“Existence is one, and necessary, eternal existence—the Creator—is identical with contingent, created, originated existence.” This is the foundation of the position of those who profess the unity of existence, such as Ibn ‘Arabī al-Tā’ī, Ibn Sab‘īn, and their followers, as has been explained at length elsewhere.
Among those who maintain that He does not speak by His will and power, while affirming that speech subsists in Him, some said:
“His individual utterances consist of particular letters and sounds that are eternal and beginningless, have always existed, and will always exist.”
They claimed that the Quran, the Torah, and the Gospel each consist of eternal, beginningless letters and sounds that have always existed and will always exist. The vast majority of rational people replied:
“It is self-evident that the letter bā’ precedes sīn, and that sīn precedes mīm. How, then, can they coexist from eternity and forever? It is also known that a particular sound does not endure for two successive moments. How, then, can it be beginningless, having always existed and continuing forever?”
Then the third group—among those who followed the approach of those speculative theologians—said:
“Rather, we say that He speaks by His will and power, with speech that subsists in His essence, as indicated by the Quran, the Sunnah, and the consensus of the early generations and the leading scholars. Even if this entails that temporal occurrences subsist in Him, there is nothing objectionable in that, whether according to revelation or reason. Indeed, this consequence is inescapable for all groups of rational people, and it is indicated by numerous scriptural texts and statements of the early generations and the leading scholars.
“We also say that He speaks the Arabic Quran by His will and power, and that He called to Moses with a voice that Moses heard, as indicated by the scriptural texts and the statements of the early generations. But we say that He was not speaking in the beginningless past, and that it is impossible for Him to