Maher Ameer Refutes Sa’eed Foudah on Restricting Some Of Allah’s Attributes to Meanings Within His Essence

Doubt about calling Allah’s affirmed attributes “attributes” (sifah)

The doubt of the one who denies describing Allah with His affirmed attributes

Now that we have finished with the confusions of the denier in the matter of the apparent wording and ta’wil [interpretive re-reading], and we have mentioned what follows for the group of falsehoods, and we have brought examples and admissions that fulfil what is required and realise what is desired, we move to another doubt that shows the argumentative level of the denier. He says that the word attribute, when it is used, does not call to mind the meaning of hand, leg, shin, and other limbs.

Rather, what first comes to mind when the word attribute is used is what stands in the essence from meanings, like power, knowledge, and will, and other such things. As for the hand, it is not understood from the bare word attribute.

If it is said to us, what is the attribute of the human being, it is not said, he has a hand and a leg. Rather this is a description of him, not an attribute of him. His attribute is that he is a thinker, a speaker, and one who wills, and the like.

If it is said, from what is the human being composed, that is, from which parts is he composed, the answer is, from a hand and a leg and a belly and a back, and the like.

In the answer to this question you mention the parts from which the human being is composed, and you do not mention in the answer mercy and knowledge and will and other attributes of meanings.

These are not parts of a human being, rather they are attributes of him. There is, then, a difference between a part and an attribute, and the matter is not as Ibn Taymiyyah claimed, that attributes are of two kinds, attributes of meanings and attributes of entities, because that which he called entities are parts and limbs, not attributes. (Ihya’ Ulum al Din 1/104).

So he claims that the hand and the face, and whatever is of the category of attributes whose counterparts in us are parts, are not called attributes, and that the word attribute is only applied to those attributes whose counterparts in us are accidents like knowledge, hearing, and sight.

We have already mentioned the distinction between attributes of meanings and attributes of entities, and that the only distinctions that count are that the first have counterparts in us that are accidents, that there is derived from them a name for the Creator, and that they are not distinguished by the sense, unlike the second. We mentioned that they affirm that what they affirm of attributes is distinguished by sense, and that it would be possible to see them if the veil were removed. The only distinction that counts in this discussion becomes derivation and the difference of their counterparts in us. Are these effective distinctions?

We ask, who decides whether it is permitted to apply the label attribute to what we affirm, or not permitted? Do we appeal to language, or to technical usage? If it is the second, then to whose usage, the grammarians, or the Ash’aris [al Ash’ariyyah], or the Mu’tazilah, or whom?

As for the grammarians, neither what we affirm nor what the Ash’aris affirm is called an attribute with them. Al Jawhari says, the attribute is like knowledge and blackness, but the grammarians do not intend this by attribute, because the attribute with them is the na’t, and the na’t is the active participle like striker, or the passive participle like struck, or what returns to them by way of meaning. (Naqd al Tadmuriyyah 93).

In the usage of the grammarians, nothing that we affirm falls under the label attribute.

As for language, Al Khalil says, description is your describing a thing with its adornment and its na’t. (Al-Sihah 4/1439).

Ibn Faris says, wa-sa-fa, the waw, sad, and fa’ is one root, which is the adorning of a thing. I described it, I describe it, description. The attribute is the mark that is inseparable from a thing, as it is said, I weighed it a weight, and the weight is the measure of a thing. It is said, the thing became qualified in the eye of the beholder, meaning it bore that it be described. (Al-Ayn 7/112) (Majmal al-Lughah 1/927).

He says, the na’t is your describing a thing with what it has of beauty.  (Maqayis al-Lughah 6/115).

Ibn Sidah says, describing a thing for it or upon it, description and attribute, is to adorn it. It is said, the description is the verbal noun, and the attribute is the state. (5) (Maqayis al-Lughah 5/148).

