Mentioning the View of the Imâm of the Shâfi'îs of His Era Abu'l Abbâs bin Surayj Radiyallâhu AnhIn the answers of the questions directed to him in Makkah, Abu'l Qâsim Sa'd bin Alî bin Muhammad az-Zanjânî said,
"All praise is due to Allâh in the beginning, in the end, outwardly, inwardly, and in every circumstance. May Allâh's peace be upon Muhammad al-Mustafâ and upon the best and pure ones from his companions and family.
May Allâh support you with His success, you asked for the explanation of what is authentic according to me regarding the Madhhab of the Salaf and the righteous ones from amongst the latter scholars concerning the attributes that came in the Book and the Sunnah. I asked Allâh for proper guidance and replied to it with the answer of one of the jurist Imâms, who is Abu'l Abbâs bin Surayj Rahimahullâh.
When he was asked a similar question, he said:
I say, and success lies with Allâh: It is impermissible for the intellects to liken Allâh, for the suspicions to limit Him, for the thoughts to confidently affirm something regarding Him, for the hearts to delve deeply regarding Him, for the souls to ponder about Him, for the thoughts to encompass Him, and for the reasons to describe Him with other than what He described Himself in His Book or with the tongue of His Rasûl Sallallâhu Alayhi wa Sallam.
It is clear and authentic according to all of those who adhere to a religion, the Sunnah, and the Jamâ'ah, consisting of the past Salaf, the Sahâbah, and the Tâbi'în who are from the famous, rightly guided and guiding Imâms until our era that all of the verses that came from Allâh regarding His essence and His attributes and the true narrations that came from Rasûlullâh Sallallâhu Alayhi wa Sallam in regards to Allâh and His attributes authenticated by the people of transmission; it is compulsory upon the Muslim individual to believe in every single one of them as they have come and to submit its affair to Allâh as He commanded. This resembles the statement by Allâh Subhânahu,﴿هَلْ يَنْظُرُونَ إِلَّا أَنْ يَأْتِيَهُمُ اللَّهُ فِي ظُلَلٍ مِنَ الْغَمَامِ﴾
"Do they then wait for anything other than that Allâh should come to them in the shadows of the clouds?" (al-Baqarah, 2/210)
This also resembles the statement by Allâh Subhânahu,﴿وَجَاءَ رَبُّكَ وَالْمَلَكُ صَفًّا صَفًّا﴾
"And your Lord comes with the angels in rows." (al-Fajr, 89/22)
This also resembles the statement by Allâh Subhânahu,﴿الرَّحْمَنُ عَلَى الْعَرْشِ اسْتَوَى﴾
"Ar-Rahmân did Istiwâ above the Throne." (Tâ-Hâ, 20/5)
This also resembles the statement by Allâh Subhânahu,﴿وَالْأَرْضُ جَمِيعًا قَبْضَتُهُ يَوْمَ الْقِيَامَةِ وَالسَّمَاوَاتُ مَطْوِيَّاتٌ بِيَمِينِهِ﴾
"And on the Day of Resurrection, the whole earth will be grasped by His Hand, and the heavens will be rolled up in His Right Hand." (az-Zumar, 39/67)
Likewise are the attributes articulated by the Qur'ân. Such as being above, soul, two hands, hearing, seeing, speaking, eye, looking, willing, pleasure, anger, love, displeasure, providence, nearness, farness, wrath, answering212, being closer than two bows or even closer, good words raising to Him, the angels and Spirit rising to Him, the Qur'ân descending from Him, Him calling upon the prophets, Him speaking with the angels, His decreasing and increasing, His knowledge, His Oneness, His power, His will, His being self-sufficient, Him being peerless, His firstness, His lastness, His outwardness, His inwardness, His life, His permanency, His eternalness, His light, His appearance, face, and Him creating Âdam Alayh'is Salâm with His hand.
