be anything here to distinguish prohibition from declaration, or to make the meanings of the verse concerning ablution different from those of the verse concerning debt. For if the created letters signifying that meaning signify nothing but it, then it contains neither multiplicity nor differentiation. If they signify relations that have no existence, then nonexistence is not a thing that could constitute a command, a prohibition, or a declaration.

According to these thinkers, there is nothing but that meaning and its relation to the realities spoken of or commanded. The Arabic Quran itself, which they hold to be created, signifies that meaning. If what it signifies is that meaning, then within it no command is distinguishable from a declaration, no command to pray from a command to give zakah, and no prohibition of disbelief from a declaration of Allah’s oneness.

If those relations have no existence, then what is nonexistent is not a thing, and nonexistence cannot constitute a command, a prohibition, or a declaration. Nor can what the Torah, the Gospel, the Quran, and all Allah’s other Books signify be nonexistent things with no reality. Nor can nonexistent things be what makes prayer obligatory and wrongdoing forbidden. By virtue of those nonexistent things, that single meaning could have only relational attributes, which are of the nature of negation: if they do not negate something existent, then they are a relation that does not exist.

The reality of the matter, according to their position, is therefore that Allah has no speech—neither meanings nor letters—except in the sense of a single meaning that has no existent or knowable reality.

Among their arguments is that, if some of His speech is said to be superior to other parts, then the less excellent would fall short of the more excellent. Yet Allah’s attributes are perfect, without deficiency, and the Quran