If he says, “I can conceive of an attribute that is not an accident, subsisting in an entity that does not occupy space, even though it has no counterpart in the observable world,” he is told:

“Then conceive of an attribute which, in us, is a part, subsisting in an entity that does not occupy space, even though it has no counterpart in the observable world. For denying that this is conceivable amounts to denying that the other is conceivable. Even if there is a certain difference between them, it has no bearing on the point at issue.”

This is why the Jahmiyyah, who negate the divine attributes, deny them all. Yet that, too, entails denying the divine Essence. Those among their counterparts who affirm these attributes known through revelation explicitly describe them as attributes subsisting in Him, like knowledge and power. This, too, is neither the intelligible meaning of the revealed text nor what reason indicates. It is only necessity that has driven them into these straits.

The root of this is that they introduced expressions found neither in the Book nor in the Sunnah—broad, undifferentiated expressions such as “occupying space,” “bounded,” “body,” “composite,” and the like. They denied what these expressions signify and made that denial a premise accepted among themselves, regarding it as established by a certain form of reasoning. They were led into that reasoning by an approach they adopted to establish the temporal origination of the world through the temporal origination of accidents, or to establish the contingency of a body through its composition from parts. They were therefore compelled to extend the argument for temporal origination and contingency to everything falling within its scope, since a conclusive proof cannot be set aside in favour of a stronger opposing argument.

They then found that this created difficulties for them, both in relation to the revealed texts and, from another angle, in relation to reason. Thus they split into factions. Some give precedence to the first argument and reject whatever opposes it: these are the Muʿtazilah. Others give precedence to the second argument and reject the first