in the highest edifice—He who existed before mankind
and fashioned a throne above the heaven,
a spacious throne beyond the reach of human sight;
beneath it you see the angels as forms.

I say: He means that those Arabs who mentioned it without being Muslims had taken this from the People of the Book. Umayyah and others like him only took this from the People of the Book; otherwise, the polytheists had no knowledge of it.

Abū al-Faraj Ibn al-Jawzī said:

“Kaʿb said: ‘The heavens in relation to the Throne are like a lamp suspended between heaven and earth.’”

He said:

“The early generations unanimously agreed not to go beyond reciting the verse. Some, however, departed from this and said that the Throne means dominion. This abandons the literal meaning for a figurative one, while also contradicting the transmitted reports. Have they not heard His words:

‘And His Throne was upon the water’?

Would you then suppose that dominion was upon the water?”

He said:

“Some of them say that istawā (‘rose over’) means istawlā (‘gained dominion over’), citing the poet’s words:

Until Bishr established himself over Iraq,
without a sword or any blood being shed.

The poet also said: