Section:
As for their “second argument,” which is the mainstay of most of them, it may be set out as follows: If it were created, He would have to create it either within Himself, within something else, or without a locus.
The first would entail His being a locus for temporally originated events, which is invalid. The second would entail its being an attribute of the locus in which it inheres. For when an attribute inheres in a locus, it is that locus—not something else—that is characterized by it. Thus, when knowledge, life, power, speech, or any other attribute inheres in a locus, that locus is what is described as living, knowing, powerful, and speaking, just as it is described as moving when motion inheres in it, or as black or white when blackness or whiteness inheres in it, and so forth. As for its subsisting without a locus, that is impossible, since it is an attribute.
The meaning of “this argument” is also sound. Yet it supports only the position of the early Muslim generations. It demonstrates the falsity of the Ash‘arīs’ position just as it demonstrates the falsity of the Mu‘tazilīs’ position and that of the Jahmīs generally. For, among “these alternatives,” the majority of the Mu‘tazilīs and Jahmīs chose the view that He creates it in a locus. They said: When Allah spoke to Moses, He created a sound in the tree, and that created sound coming from the tree was His speech.