The Two Hands and the Fingers of Allah

The Creed of the Prophet ﷺ, Part 1: The Hands and the Fingers

Ibn Mājah, al-Sunan, al-Muqaddimah

Ibn Mājah said in al-Sunan, al-Muqaddimah:

Muslim, al-Ṣaḥīḥ

Muslim reported in his Ṣaḥīḥ:

Al-Bukhārī, al-Ṣaḥīḥ

Al-Bukhārī reported in his Ṣaḥīḥ:

Al-Bukhārī, al-Ṣaḥīḥ

Al-Bukhārī reported in his Ṣaḥīḥ:

Muslim, al-Ṣaḥīḥ

Muslim reported in his Ṣaḥīḥ:

Al-Bukhārī, al-Ṣaḥīḥ

Al-Bukhārī reported in his Ṣaḥīḥ:

Al-Tirmidhī, al-Jāmiʿ

Al-Tirmidhī said in al-Jāmiʿ:

Al-Bukhārī, al-Ṣaḥīḥ

Al-Bukhārī reported in his Ṣaḥīḥ:

The summary itself is accurate and fully sourced now: two hands (Bukhārī 7411, 'His other hand'); the right hand folding the heavens (4812); grasping (Ibn Mājah 198 / Muslim 2788); writing the Torah (6614 / Muslim 2652); creating Ādam (Tirmidhī 2134); fingers (Bukhārī 4811; Muslim 2654); the full hand (7411); the Prophet's gesture (Muslim 2788, Ibn Mājah 198).

What Is the Meaning of the Hand of Allah? Answering the Ashʿarī Argument

Qurʾān

Allah, the Exalted, said:

Al-Bukhārī reported in his Ṣaḥīḥ from Anas:

State the objection in its strongest form before answering it. The Ashʿarī argument is: (1) a hand, in the language, is a bodily member (jāriḥah); (2) bodily members are impossible for Allah; therefore (3) one who 'affirms the apparent meaning' while denying members either affirms members or affirms only a word. The essay's answer, in substance, is that premise (1) generalises from created hands. A word's core meaning (here: that by which one grasps, takes, holds and creates) is shared, while the reality and modality of each instance follow the one it is attributed to. Ibn Taymiyyah sets this out in al-Risālah al-Tadmuriyyah (al-aṣl al-awwal and the mithāl of the soul) and in al-Risālah al-Madaniyyah; cite those pages when the compilation is done.

Ibn Taymiyyah, Majmūʿ al-Fatāwā

Ibn Taymiyyah said in Majmūʿ al-Fatāwā:

Al-Dhahabī said in Siyar Aʿlām al-Nubalāʾ:

Ibn Taymiyyah said in Bayān Talbīs al-Jahmiyyah:

The distinction itself (ẓāhir as understood by a mushabbih vs. ẓāhir befitting Allah) is standard in Ibn Taymiyyah (e.g. al-Tadmuriyyah, al-qāʿidah al-thālithah).

Al-Ṭabarī, Jāmiʿ al-Bayān (Ed. al-Turkī)

Al-Ṭabarī said in Jāmiʿ al-Bayān:

The argument from 43:3 is stronger with al-Ṭabarī's full sentence. He contrasts the Arabic Qurʾān with 'foreign speech whose meanings we do not comprehend', so a revelation whose attribute-verses have no understood meaning would be in the position al-Ṭabarī says the Arabic Qurʾān is not in. Add Q 38:29 (li-yaddabbarū āyātih) and Mujāhid's 'I went through the Muṣḥaf with Ibn ʿAbbās three times, stopping at every verse and asking him about it' (Tafsīr al-Ṭabarī, introduction) as further evidence.

(1) 'They do not believe Allah is a real thing somewhere. Instead He is absolutely nowhere' misstates the Ashʿarī position. They affirm that Allah exists (mawjūd) and is not in a place or direction (lā fī makān wa-lā fī jiha). The fair statement is: 'they deny that He is in a direction, above the world, distinct from it', which is precisely what the Atharīs dispute. The Atharī rejoinder (Ibn Taymiyyah, Bayān Talbīs) is that an existent that is neither inside the world nor outside it, neither connected nor separate, cannot be distinguished from the non-existent. Cite that, rather than attribute 'He is nowhere' to them. (2) 'concrete thing' needs care: what the essay means is that the hand is an attribute of the essence (ṣifah dhātiyyah khabariyyah), not an attribute of meaning (ṣifah maʿnawiyyah) like hearing and seeing. Use that established terminology.

