Ahmad ibn al-Husayn: Ahmad ibn ‘Alī al-Abbār narrated to us, saying: I heard Yahyā ibn Ma‘īn say, “If you hear a Jahmī say, ‘I disbelieve in a Lord who descends,’ say, ‘I believe in a Lord who does whatever He wills.’”

For some who revere these authorities but deny that acts performed by choice subsist in Him—such as al-Qādī Abū Bakr and his followers, Ibn ‘Aqīl, al-Qādī ‘Iyād, and others—construe their words, “He does whatever He wills,” as meaning that He brings into being something separate from Himself, without any act whatsoever subsisting in Him.

This interpretation follows necessarily from two principles they hold:

(The first is that, in their view, the act is identical to what it produces, and creation is identical to the created thing. Thus, they interpret His transitive acts, as in His saying, “He created the heavens and the earth,” and similar statements, to mean that these things came into existence through His power, without any act proceeding from Him and subsisting in His own Being. Rather, His state before creating and after creating is the same. In their view, nothing new has arisen except a relation and a connection, which is something non-existent, not existent.

They say the same concerning His hearing His servants’ voices and seeing their deeds, His having spoken to Moses and others, His having sent down the Quran or abrogated whatever He abrogated of it, and other such matters. In their view, nothing new has arisen except a mere “connection” and “relation” between the Creator and the created, which is something non-existent, not existent.

They likewise say this concerning His rising over the Throne, if they affirm that He is above the Throne. This is the position of Ibn ‘Aqīl and others, and it was the earlier of al-Qādī Abū Ya‘lā’s two positions. Ibn ‘Aqīl calls this “connection” states; perhaps he likens it to the “states” affirmed by those speculative thinkers who affirm them