Al Hamawi says, I described him a description, from the pattern of wa’ada, I mentioned his na’t with what is in him. It is said, it is taken from their statement, the garment described the body, when it showed and made clear its form. It is said, the attribute is for a passing state, and the na’t is for what is in constitution or character. The attribute is from description, like promise is from promising, and its plural is attributes.  (Al-Muhkam wa al-Muhit al-A’zam 8/383, and Lisan al-Arab 15/457).

Al Jurjani says, the attribute is the noun that indicates some of the states of the essence, such as tall, short, rational, and foolish, and other than that. It is the mark that is inseparable for the very essence of the one described by which it is known. (Al-Misbah al-Munir 2/661).

Zakariyya al Ansari says, the attribute is the mark that stands in the very essence of the one described.  (Al-Ta’rifat 133).

Al Tahanuwi summarises what has been mentioned about attribute in language and usage and says, the attribute with the kasrah and the description are synonymous in language. The meaning of attribute is the clarification of the ambiguous, and the clarification of fitness for a thing, and the clarification of a meaning in a thing. Some of the theologians differentiated between them and said, the description stands in the one described, and the attribute stands in the describer.

The statement of the speaker, Zayd is a knower, is a description for Zayd by consideration that it is the speech of the describer, not an attribute for him, and his knowledge which stands in him is an attribute, not a description. The attribute in the statement of the jurists, the attribute of the prayer, is the acts that occur in the prayer, whether they are obligations or not, as in al Burjandi and al Durr.

The attribute is also used for what is predicated of a thing and its opposite is the essence, and for what does not stand by itself in meaning and its opposite is the essence as you have known, and for the external matter that is predicated and its opposite is the part, and for what stands in another, and for the na’t, and for the derivative description as you will know under the word description. From the derivative attribute are the active participle, the passive participle, the adjective that resembles the active participle, the elative, and what runs in their path like the nisbah adjective. This is in Sharh al Kafiyah in defining the mubtada’. (Al-Hudud al-Aniqah 72).

We can, then, define the attribute as, the mark of a thing by which it is known and distinguished, in this simple way. It includes everything that is specific to Allah and by which we know Him, of attributes of action and essence, and of attributes of meanings and attributes of entities.

The label attribute is not in language restricted to one category of attributes, such as attributes of meanings without attributes of action, self attributes, and attributes of entity. The statement of the denier, if it is said to us, what is the attribute of the human being, it is not said, he has a hand and a leg, is sheer arbitrariness.

Yes, one does not say this, not because the answer is wrong, but because these things do not distinguish the human being from other animals. If the human being were unique in the attribute of hand and leg, then answering the question with, he is an animal that has a hand and a leg, would be a correct and complete answer. The reason one does not answer with this is not because these are not attributes, as he claimed.

If we wanted to turn the matter against him, we would say, likewise it is not correct to answer this question by saying that a human being has hearing and sight and life, for the very same reason mentioned above.

Does the fact that one does not answer with this mean that they are not attributes? How strange the denier and his proofs are.

You might be asked about the attribute of the angels and you answer, luminous beings that have wings, for example. Then the wing is counted as an attribute of the angel, and wings are not attributes of meanings.

His statement, rather this is a description of him not an attribute of him, is a distinction of no value. Description is the mention of attributes, and it is applied to the attribute just as it is applied to the act of the describer. We can also turn the matter against him and say, your statement, O denier, as for his attribute, it is that he is a thinker, a speaker, and one who wills, and the like, does not contain enumeration of his attributes. It contains enumeration of the names derived from those attributes.

Even the Mu’tazilah do not dispute you in these. So where are the attributes in your answer? If you wanted to mention the attributes that you affirm, you would have to say, he is one who possesses thought, speech, and will. Is this different from what you invalidated, that he is one who possesses a hand, and a face?

His statement, if it is said, from what is the human being composed, that is, from which parts is he composed, the answer is, from a hand and a leg  and a belly and a back, and the like. Then in the answer to this question you mention the parts from which the human being is composed, and you do not mention mercy and knowledge and will, is because you asked about composition and structure.

