Wednesday, May 18, 2011

"Above His Arsh" The wahabi doctrine of flawed aboveness




Quote :
^Wahabi/Salafi
says:

Quote:
“How do you people explain away so many narrations that confirm He swt is above His Arsh?
Oh yeah! You then say we don’t know what they mean. Is it even remotely conceivable that Allah’s Messenger pbuh would introduce Allah to His creation and then not explain what the real meaning was and would leave it for people like YOU to explain to us what their ‘ REAL ‘ meaning was. This is a joke.”

^Reply:

We do believe in His aboveness, but in the sense of might or majesty, not direction. 

This is a very common usage of this sort of term, and it is not ambiguous if you know Allaah, or simply that one should always understand words ascribed to Allaah in the most befitting sense possible. 

No one is claiming that the words are unfit. However, some words have several meanings, some of which may be unfit.
That is why it is important to understand them correctly.

Why don’t you try to understand before you write or speak?

If someone knows that Allaah is not like creation, because He is not created, then he will have no problems with any of this.

The only way we can see that creation needs a creator is because we see that they have surfaces/limits/borders. There is nothing else that you can sense with your eyes.

If you say Allaah is in a direction, in the sense that He could be pointed out, then you will have no way to prove the creation’s need for a creator, because something that can be pointed at must have a limit.

You do not find that problematic? 

Listen, if you want to keep the rhetoric at the arrogant and argumentative level, where you try to attribute to us opinions we do not have, and you don’t make an honest effort to understand and address the arguments made, you will be moderated. No arguments here for the sake of arguing. There are plenty of forums for satisfaction of mean lusts.
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Al-Qurţubiyy states:
I say accordingly that Aļļaah’s aboveness and His highness refers to His highness of glory and attributes and greatness. That is, nothing is above Him when it comes to the meanings of greatness that are necessarily ascribed to Him, and there is nothing that shares His aboveness with Him. Rather He is the most High in the absolute sense, subĥaanah.1
(Tafsiir Al-Qurţubiyy, 7 / 220)

Note that because aboveness in location is relative, unlike the absolute aboveneness that Al-Qurţubiyy affirms, those who believe in it are bound to attribute flaw to Aļļaah.

In Al-Asnaa Al-Qurţubiyy says this explicitly:

It is said to them [the anthropomorphists who believe Aļļaah is in a place or direction, etc.]:

“If Allaah was specified by a specification, formed by a form, limited by a limit and end, existing in a specific direction, [or] changing by emergent [previously non existing] attributes in Himself, then He would have been emergent and specified by whatever He was specified with in terms of quantity and form, and [thus] requiring a specifier [for the quantity and form], and if He required a specifier, then He would have been in need and emergent. And if this is invalid, then it is true that He is without a limit or an end, and that He is Self-existent in the sense that He does not need a place to confine Him or a body to be in, or something to hold Him, or another that He gets help from. His attributes of His self do not change by His actions or leaving them. (Al-Asnaa, 2/21)

In short, Al-Qurţubiyy says that believing Allaah’s aboveness is one of direction/ location necessitates believing He has a flaw. This is because it necessitates likening Him to things that need a creator to specify it.

It also necessitates another flaw. 

This additional flaw is that they will either have to say that Aļļaah can create a body above Himself, and thereby become below, or that He cannot, and have thereby attributed to Him lack of power to create bodies anywhere He chooses.
They have also made Him, according to their belief, dependent on creating something below Himself, in order to achieve aboveness.

No wonder then, that Ibn Taymiyyah said Aļļaah must create something or another. 
According to him, the Creator would lose His aboveness if He did not! 
Such is the dilemma of the relative aboveness doctrine of wahabism.

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1تفسير القرطبي – (7 / 220): قلت: فعلوا الله تعالى وارتفاعه عبارة عن علو مجده وصفاته وملكوته. أي ليس فوقه فيما يجب له من معاني الجلال أحد، ولا معه من يكون العلو مشتركا بينه وبينه، لكنه العلي بالإطلاق سبحانه.
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References:
Al-Asnaa Fii Sħarĥi Asmaa’-illaahi-l-Ĥusnaa. Al-Qurţubiyy. 1995: Daar Aş-Şaĥaabah Li-t-Turaatħ.
Jaamiˆu Aĥkaami-l-Qur’aan. Al-Qurţubiyy (671 AH), Sħasuddiin. Ed. Aĥmad Al-Farduuniyy & Ibraahiim Aţfiisħ. Kairo, Egypt: Daar ˆaalam Al-Kutub Al-Mişriyyah, 1384.
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