All praise is due to Allaah, and may the prayers and salutations be upon His Messenger, to proceed:

In an earlier article we paid a visit to the Jahmite Ash'ari Faculty of Metaphysics where we met this guy on the left, he is Abu Nicomachus Aristotle (d. 322BC), the well-known Greek Philosopher. This was during our quest to find out why according to some people, believing what is clearly manifest in the revealed texts that Allaah is above the Throne, with His Essence, necessitates that He is a created body (jism). We were fortunate enough to catch Abu Nicomachus explaining, from his book called "Physics", that the definition of "makaan (place)" is:

...the boundary of the containing body at which it is in contact with the contained body...

And we learned from the Greek Ustaadh that "makaan (place)" necessitates Jismiyyah (something being a body), meaning that if something is said to be in a "place (makan)" then it must be a body, by necessity. And we should point out here that the Mutakallimoon (who are the opponents of the Philosophers) have a different definition of "makaan (place)" and consider it to be:

...the conceptual or imagined empty space (void) that is occupied by the body ...

However, this difference between the Philosophers and the Mutakallimoon in the definition - [i.e. whether it is the surrounding boundary of an object, or the occupied conceptual volume of the object itself] - matters little, because whatever the definition, to all of them makaan (place) necessitates Jismiyyah (something being a body) - so we have the same end result, and it is this notion that is the basis of the rejection of the Jahmite Ash'aris that there is a Lord above the Throne.

And we also explained in other articles the origin of the deen of the Jahmites, the debates of Jahm bin Safwan with the Indian Materialist Philosophers, and that as a result of that, Jahm concocted a belief in which he claimed Allaah is in every place and in every thing, without Him being perceived with the senses, and without Him being subject to any description whatsoever. And the saying, "He is neither within the universe, nor outside of it, neither above it, nor below it, neither touching it, nor separate from it..." was an extension of it.

The Creed of the Early Ash'aris Regarding Allaah's uluww "Bi Dhaatihi" (Allaah Being Above the Creation With His Essence)

And we have also covered the creed of the Early Ash'aris and their affirmation of a Lord and Deity, that exists, With His Essence, above His creation, above His Throne, and that the Early Ash'aris, under the influence of Ilm ul-Kalaam added to this affirmation certain terms and phrases such as "without confinement" and "without contact" and the likes and this being an admission on their behalf that Allaah is above the Throne without that necessitating that He is a body (jism) like the created bodies (ajsaam) and without Him being in a "place" like the created places - so they affirmed His aboveness with His Essence, but negated from Him all the necessities of created bodies - and this is in opposition to the Jahmiyyah who negated aboveness in its entirety, and in opposition to the Karraamiyyah who affirmed Allaah is above the Throne and is a body (jism), though they stated "not like the created bodies (ajsaam)". And in this, the Early Ash'aris, having adopted the creed of Ibn Kullaab were in agreement with the creed of the Salaf, except in their addition of the phrase "...and is not a body (jism)", since it is not from the way of the Salaf to introduce generalized ambiguous words not affirmed or denied for Allaah in the texts.

And we quoted the saying of Ibn al-Qayyim (rahimahullaah) in "as-Sawaa'iq al-Mursalah" (Mukhtasar, tahqeeq of al-Mawsilee, pp.504-507):

The translation of which is:

Chapter:

The most informed of people (meaning Abu Walid Ibn Rushd, d. 595H) regarding the sayings of the Philosophers has quoted the agreement of the Hukumaa (knowledgeable people of all nations) that Allaah, and His Angels are above (fis-samaa, elevated), just as all the [revealed] legislations are united upon that. And he has corroborated that through a rational method that is of the type of the corroboration of Ibn Kullaab, al-Haarith al-Muhaasibee, Abu al-Abbas al-Qalanisi, Abu al-Hasan al-Ash'ari, al-Qadi Abu Bakr al-Baqillani and Abu al-Hasan az-Zaghuni, and others besides them who say that "Allaah is above the Throne and is not a body (jism)". They said: Affirmation of the attribute of al-uluww (elevation) and fawqiyyah (aboveness) for Him, the Sublime, does not necessitate Jismiyyah (being a body), and nor affirmation of place (makaan).