The human being is composed and structured from these things. The Creator is not composed and structured, in the linguistic sense. Whoever says such a thing disbelieves straight away. It is natural that you are answered in this way when you ask about composition and structure. You are not answered with knowledge and mercy and will, because they follow these composites. They are weaker than them in existence originally. Composition belongs in the first place to what is stronger than them in existence, which are the parts and the members of the human being.

Let us turn this against him too. We say, if you were asked, what are the accidents of the limbs of a human being, you would say, hearing and sight and knowledge and pain and other such things.

These are accidents that stand in limbs. It would follow that you should not attribute them to the Creator, Glorified is He, and that you should not call them attributes, but accidents and powers.

Who deceived the denier to think that the nouns of meanings that are jamid like hearing and sight and life, from which names are derived like the All Hearing and the All Seeing and the Ever Living, are the only things by which the one described is described?

One may use for describing the one described the word dhu, or the relative pronoun. Murtada al Zabidi says, dhu means possessor. It is a word coined to be used in order to reach describing by means of generic nouns. (Kashshaf Istilahat al Funun wa al Ulum 2/1078).

This is, literally, the statement of Ibn Sidah before him. (Taj al Arus 10/126).

Abu al Baqa’ al Kafawi says, it is a means to describing by generic nouns, just as alladhi is a means to describing definite nouns with sentences. It is a means to describing by generic nouns, just as alladhi is a means to describing definite nouns with sentences. (Al-Muhkam wa al-Muhit al-A’zam 10/91).

Ibn Ya’ish says, it is not permitted to say dhu with the masculine pronoun attachments, because it only enters as a means to describing nouns by generic nouns, just as alladhi enters as a means to describing definite nouns by sentences. (Al-Kulliyat 459).

The only difference is that the name derived from an attribute is derived from a jamid noun which is the root of derivation and it is the title of the attribute.

Al Alim is derived from al ilm, and al Basir from al basar. The jamid noun is either a noun of essence, and the essence here is what is distinguished by sense, like hand and face and mountain and other such things, or a noun of meaning, and a meaning is what is not distinguished by sense, like mercy, anger, hearing, and sight. Derivation is not accepted except from nouns of meanings, which is the second category of jamid nouns.

This is a purely linguistic matter. It has no connection to the distinction between what is called an attribute and what is not called an attribute. Its end is the distinction between attributes from which derivation is made and attributes which are not the source of derivation.

If Allah had willed, and the language had a derivation from a noun of essence, so that a name like badeed would be derived, for example, for the one who has the attribute of the hand, would the denier then accept calling it an attribute? Would the difference of external realities for him be only following the man-made linguistic rule?

The consideration is for the realities, then, not for this. Especially after we have shown that the attribute in language includes what the denier disputes us about, like mercy, anger, joy, and other such things, and in addition attributes of actions and other relational attributes and special characteristics. All of them are used to describe the Lord, whether by derivation or without it.

In the ways of linking the attribute to the one described, al Amidi says, the investigation of the matter is that the attribute that stands in the locus has an aspect of generality and specificity. Derivation may be from the aspect of its generality, like deriving knower from knowledge which stands in him. It may be from the aspect of specificity, like deriving jurist from what stands in him of the specific knowledge of fiqh.

It may be for the very locus in which the attribute stands, like deriving black for the locus in which blackness stands. It may be for the whole to which the locus of the attribute belongs, like deriving scholar for the human being from the knowledge that stands in his self. If derivation is impossible, then an annexation must be estimated. That is as in the scent of musk which stands in musk. Even if derivation from it is impossible, annexation must be made. One says, the scent of musk. (Sharh al-Mufassal 1/157).

