although it gathers all realities, has as its most particular states perplexity, worship, and transcendence. Transcendence—His elevation beyond being likened to His creation—leads to perplexity concerning Him, and so does worship.
He gave us the power of thought to consider what acquaints us with ourselves and with Him. The ruling of this power requires that there be no likeness between us and Him—glory be to Him, Most High—in any respect, except our reliance upon Him specifically for bringing our entities into existence. The utmost that transcendence imparts is the affirmation of relations—nisab, with a kasra on the nun—for Him through us, because of the necessities we require for our entities’ existence. These are what are named attributes.
If we say that these relations are matters added to His essence, that they are existent, and that He has no perfection except through them, then, were they absent, He would be intrinsically deficient, perfected by an existent addition. If we say, “They are neither He nor other than He,” this is contradictory speech and a statement without spirit, indicating its speaker’s deficient intellect and limited consideration more than it indicates His transcendence.
If you say, “They are not He, nor do they have existence: they are only relations, and relations are nonexistent matters,” we give nonexistence an effect within existence. The relations multiply because the rulings imparted by the entities of the possible things multiply.