And we quoted also the saying of al-Qurtubi regarding the issue of al-istiwaa, from his book "al-Asnaa Fee Sharh Asmaa Allaah il-Husnaa", (2/123):

And here is the translation of this statement:

And the sixth: The saying of at-Tabaree, Ibn Abee Zayd, al-Qaadee Abdul-Wahhaab and a group (jamaa'ah) of shuyook (scholars) of hadeeth and fiqh (jurisprudence) and it is apparent (from) some of the books of the qaadee, Abu Bakr [al-Baqillani] - may Allaah be pleased with Him, and [also] Abul-Hasan [al-Ash'ari]. And al-Qaadee Abd ul-Wahhaab quoted this from him, I mean from al-Qaadee Abu Bakr, textually - which is that He, the Sublime, ascends over His Throne with His Essence (bi dhaatihi) - and in some places they applied (the words) "above His Throne (fawqa arshihi)".

The Imaam, Abu Bakr (Muhammad bin al-Hasan al-Hadramee al-Qayrawaanee) said: "And that which I say is [what is] correct [i.e. Allaah being above the Throne, making istiwaa with His Essence], without confinement, nor fixing in a place, nor being inside of it, and without touching".

I [al-Qurtubi] say: This is the saying of al-Qaadee Abu Bakr [al-Baqillani] in the book of his "Tamheed ul-Awaa'il". And we have mentioned it. And this has also been said by the teacher, Abu Bakr bin Fawrak in "Sharh Awaa'il il-Adillah", and it is the saying of Ibn Abdul-Barr, and at-Talamankee and others from amongst the Andulusians, and [also] al-Khattaabi in the book "Shi'aar ud-Deen", and that has already preceded.

So the Early Ash'aris mentioned here, al-Ash'ari himself, al-Baqillani, and al-Fawrak (and others mentioned below) affirmed Allaah is above the Throne, with His Essence, without that necessitating that He is a body (jism) and the Later Ash'aris, from al-Juwaynee (d. 478H) onwards, they reverted back to the deen of the Jahmites in this regard, and so their saying became, "He is not within the universe, nor outside of it..." and so on and others invented the saying that Allaah's aboveness is aboveness of status and power exclusive of aboveness of the essence (dhaat), and then this became the saying of the Later Ash'aris - becoming synonymous with the deen of the Jahmites.

As for the creed of the Early Ash'aris, that Allaah is above His creation, above the Throne, with His Essence, then you can refer to that in these articles, along with the saying of Ibn Kullaab who preceded them in this:

So when this was clarified there was nothing but stubborn denial and that is perfectly understandable because it is clear that most Ash'aris have been defrauded by their teachers and mentors, who have not told them what the leading Imaams of the Ash'aris were upon - those who are said to be the founders - in relation to Allaah's uluww and His sifaat Dhaatiyyah, such as Face, Hands and Eyes. They affirmed these attributes without ta'weel, whilst negating takyeef and tamtheel, and in fact they refuted the very same ta'weels that were adopted by the Later Ash'aris from the Jahmiyyah and Mu'tazilah.

So with this little background it is appropriate now to move on to the subject of our article - which is the ridiculous claim of a depraved and wanton Jahmite, posing as a highly-charged 21st century Kalaam atomist, fraudulently ascribing himself to Abu al-Hasan al-Ash'ari, when al-Ash'ari is free of him and his likes.

Jahmee Baleed Naruiji: The Early Ash'aris and the 'Wahhabis'

In a previous article we advised the Philadelphian Jahmites that if you want to be taken seriously in discussion, then you don't make claims such as "Muhammad Abduh (the Egyptian, d. 1905CE) founded Salafiyyah" when the facts are that Muhammad Abduh held Ash'arite positions in his creed, and was far removed from Salafiyyah. We advised those Philadelphian Jahmites that by indulging in such antics, you only give the people the impression, from the outset, that you work full time in a circus as a clown and do history and creed in between the breaks.

