Thus, what is said of His attributes is like what is said of His essence. Nothing is like Allah Most High, whether in His essence, His attributes, or His actions. What is understood, however, is that the relation of an attribute to its possessor is like the relation of the corresponding attribute to its possessor. Allah’s knowledge, speech, descent, and rising are appropriate to His essence and befit it, just as a servant’s attributes are appropriate to his essence and befit it. The relation of His attributes to His essence is like the relation of the servant’s attributes to his essence.

For this reason, some have said:

“If someone asks you, ‘How does He descend? How did He rise? How does He know, speak, decree, and create?’ say to him, ‘What is He like in Himself?’ If he says, ‘I do not know what His essence is like,’ say to him, ‘Nor do I know what His attributes are like, for knowing what an attribute is like depends upon knowing what its possessor is like.’”

This applies when these names and attributes are used with a specific, determinate reference—which is how they occur in the Quran and Sunnah. But when they are used in an unqualified, general sense—as in the statements of speculative thinkers, “What exists is divided into the eternal and the originated,” and “Knowledge is divided into eternal and originated knowledge,” and similar statements—this is what the unqualified, general expression denotes, and knowledge is an unqualified, general concept. Concepts are unqualified and general only in the mind, not in concrete reality. Thus, an existent with unqualified or general existence is found only in the mind; anything unqualified or general is found only in the mind; and an unqualified, general human being or animal is found only in the mind. Existing things themselves, by contrast, are always determinate, particular, and distinct from others.

Let the discerning reader reflect carefully on this crucial distinction, for many speculative thinkers have stumbled here while delving