—he is told: “Those very ‘accidents’ you affirm likewise entail corporeality and mental composition, just as—by your own reckoning—these other attributes entail sensible composition. If you can affirm those attributes in such a way that they are not accidents, or insist that calling them ‘accidents’ does not prevent their reality, then be consistent: affirm these attributes in a way that they are not a composition or parts, or maintain that describing them as such does not negate their reality.
If someone objects, ‘These attributes can be conceived only as parts,’ he is answered, ‘And those can be conceived only as accidents.’ Should he say, ‘An accident is that which does not endure, whereas the Lord’s attributes are everlasting,’ it is said in reply, ‘And a part is that which can be detached from the whole, which is impossible with respect to God. Just as the separation of His eternal attributes is absolutely impossible, so creatures alone may be separated from their accidents and parts.’
If he protests, ‘But that is corporeality, and corporeality is impossible,’ he is told, ‘This, too, would be corporeality—and corporeality is indeed impossible.’
Should he argue, ‘I can conceive of an attribute that is not an accident and yet inheres in no spatial locus, even though nothing like it exists in the created realm,’ he is told, ‘Then likewise conceive of an attribute which, in our case, would count as a “part” yet inheres in no spatial locus, even though nothing like it exists in the created realm. To deny the intelligibility of this is to deny the intelligibility of that. Whatever minor distinction you allege between the two does not affect the point at issue.’
For that very reason the Jahmī negators rejected every attribute, but such a stance ultimately leads to denying the very Essence. Others in their camp who do accept these so-called “scriptural attributes” declare them to be attributes subsisting in Him, like knowledge and power. Yet this position, too, is neither the evident meaning of the revealed texts nor the conclusion of sound reason; sheer necessity alone has forced them into these narrow straits.
The root of the whole affair is that they introduced terms found neither in the Book nor in the Sunnah, namely