And this advice is going to be repeated here today, to our Jahmee Baleed, who is fraudulently passing off as a follower of the creed of Abu al-Hasan al-Ash'ari.

So lets look at one of his claims:

And regarding this we say:

This saying that he has quoted from somebody, then it is correct and and it summarizes the position of the Salaf, save that it is not necessary to negate that one speaks with "jism (body)" - since what is manifest and clear from the Book and the Sunnah is that Allaah is above the Throne, with His Essence, and that is the truth, and truth does not have any false necessities that need to be denied, except in the minds of "Aristotelian Metaphysicists" who have claimed that the metaphysical classifications of jawhar (substance), 'arad (incidental attribute), jism (body), makaan (place), jihah (direction), tahayyuz (space-occupation) for what is created can also be applied to the uncreated (the Creator) to determine what can and cannot be said about Him - and that this knowledge is qat'ee (decisive and definitive) over the texts of the Book and the Sunnah which amount only to presumed knowledge and mere ambiguities.

And regarding the verbal expression of negating "jism (body)" it is not from the way of the Salaf to affirm or negate generalized terms that are not reported in the Book and the Sunnah for Allaah, and by which both truth and falsehood may be intended. This is because, once that door is opened, the criterion of truth is moved away from the platform of the Book and the Sunnah, to another platform that gives authority to the judgement of the intellect and ambiguous, generalized words and phrases. The way of the Salaf, which is the manifest truth, is to affirm for Allaah whatever He and His Messenger affirmed for Him, and to negate from Allaah whatever He and His Messenger negated for Him, and to adhere to the words used in the Sharee'ah, for Allaah is most-knowledgeable of Himself.

And those whom this Jahmee Baleed is intending to revile in this article of his, they are merely expressing the statement of the Salaf us-Saalih, then their saying is nothing other than:

Allaah is above the Throne [and as the need has arisen, to say in addition:] "with His Essence, separate and distinct from His creation" on account of the presence of and proliferation of the belief of Ittihaad and Hulool (Allaah entering or merging with the creation) in the Ummah.

So they do not depart from the sayings of the Salaf.

As for those who said, "Allaah is above the Throne and not a body (jism)", then they are none other than the Early Ash'aris, as has preceded. And they said this in response to the Karraamiyyah Mujassimah who said that "Allaah is above the Throne and is a body (jism)". And the Karraamiyyah were in turn responding to the Jahmites who said "Allaah is not above the Throne, rather He is in every place with His Essence". So the Karraamiyyah refuted innovation with innovation and the Early Ash'aris, following Abdullah bin Sa'eed Ibn Kullaab (d. 240H), also countered innovation with innovation. The Karraamiyyah said, "...is a body (jism)" and the Kullaabiyyah and early Ash'ariyyah said, "...is not a body (jism)", whilst agreeing that Allaah Himself, with His Essence, is above the Throne.

Coming to our point now, it is clear that the Jahmee Baleed has treated the saying that he has quoted as being a 'Wahhabi' saying, and if he was a genuine As'hari instead of the counterfeit and fraudulent one that he is, he would have known, that this is actually the saying of the Early Ash'aris without dispute.

And just like our Philadelphian Jahmites sought to use the name of Muhammad Abduh - the Egyptian (d. 1905) who was a heretic, who held Ash'arite positions in creed, and who harbored the intricacies of Shi'ite Mysticism which he learned from his master Jamal ud-Din al-Afghani - they sought to use his name in order to malign and defame the da'wah of the Salaf. And this is generally the way that these Jahmites argue for the veracity of their deen, because their deen cannot stand on its own merit - as explicitly and textually admitted by two of their greatest Imaams, al-Ghazali (d. 505H) and ar-Razi (d. 606H) see here.

