Likewise, He says in the account of Moses:

“When he came to it, he was called: ‘Blessed is whoever is in the fire and whoever is around it.’”

And He, Exalted is He, says:

“When he came to it, he was called from the right side of the valley, in the blessed spot, from the tree: ‘O Moses, indeed I am Allah, Lord of the worlds.’”

This clearly shows that He called to him only when he arrived; the call did not exist in pre-eternity, as the Kullābiyyah claim. They say that the call inheres in Allah’s essence from pre-eternity and is inseparable from His essence: He has always been and will always be calling to him. However, when Moses arrived, He created in him the capacity to perceive what had existed from pre-eternity.

Among those of them who hold that speech is a single meaning, some say that Moses heard that meaning with his ears, as al-Ash'arī holds. Others say instead that he was enabled to understand of it what he understood, as al-Qādī Abū Bakr and others hold. They are therefore asked: “According to you, it is a single meaning that neither admits division nor comprises multiple meanings. Did Moses understand the whole meaning or only part of it? If you say the whole of it, then he knew all of Allah’s knowledge. If you say part of it, then it admits division, whereas you hold that it does not.”

Those followers of the Kullābiyyah who hold that the call and the rest of the pre-eternal speech consist of letters, or letters and sounds, inseparable from the Lord’s essence—as the Sālimiyyah and those who agree with them maintain—say that He creates in Moses the capacity to perceive those letters and sounds. Yet the Quran, the Sunnah, and the statements of all the early generations indicate that He called to him and spoke privately to him only when he arrived. The call did not exist before that, let alone being eternal and without beginning.

And He, Exalted is He, says:

“When they tasted the tree, their nakedness became apparent to them, and they began covering themselves with leaves from Paradise. Their Lord called to them: ‘Did I not forbid you both from that tree and tell you that