Allah is described as possessing a hand that befits Him, Glorified is He. It is said of it, the hand of Allah. It is annexed to Him as the annexation of the attribute to the one described. He is described as possessing a face that befits Him, Glorified is He.

It is said of it, the face of Allah. It is annexed to Him as the annexation of the attribute to the one described, just as He is described as possessing knowledge, and above every possessor of knowledge is One All Knowing, and as possessing power, the Possessor of Power, the Strong, and as possessing mercy, and your Lord is the Forgiving, Possessor of Mercy.

The difference between the two categories is, then, that in one category the one described is called by a name derived from it, or by means of dhu, or by annexation. In the second category, the one described is described by means of dhu and by annexation only.

Shaykh al Islam says about what is annexed to Allah, Glorified is He, in the Book and the Sunnah, whether it is the annexation of a name to a name, or the ascription of a verb to a name, or the predication by a name about a name, it does not fall outside three categories.

The first is the annexation of the attribute to the one described, like His saying, and they do not encompass anything of His knowledge, and His saying, indeed Allah is the Provider, Possessor of Strength. In the hadith of istikharah, O Allah, I seek Your choice by Your knowledge and I seek Your enabling by Your power. In the other hadith, O Allah, by Your knowledge of the unseen and Your power over the creation. This is in nominal annexation.

As for in the form of the verb, like His saying, Allah knew that you were betraying yourselves, and His saying, He knew that you will not be able to count it, so He turned to you in mercy.

As for the predication which is a nominal sentence, like His saying, and Allah is Knowing of everything, and Allah is Powerful over everything. This is because the speech by which essences are described is either a sentence or a single word.

The sentence is either nominal, like His saying, and Allah is Knowing of everything, or verbal, like His saying, He knew that you will not be able to count it.

As for the single word, the attribute must be annexed in it in wording or in meaning, like His saying, of His knowledge, or the annexation of the one described, like His saying, Possessor of Power. (Abkar al-Afkar 1/381–382).

Even if we suppose that the claim of the denier is correct, and that they are not called attributes in language, what then? We have not found better than the label attribute to apply to it, so that you may make clear that it stands in the Essence of the Creator and that He alone is distinguished by it, Glorified is He, just as He is distinguished by the rest of His attributes.

If it is not in itself called an attribute, then it is neither an attribute nor a part. Rather it is a necessary matter annexed to the Creator which never separates from Him and by which He is distinguished, Glorified is He. It is not said of it that it is identical with His Essence, nor other than it. Why then the brawling with such a flimsy objection?

Did any of the Mu’tazilah or the early Ash’aris or their later scholars object to calling these things attributes of Allah? If the matter were as the denier says, those most deserving of mentioning it would have been those who negated these attributes in the first centuries, or at least the imams of the Ash’aris who did not affirm them.

Yet we find the admission of his own that the early imams of the Ash’aris affirmed these attributes by following the apparent wording. We have quoted the statement of al Baydawi, the fourth, regarding other attributes which the Shaykh affirmed, which are istiwa’ [rising over], hand, face, and eye, because of the apparent texts that mention them, and the rest made ta’wil.

The imams of the Ash’aris followed the apparent wording in affirming these matters as attributes of Allah. If the language did not call these attributes, they would not have taken the apparent wording in them, and they would not have accepted them as attributes for the Creator.

Let no objector here dispute that his imams did not affirm them as attributes as we affirm them. This is not our purpose here. Our purpose is that they called them attributes, and that is enough.

A sample dialogue about apparent wording and ta’wil.

We summarise what has preceded in a comprehensive sample dialogue in which it is said.

The mutakallim [theologian]: By what do you argue for your creed?

I said, by the Book and the Sunnah.

The mutakallim: How do you argue by them when you have not yet established their truth rationally?

I said, I am debating with you, not with an atheist, and there are many paths for establishing their truth. They are not restricted to what the minds of the philosophers and the theologians invented in past centuries.

The mutakallim: What are your proofs in revelation?