Again, like Allâh Subhânahu's statement,﴿أَأَمِنْتُمْ مَنْ فِي السَّمَاءِ﴾
"Do you feel secure from He, Who is in the heaven (Allâh)?" (al-Mulk, 67/16)
Him hearing from others and others hearing Him, and His other attributes mentioned in His revealed Book and all of His attributes mentioned by al-Mustafâ Sallallâhu Alayhi wa Sallam. Such as planting Jannat'ul Firdaws and the tree of Tûbâ with His Hand, writing the Tawrâh with His Hand, laughing, amazement, Him placing His foot, mentioning fingers, descending every night to the heaven of the world, His jealousy, Him being happy with the repentance of His slaves, that He is not one-eyed, that He turns away from what He dislikes and does not look at it, that both of His hands are right hands, the Hadîth of the two handfuls, that He looks such and such times at al-Lahw'ul Mahfûdh every day, that He will take three handfuls with His palm and enter them in Jannah on the Day of Judgement, and the Hadîth regarding the handful through which He will take a group who never did any good out of Hell-fire. Also like the Hadîth,«إِنَّ اللهَ خَلَقَ آدَمَ عَلَى صُورَتِهِ»
"Verily, Allâh created Âdam in His image."213
In another narration, it reads,«على صورة الرحمن»
"In the image of ar-Rahmân."214
Affirming His speech with letters and sound, His speech with the angels, Âdam, Mûsâ, Muhmmad, the martyrs, and the believers when they are being called to account and in Jannah, the revelation of the Qur'ân to the heaven of the earth, the Qur'ân being in the Masâhif (pl. of Mushaf). Also like (the Hadîth,)«مَا أَذِنَ اللَّهُ لِشَيْءٍ كأذنهِ لِنَبِيٍّ يَتَغَنَّى بِالْقُرْآنِ»
"Allâh has not listened to anything as He does to a prophet chanting the Qur'ân."215
The statements, actions, and spirits ascending to Him, the Hadîth of the Mi'râj of the Rasûl Sallallâhu Alayhi wa Sallam with his body and soul, and other than these which are allegorical reports authentically narrated from the Nabî Sallallâhu Alayhi wa Sallam that came regarding the attributes of Allâh Subhânahu which have reached us and which have not reached us that are authentic; our belief regarding them and the allegorical verses of the Qur'ân is as follows:
We accept them and do not reject them. We do not interpret them with the forceful interpretations of the opponents nor do we construe them according to the Tashbîh of the Mushabbihah. We do not increase them nor decrease them. We do not explain them nor do we make Takyîf of them. We do not mention them with the thoughts of the hearts. Rather, we generalize what Allâh generalized, and explain what the Nabî Sallallâhu Alayhi wa Sallam, his companions, the Tâbi'în, and the pleasing Imâms from the Salaf who were known for their religion and trustworthiness explained. We agree upon what they agreed and stay away from what they stood away from. We submit the narrations to their apparent meaning and the verses to their apparent meaning, and we do not believe in the forceful interpretations of the Mu'tazilah, Ash'ariyyah, Jahmiyyah, Mulhidah, Mujassimah, Mushabbihah, Karrâmiyyah, and Mukayyifah. Rather, we accept them without forceful interpretations, believe in them without Tamthîl, and say: Believing in them is obligatory, believing [in them] is the Sunnah, and seeking their interpretations is an innovation."
This is the end of the statements by Abu'l Abbâs bin Surayj narrated by Abu'l Qâsim az-Zanjânî in his answers.216
[Ibnu Surayj was the reference in regards to knowing the Madhhab. Such that he was preferred over all of the companions of ash-Shâfi'î including al-Muzanî.
Abû Ishâq the author of at-Tanbîh said, "I heard Abu'l Hasan ash-Shayrajî say: Verily, the index of the books of Abu'l Abbâs comprises of 400 books."217
He passed away in the year 306 H. May Allâh have mercy upon him.]
212- In the other copy, the phrase, "shyness" is found in place of "answering."
213- Muslim, Hadîth no. 2612.
214- Ibnu Abî Âsim, as-Sunnah, 1/228-229, Hadîth no. 517.
215- With similar wording in al-Bukhârî, Hadîth no. 5023-5024, 7482; Muslim, Hadîth no. 792.
216- With similar wording in Ibn'ul Qayyim, Ijtimâ'ul Juyûsh'il Islâmiyyah, Dâru Atâ'ât'il Ilm, p. 252-259.
217- Ibn'ut Tilimsânî, Sharh'ul Ma'âlim, 1/10.
