, for this is impossible even with the attributes of created beings: an attribute cannot leave the subject in which it subsists and pass to another. How much more so with the attributes of the Creator—majestic is His glory.

He, Exalted, says concerning the speech of created beings:

“Grave is the word that comes out of their mouths; they speak nothing but a lie.”

That utterance subsists in the speaker and is heard from him. Its coming out of his mouth does not mean that the speech subsisting in him leaves him and passes to someone else. Rather, each thing issues forth in a manner appropriate to it. Knowledge and speech, when received from a scholar or speaker, do not diminish in their source. Hence they are likened to a light from which everyone draws illumination, while it remains unchanged and undiminished. Thus, the statement of some of the early generations, “Al-Samad is the One from whom nothing issues,” is sound in the sense that nothing of Him separates from Him.

For this reason, it is impossible for Him to beget or to be begotten. Begetting, generation, and everything denoted by such expressions require two sources. Whatever is generated as a self-subsisting entity must have material from which it emerges; whatever is an accident subsisting in another must have a subject in which it subsists. He rules out the first by His word, “One,” for the One is He who has neither an equal nor a counterpart. It is therefore impossible for Him to have a consort, whereas generation occurs only between two things. He, Exalted, says:

“How could He have a child when He has no consort? He created all things, and He has knowledge of everything.”

Thus He, glorified be He, denies having a child because its necessary prerequisite is impossible for Him, for the absence of a necessary prerequisite indicates