The shaykh and imam, the learned and erudite scholar, the great scholar of the Muslim community and ocean of knowledge, Shaykh al-Islam Taqī al-Dīn Abū al-‘Abbās Ahmad ibn Taymiyyah—may Allah have mercy on him, be pleased with him, and admit him to Paradise—said:

All praise belongs to Allah. We praise Him, seek His help, and ask His forgiveness. We seek refuge in Allah from the evil within ourselves and from our evil deeds. Whomever Allah guides, none can lead astray; and whomever He leads astray, none can guide. I bear witness that none is worthy of worship except Allah alone, without partner, and I bear witness that Muhammad is His servant and Messenger. May Allah bless him and his family and grant him abundant peace.

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Concerning what al-Rāzī stated in al-Arba‘īn (The Forty) regarding “volitional attributes,” which they call “the inherence of temporal occurrences,” after establishing that most groups of rational thinkers hold this position, even though they deny it verbally.

He said:

“Know that attributes fall into three categories: real attributes devoid of relations, such as blackness and whiteness. The second consists of real attributes that necessarily entail relations, such as knowledge and power. The third consists of pure relations and pure relationships, such as a thing’s being prior to another