We are the children of Allah,”
and those who say, “Philosophy is becoming like God.” A child is of the same kind as its parent and is its counterpart, even though it is an offshoot of it. Hence, those who affirm these ideas are among the most extreme of all people in asserting resemblance and equivalence to Him, assigning Him rivals, and equating others with Him and placing them on a par with Him.
Thus, the philosophers who maintain that intellects and souls emanate from Him through generation and causation make them His rivals and take them as gods and lords. Indeed, they may worship only them and invoke none besides them, regarding them as the originators of everything else beneath them.
So praise be to Allah, who has not taken a child and has no partner in His dominion. And:
“Blessed is He who sent down the Criterion to His servant, so that he may be a warner to all the worlds.”
“He to whom belongs the dominion of the heavens and the earth