Al-Bukhārī, al-Ṣaḥīḥ

Al-Bukhārī reported in his Ṣaḥīḥ from Ibn Masʿūd:

Muslim reported in his Ṣaḥīḥ:

Ibn ʿAsākir, Tārīkh Dimashq

Ibn ʿAsākir reported in Tārīkh Dimashq:

Tafsīr Isḥāq al-Bustī reported in p.:

Al-Khallāl reported in al-Sunnah:

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad reported in Kitāb al-Sunnah:

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad reported in al-Sunnah:

Precision and fairness, since this is the most contested claim in the essay. (a) Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah's own transmission in ʿAbd Allāh's al-Sunnah (no. 1162, Ḥumayd al-Aʿraj ← Mujāhid ← ʿUbayd) ends: 'until he reaches a place Allah knows best'; no. 1085 (Abū Maʿmar ← Sufyān, same chain) reads 'draw near, draw near, to a place Allah knows best'. The words 'until he places his hand in His hand' come in no. 1163 through al-Aqraʿ, who reports that Sufyān added it. So 'Sufyān added, with a chain of reliable men' should read: 'al-Aqraʿ reported that Sufyān added…; the editor of al-Sunnah says of no. 1163: its men are reliable (rijāluhu thiqāt)'. (b) The 'touch' wording ('ḥattā yamassa baʿḍahu') is via Manṣūr ← Mujāhid. Al-Khallāl's editor (al-Zahrānī) grades its chain ṣaḥīḥ but says it cannot override the tanzīh texts . (c) The report is a tābiʿī's tafsīr, not marfūʿ. (d) The author's 'I also affirm touch' is the author's own position, and he notes that some Atharīs suspend judgement (tawaqquf).

Numbering checked on the page: al-Bukhārī 6661 (Sulṭāniyyah 8/134) — Anas: 'Hell keeps saying: Are there more? until the Lord of Might places His foot in it' — correct.

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad, al-Sunnah

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad reported in al-Sunnah:

Al-Ḥākim, al-Mustadrak

Al-Ḥākim reported in al-Mustadrak:

(1) 'Left Hand (Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim 2788)': the word bi-shimālihi in Muslim 2788 is in ʿUmar ibn Ḥamzah's narration from Sālim. Al-Bayhaqī (al-Asmāʾ wa-l-Ṣifāt) judged this word a solitary addition (tafarrud) of ʿUmar ibn Ḥamzah, and several Atharīs held both hands to be 'right' following Muslim 1827 ('wa-kiltā yadayhi yamīn'). Others accepted 'shimāl' (e.g. Abū Yaʿlā). Present the disagreement, not the word alone.

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad, al-Sunnah

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad reported in al-Sunnah:

Ibn ʿAbbās's report is the textual basis for the essay's 'His attributes have positions'. It is mawqūf, with a chain graded ṣaḥīḥ by al-Ḥākim and al-Dhahabī . Present it with both routes (Wakīʿ and Abū ʿĀṣim from Sufyān) and note the alternative report from Ibn ʿAbbās ('kursiyyuhu ʿilmuh', via Jaʿfar ibn Abī al-Mughīrah in al-Ṭabarī), which al-Ṭabarī preferred and which Atharī critics answer on grounds of its chain. That makes the case complete rather than one-sided.

Ibn Taymiyyah, Bayān Talbīs al-Jahmiyyah

Ibn Taymiyyah said in Bayān Talbīs al-Jahmiyyah:

The Ibn Taymiyyah quotation is given without a reference. Also define 'part' (juzʾ / baʿḍ) as the essay does: separable and joinable. Then note that the early texts use baʿḍ without implying separability, which is the essay's own point.

