the other with respect to that attribute alone. Understand and pay attention. Consider your being a sign pointing to Him, glory be to Him: have you described Him with any attribute of perfection except by drawing upon yourself? Take heed.
If you enter through the door of stripping away comparability, you deny of Him the imperfections that are possible for you, even though they have never subsisted in Him. But since the corporealist and the one who likens Him to creatures have attributed them to Him, you deny that attribution. Had this not been imagined, you would have undertaken none of this negation. Know this. Although “form” has many further avenues of interpretation here, we have refrained from mentioning them because our purpose in this book is to avoid undue length. “God speaks the truth, and He guides the way” [al-Ahzab 33:4].
(Interpreting) the Cubit
A report from the Prophet, God bless him and grant him peace, states that the unbeliever’s molar in the Fire is like Mount Uhud, and that the thickness of his skin is forty cubits by the cubit of the Compeller. This is an attribution of honor: a measure established by God Most High and attributed to Him. Likewise, you say, “This thing is so many cubits by the king’s cubit,” meaning the larger cubit established by the king. For example, the king’s forearm as a bodily member may be like other people’s forearms, while the cubit he has established as a measure exceeds the bodily—
