then he devised an argument very much like that of the Christian heretics. Those heretics claim that the spirit within Jesus is God’s own Spirit, proceeding from His very essence; whenever God wishes to bring something into being, that spirit enters one of His creatures, speaks through that creature’s tongue, commands what it wishes and forbids what it wishes, all the while remaining a spirit hidden from human sight.

So Jahm appropriated a similar line of reasoning and said to the Sumanī:

“Do you not claim that you have a spirit within you?”

“Yes.”

“Have you seen your spirit?”

“No.”

“Have you heard it speak?”

“No.”

“Have you perceived any sensation of it?”

“No.”

Jahm concluded, “Exactly so is God: His face is not seen, His voice is not heard, His scent is not smelled. He is hidden from all vision and is not confined to one place rather than another.”

He then anchored his position on three ambiguous verses, the first of which is the divine statement:

“There is nothing like unto Him” (al-Shura 42:11).