unsound, as has been explained at length elsewhere. The truth is that everything besides Allah has come into existence and depends upon Him at all times. He sustains it and brings it to nonexistence, just as He brings it into being and originates it. Thus He brings things into existence from dust and other things, then causes them to perish and transforms them into dust and other things. Many of these people have claimed that everything besides Allah will cease to exist and then be restored.

Some of them have said: “This is possible, but establishing it depends upon revelation, and revelation has neither affirmed nor denied it.” This is their conception of the resurrection. Yet neither the Book nor the Sunnah has taught this, nor has reason established it. Rather, the Book and the Sunnah make clear that Allah transforms the world from one state to another: He splits the heaven, makes the mountains like wool, rolls up the sun, and does the other things He has foretold in His Book. He has not stated that all things will cease to exist and then be restored.

Some of them further say that these things will cease to exist thereafter, because an endless succession of events is impossible, as the Jahmiyyah maintain. This is among the views for which the early generations and the leading scholars condemned them, as has been discussed elsewhere.

They said this only to carry through the implications of their claim that a perpetual succession of originated events is impossible. They said: “Whatever must have a beginning must also have an end.” This has been explained at length, and the unsoundness of this principle has been demonstrated.