I said, the apparent wording of the Book and the Sunnah in which there is no diverting evidence away from them.

The mutakallim: I dispute with you that their apparent wording is with you in your statement about real elevation.

I said, your dispute has no value after the groups have admitted that this is the indication of the apparent wording in revelation. They say that these must be interpreted away in their view, to remove them from what they allege is false.

The mutakallim: They intended what appears to the people of corporealism and anthropomorphism, not what appears to the people of truth.

I said, none of them said that. Rather all of them plainly state that their problem is with the linguistic apparent wording of the text and the understanding that is built on the Arabic tongue. All of them plainly state that the apparent wording in general is rejected if it opposes what they deem decisive. They intend by apparent wording the well known usuli meaning, not what you have invented. It is good that you feel the falsehood of this statement and its consequences, and by that you are refuting them and invalidating their statement.

The mutakallim: I do not care about them. I dispute with you about the apparent wording.

I said, you know the apparent wordings by which I argue. How do you dispute with me about them?

The mutakallim: Because you have cut words from their contexts. This is not called an apparent wording, but a cutting off. If you took them in their full sequence they would not indicate affirming these matters.

I said, we do not permit in the first place that a word be understood independent of its context. How do you attribute that to us? Our constant response to the one who alleges that the word istiwa’ bears a number of meanings is that we say to him, the context and the governing preposition ‘ala favour one meaning and make it the apparent wording which is not to be diverted without proof. Here are the contexts before you. Where do you see in them what invalidates affirmation?

The mutakallim: If you looked into the context you would know that it is a metaphor that must be understood by the instrument of the science of eloquence.

I said, this itself is leaving the apparent wording. The mere use of metaphor and comparison is counted as leaving the apparent wording and the linguistic reality.

The mutakallim: This ta’wil is necessary for understanding the text.

I said, your mere admission that it is ta’wil means that you do not affirm the apparent wording. Ta’wil is a diverting away from the apparent wording. Do you know what you are saying, or do you deny for the sake of denial?

The mutakallim: I still deny and I do not concede that you hold to the apparent wording. The apparent wording is only known by the verbal and situational indicators.

I said, this is not the linguistic apparent wording. It is called in a special usage the apparent wording by proof, and its true name is the construed meaning. I will concede to you, and I do not disagree with you that the apparent wording is only established by looking at the verbal and situational context which are known to the speaker and the hearer, so that the intent becomes clear and ambiguity and weakness of communication do not take place. This is not the statement of your companions in any case. Do you find verbal indicators that invalidate our affirmation?

The mutakallim: Yes, and they are …

I said, note that you are arguing with something that does not rise to the level of being an apparent wording to invalidate the indication of our apparent wordings. This has no value. The author has invalidated your argument by the verse of negation of likeness, which is the strongest thing you have. The upshot is, you have no verbal indicator that invalidates or motivates leaving the apparent wordings which you rely upon.

The mutakallim: What about the rational indicator? It is considered and it weighs in favour of ta’wil.

I said, this rational indicator must be necessary, unknown to none of the hearers, or theoretical which has become like what is necessary because of its spread and prevalence, such that the hearer brings it to mind when addressed by revelation. None of the indicators you allege are like that. How is it if we do not only deny that they are necessary and prevalent among the Salaf [early generations], but we deem it impossible that a single man among them knew them at all in that period. They had only these apparent wordings which had no diverting indicator from verbal or situational indicators.

The mutakallim: Then they consigned the meaning.

I said, why would they consign the meaning. Tafwid comes as an epistemic stance and a second level after the apparent wordings are formed, after diverting them and preventing them from being carried out. You have conceded to me that these apparent wordings were not problematic for them, due to their lack of any textual or rational impediment against carrying them out. Why would they consign the meaning?