And following in their footsteps, the Jahmee Baleed Naruiji, has tried to use the viewpoint of the Early Ash'aris, that "Allaah is above the Throne (with His Essence) and is not a body (jism)" in order to malign the so-called 'Wahhabis' - and you don't know whether to laugh or to cry at this clown, and you scratch your head and think how can people take these clowns seriously, when this is the level of their knowledge and these are the antics they make an open display of? But what does throw you into dismay though, is the fact that there are mountains upon mountains of Muslims whose minds have been corrupted by the likes of these clowns - may Allaah guide them and save them from the clutches of these people.

Thanks Abu Nicomachus, You The Man!

The Jahmee, arguing in favour of the deen of the Jahmites that there is no deity above the heaven, stated, in the same article:

Through this, the Jahmee Baleed has revealed the true source of his teaching and the true source of his philosophy and theological speculation. It is none other than al-Ustaadh, Abu Nicomachus Aristotle bin Nicomachus (d. 322BC) who is the same one who corrupted the deen of the Sabeans and who turned a fair portion of them into star-worshippers - and this is the subject of another article. But this speech of the Jahmee Baleed, we want you to compare it with the saying of Aristotle that we covered in this article, and we can repeat it here. Read the above saying of the Jahmee Baleed three times for good measure, then read what is quoted below, in order to understand the true degree of tail-endishness we are dealing with here:

Al-Ustaadh Abu Nicomachus Aristotle Bin Nicomachus al-Masedonee (d. 322BC) explains in his work titled Physics, Book 4, Part 4, what is said to be "place" (makaan), providing what he deems to be the correct conceptualization and definition of it:

What then after all is place [makaan]? The answer to this question may be elucidated as follows.

Let us take for granted about it the various characteristics which are supposed correctly to belong to it essentially. We assume then-

(1) Place [makaan] is what contains that of which it is the place [makaan]. (2) Place [makaan] is no part of the thing. (3) The immediate place [makaan] of a thing is neither less nor greater than the thing.

(4) Place [makaan] can be left behind by the thing and is separable. In addition:

(5) All place [makaan] admits of the distinction of up and down, and each of the bodies [ajsaam] is naturally carried to its appropriate place [makaan] and rests there, and this makes the place [makaan] either up or down.

Having laid these foundations, we must complete the theory. We ought to try to make our investigation such as will render an account of place [makaan], and will not only solve the difficulties connected with it, but will also show that the attributes supposed to belong to it do really belong to it, and further will make clear the cause of the trouble and of the difficulties about it. Such is the most satisfactory kind of exposition...

... We say that a thing is in the world, in the sense of in place, because it is in the air, and the air is in the world; and when we say it is in the air, we do not mean it is in every part of the air, but that it is in the air because of the outer surface of the air which surrounds it; for if all the air were its place, the place of a thing would not be equal to the thing-which it is supposed to be, and which the primary place in which a thing is actually is

When what surrounds, then, is not separate from the thing, but is in continuity with it, the thing is said to be in what surrounds it, not in the sense of in place, but as a part in a whole. But when the thing is separate and in contact, it is immediately 'in' the inner surface of the surrounding body, and this surface is neither a part of what is in it nor yet greater than its extension, but equal to it; for the extremities of things which touch are coincident...

... It will now be plain from these considerations what place [makaan] is. There are just four things of which place [makaan] must be one - the shape, or the matter, or some sort of extension between the bounding surfaces of the containing body [jism], or this boundary itself if it contains no extension over and above the bulk of the body [jism] which comes to be in it...

Well, then, if place is none of the three-neither the form nor the matter nor an extension which is always there, different from, and over and above, the extension of the thing which is displaced - place [makaan] necessarily is the one of the four which is left, namely, the boundary of the containing body at which it is in contact with the contained body...

...For this reason, too, place [makaan] is thought to be a kind of surface, and as it were a vessel, i.e. a container of the thing. Further, place [makaan] is coincident with the thing, for boundaries are coincident with the bounded...

Thus, according to al-Ustaadh Abu Nicomachus (d. 322BC), place [makaan] necessitates [jismiyyah] which is something being a body [jism]. Now although, Abu Nicomachus is speaking within the context of the Greek notions of the celestial spheres and their movements - because that is how they understood the universe - it does not affect his definition of place [makaan], since he makes it to be something that necessitates Jismiyyah, something being a body. Thus, something with "place" [makaan], is by definition a body [jism], since place is the boundary or the surrounding border of the body [jism] it contains.

