cannot subsist in anyone other than the speaker, just like all other attributes.” In their view, however, the Arabic Quran cannot subsist in Allah’s essence, exalted is He. Were they to allow Allah’s speech to subsist in another, this would invalidate the principle upon which they and the rest of Ahl al-Sunnah agreed, and by which they refuted the Muʿtazilah’s assertion that the Quran is created. These people acknowledge that some parts of the Arabic Quran are superior to others, since they regard it as created; according to the great majority of them, however, it is not Allah’s speech.

Some of their later scholars say that the expression “Allah’s speech” is used in two distinct senses: the meaning subsisting within the self, and the created Arabic speech that signifies it. As for Allah’s speech which they regard as uncreated, it is that meaning, within which, they maintain, differences in excellence are impossible. Their fundamental position is that Allah’s speech consists of meanings—indeed, of only a single meaning—and that the meanings of Allah’s Book are one single thing, admitting neither multiplicity nor division.

Thus, the meaning of the Throne Verse, the verse concerning debt, al-Fātihah, the surahs beginning “Say: He is Allah, One” and “Perish,” the Torah and the Gospel, every divine saying, everything the Lord says to His servants on the Day of Resurrection, and everything He says to the angels and prophets—all these are numerically one and the same meaning, not merely one in kind. It admits neither multiplicity nor division. They also hold that the Arabic Quran is not Allah’s speech, but the speech of another—Gabriel or Muhammad—or a created thing among His creations through which that single meaning is expressed. That single meaning is the command to do everything He has commanded, the prohibition of everything He has forbidden, and the declaration of everything He has declared. They hold that command, prohibition, and declaration are not kinds or divisions of speech, for what is numerically one does not admit