The mutakallim: Then you are saying that they affirmed them as limbs and members and …

I said, this is due to your bad opinion and bad understanding. When the attribute is added to the Creator, the language and the texts of revelation require us to strip it of what is attached to it when it is added to the created. We have not left the apparent wording by that, because the apparent wording with us is only known by the context. Your statement, the hearing of Zayd, is not like your statement, the hearing of Allah. The annexation qualifies and restricts. As for hearing when it is bare, whoever denies metaphor will say to you, it is ambiguous when it is bare, and it must be placed in its contexts so that its meaning is known. Whoever affirms metaphor says to you, you must interpret it when it is bare, not by what suits its annexation to the created. The lexicons, especially the later ones, explain it by what they have become used to from created beings, and they do not pay attention to explaining it when it is bare. If you intended by apparent wording what is in these lexicons, none of the two sides would be holding to the apparent wording, even in hearing and sight and will and life. Nothing that is attributed to Allah would then be upon its apparent wording.

You are originally proceeding from a misunderstanding of the apparent wording, and you build on it these fallacies.

The mutakallim: It matters to me here that you do not say that we ascribe disbelief and lying to the apparent wording of revelation.

I said, this follows for you, as has been plainly stated by those who stated it, whether you wish or refuse.

The mutakallim: I concede that this is disbelief, but it is warded off by decisive proofs. Allah did not leave His revelation appearing to be disbelief except to test by the mutashabih.

I said, we have shown that there are no decisive proofs that prevent carrying out the true apparent wordings. Perhaps they prevent carrying out what you think is the apparent wording which is specific to the created, and you thought it was the indication of what is attributed to Allah. The author will later debate you in the matter of the mutashabih.

The mutakallim: Where is the ascription of lying to the Creator? How do you accuse us of such a thing?

I said, find a description more fitting than this for what you say. You claim that Allah sent down a revelation, and holding to its apparent wording is of the foundations of disbelief, and that it is not possible to hold to its apparent wordings until they are presented to rational decisives. These rational decisives it is impossible that a single Arab among those addressed by revelation knew them. Then He describes His revelation as guidance, clarity, truth, and wisdom. Revelation described a small number of words used by Ibrahim as lies, and they are far below this by many degrees. What thing is then described as lying, if not this which you allege falsely in revelation?

The mutakallim: I allege that the early centuries knew these decisives.

I said, this is false and sheer stubbornness. Even in our day, you find most theologians are imitators. They do not reach these decisives by their mere intellects and independent reasoning. We can assert a fortiori that the majority of Muslims, elite and common folk, did not know these decisives. How can it be thought that the early centuries knew them, while they were not imitating anyone and they did not know anything of these fine theoretical proofs? Especially since affirming these apparent wordings was with them originally before revelation was sent down. They were at ease with ascribing these matters to Allah. Revelation did not come with what removes this tranquillity. Rather it confirmed it, but it purified them from what they had added to it of comparison.

The mutakallim: Calling what you affirm attributes in the first place is misleading. They are not attributes, rather they are parts.

I said, who are you to strip the label attribute and put it on what you wish and remove it from what you wish, after centuries have passed over the Ummah while they called them attributes without anyone objecting with such a thing? Do you think that you have discovered something new? They are attributes even in the created who is composed of parts. How then are they not attributes for the Creator who is transcendent, Glorified is He. Your private terminologies have no value here.

The mutakallim: Attribute is said in the derivatives such as so and so is all-hearing or all-seeing.

I said, this is the special restriction of the grammarians. On this, even what you affirm of attributes is not so, for hearing and sight and life are jamid nouns and not derived. If you were asked about the attributes of a certain being you would say, he is all-hearing and all-seeing, and you would not say, he is hearing and sight.

The mutakallim: My intent is that the attribute is applied to that from which these names are derived.

I said, this is sheer arbitrariness then. Imagine if the language had come with derivation of names from the attributes about which you dispute us. Would your view about negating them then change?

Intisar al-Tadmuriyyah by Maher Ameer Pages 964-974