not other than Him. Nor do they say, “It is (not) He Himself, nor is it other than Him.” (1) Rather, because of the confusion it entails, they refrain from using the ambiguous expression (2) in either negation or affirmation.

The Jahmiyya say: “Everything besides Allah is created. His speech is other than Him and is therefore created.” The imams of the Sunnah responded: “If ‘other’ and ‘besides’ are intended to mean something separate from Him, then His knowledge and speech are not included under those terms, just as they are not included in the Prophet’s words—may Allah bless him and grant him peace: ‘Whoever swears by other than Allah has committed shirk.’” The Sunnah establishes that it is permissible to swear by His attributes, such as His might and greatness. (3) It is therefore known that, when used without qualification, “other than” does not include His attributes. If “other” is intended to mean that one thing is not identical to another, there is no doubt that knowledge is not the knower and speech is not the speaker.

Likewise, the term (“dependence” may mean) an effect’s dependence upon its agent (4) and similar cases. It may also mean concomitance, in the sense that neither of two things exists without the other, even if neither has any causal effect upon the other, as with correlatives such as fatherhood and sonship.

The equivocal nature of the term “composite” has already been explained. Thus, if someone says, “If He possessed knowledge, He would be composite of an essence and knowledge,” this does not mean that the two were once separate and then came together, nor that either may separate from the other (5). Rather, it means that if He possesses knowledge, there is an essence and knowledge subsisting in that essence.

As for his statement, “A composite depends upon its parts,” it is well known that the whole’s dependence upon