ʿUbayd ibn ʿUmayr and Ḥakīm ibn Jābir on the Hand, against al-Ghazālī and al-Bayhaqī

Al-Mizzī, Tahdhīb al-Kamāl

Al-Mizzī said in Tahdhīb al-Kamāl:

'Learnt and narrated from' needs sources, Companion by Companion. The biographical works (al-Mizzī, Tahdhīb al-Kamāl, s.v. ʿUbayd ibn ʿUmayr ibn Qatādah al-Laythī; Ibn Ḥajar, Tahdhīb al-Tahdhīb) list his narrations from ʿUmar, ʿAlī, Abū Dharr, ʿĀʾishah, Umm Salama, Ibn ʿUmar, Ibn ʿAbbās, Abū Mūsā and others. Cite them and note any narration whose hearing (samāʿ) the critics questioned. You chose!' is rhetoric.

Al-Ghazālī, al-Iqtiṣād fī al-Iʿtiqād

Al-Ghazālī said in al-Iqtiṣād fī al-Iʿtiqād:

Ibn ʿAsākir, Tārīkh Dimashq

Ibn ʿAsākir reported in Tārīkh Dimashq:

Tafsīr Isḥāq al-Bustī reported in p.:

Al-Khallāl reported in al-Sunnah:

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad reported in Kitāb al-Sunnah:

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad, al-Sunnah

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad reported in al-Sunnah:

Al-Bayhaqī, al-Asmāʾ wa-l-Ṣifāt

Al-Bayhaqī said in al-Asmāʾ wa-l-Ṣifāt:

Ibn Abī Shayba, al-Muṣannaf, Ed. al-Ḥūt

Ibn Abī Shayba reported in al-Muṣannaf, ed. al-Ḥūt:

Al-Dhahabī said in Kitāb al-Arbaʿīn fī Ṣifāt Rabb al-ʿĀlamīn:

Two corrections. (1) The chain Ibn Abī Shayba ← ʿAbd Allāh ibn Numayr ← Ismāʿīl ibn Abī Khālid ← Ḥakīm ibn Jābir is sound to Ḥakīm; al-Dhahabī says 'ṣaḥḥah ʿan' (Arbaʿīn no. 77). But in al-Dhahabī's wording Ḥakīm says 'ukhbirtu' ('I was informed that your Lord…'), i.e. he names no source. Ibn Abī Shayba's wording gives it as Ḥakīm's own statement. It is therefore a maqṭūʿ report of a Tābiʿī about the unseen, from an unnamed informant in one version; the content may well come from the People of the Book. State this precisely. Its value is as evidence of what an early Tābiʿī accepted, not as a ḥadīth.

Attribute it as 'al-Bayhaqī, relaying some of the ahl al-naẓar' .

The Hands of Allah: Ibn Qutaybah and the Report of Aḥmad's Gesture

Ibn Qutaybah, al-Ikhtilāf fī al-Lafẓ wa-l-Radd ʿalā al-Jahmiyyah

Ibn Qutaybah said in al-Ikhtilāf fī al-Lafẓ wa-l-Radd ʿalā al-Jahmiyyah:

Ibn Qutaybah (d. 276) is a strong witness because he grants that 'yad' can mean favour or power in some contexts, then argues from Ṣād 75 ('with My two hands'), the dual, and Ādam's distinction over Iblīs that here it can only be the hand itself. That is the same argument al-Bayhaqī's source uses against favour/power . The difference is that Ibn Qutaybah stops at 'we do not say how', while the later Ashʿarīs add 'not by contact'.

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad, al-Sunnah

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad reported in al-Sunnah:

The editor's footnote reproduces Ibn Ḥajar said in Fatḥ al-Bārī:

'Chain to Imam Aḥmad: authentic': ʿAbd Allāh reports what he saw his father do, so the chain to Aḥmad is ʿAbd Allāh himself. The report describes Yaḥyā al-Qaṭṭān gesturing, and Aḥmad demonstrating Yaḥyā's gesture. Aḥmad's own gesturing is in al-Khallāl via al-Marrūdhī, known through Fatḥ al-Bārī 13/397 .

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad, al-Sunnah

ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad reported in al-Sunnah:

Ibn Ḥajar, Fatḥ al-Bārī

Ibn Ḥajar said in Fatḥ al-Bārī: