and “the Necessary,” “the Self-Sufficient,” “the Eternal,” and the denial of any likeness. They then turned to what is stated in the Quran and Sunnah, where Allah Most High is called “the Unique,” “the One,” and “the Most High,” as well as other expressions denying that He has any likeness or equal. They said:

“This proves the meanings to which we have assigned these names.”

This is among the gravest fabrications against Allah.

Likewise, the philosophers seized upon the terms Creator, Agent, Maker, Originator, and the like, and assigned them an invented meaning. They divided origination into two kinds: essential and temporal. By essential origination, they meant that the creature coexists with the Lord eternally, without beginning or end. Yet this expression is not known with such a meaning in the language of any nation. Had they merely adopted it as terminology of their own, we would not have contested it. Their purpose, however, was to mislead people and to say:

“We affirm that the world originated and that Allah is its Creator, Agent, and Maker.”

They thus employed expressions whose meanings are necessarily known to entail that the effect comes after the one who produces it. Such expressions are not applied to something that is as eternal as the Lord and has coexisted with Him without beginning or end.

Likewise, some have done this with the term [the Speaker] and other designations. If this were done to the writings of Sibawayh and Hippocrates, what they set forth concerning grammar and medicine would be corrupted. If it were done to the words of individual scholars such as Mālik, al-Shāfiī, Ahmad, and Abū Hanīfa, the knowledge conveyed by them would be corrupted and people would be misled about it. What, then, when this is done to the words of the Lord of the worlds?