While we should note here that this definition originates with the Philosophers and is not that which was laid down by the Mutakallimoon (the Jahmiyyah, Mu'tazilah, Kullaabiyyah, Ash'ariyyah, Maturidiyyah), for the Mutakallimoon say that "makaan (place)" is the imagined or conceptual volume of empty space (void) that is occupied by a body, whereas the Philosophers say it is the surrounding border or surface boundary that is defined as "place".

In any case, there is no difference between the saying of Abu Nicomachus and the saying of our Jahmee Baleed who has used this to reject the creed that is manifest in the Qur'aan which is that Allaah, with His Essence, is above His Throne, separate and distinct from His creation. And to this Jahmite, Abu Adam Naruiji, this creed is Tajseem and is kufr.

A More Detailed Analysis of This Aristotelian Metaphysical Creed Of The Jahmee Baleed Naruiji

It is befitting that we comment on the above words of the Jahmee to provide further elucidation of what is really going in in reality:

So regarding his saying:

If you say that Allaah is in a place/location over the Arsh...

From honesty, integrity, truthfulness and fear of Allaah is that when you quote the saying of the opponent, that you do it with precision and exactness. And your opponents, are in fact all of the Prophets and Messengers, all of the revealed Books, the Prophet (sallallaahu alayhi wasallam) and all his Companions, and the entirety of the early Salaf, as well as the leading Scholars of the Early Ash'aris in addition to many other other factions. So deceptively characterizing your opponents as 'Wahhabis' avails you nothing.

And their saying is that "Allaah is above the Arsh", and they never said, "Allaah is in a place/location over the Arsh" with the baatil (falsehood) that you intend to throw upon them. For you entered the phrase, "is in a place/location" into their saying, "Allaah is above the Throne" in order to deceive and confuse the gullible and ignorant. And the reason why you said this was to conceal what amounts to an explicit charge against the revealed texts that they speak with what amounts to manifest kufr.

And this is made clear by what you said next (emphasis ours):

It is not about the words you use. If you say that Allaah is in a place/location over the Arsh, then you are saying that He is a body...

The reality of your saying is:

If you speak with what the revealed texts speak with, that "Allaah Himself is above the Throne" - then upon our Metaphysics which we have derived from the Greek Philosophers, and through which we have classified the observable universe, and which we have made into the acceptable knowledge for speaking in the matters of divinity - in light of that, you are declaring Allaah to be a body which is kufr.

But the Jahmee can't keep a straight face and say that outright, and this is why he has to fabricate lies and enter into dhulm and kadhib (oppression and lying) against his opponents and to claim against them that they say, "Allaah is in a place/location over the Arsh", when they never said any such thing.

However, these Jahmites make it binding that anyone saying that "Allaah being above the creation" is really saying, "Allaah is confined by space".

The saying of the people of the truth is:

That the universe must have an outer limit where it comes to an end, otherwise it extends to infinity and this is Atheism. And what you understand to be "makan (place)" is whatever is within this created universe. And Allaah is outside of, or beyond this universe, and He exists beyond the boundaries of this universe with a true and real existence signified by a true and real essence (dhaat) that is described with true and real attributes, the meanings of which we know, but the realities of which we do not know. And as all created spaces (amkinah) have ended within the boundaries of the created universe, then there is nothing that confines Allaah, since there is no created "space (makaan)" beyond the creation. And if you persist in insisting that what is beyond the universe is a "makaan (space)" just like the "makaan (space)" that is within the created universe, then this means that you speak with pure Atheism and explicitly reject that Allaah exists outside of the human mind and outside of the creation with a true and real existence.

And thus, it is not permissible to fabricate lies upon your opponents by making tahreef (distortion) of their words and of their sayings, and changing them from "Allaah is above the Throne" into "Allaah is in a place/location over the Throne", when you mean by this a "place (makaan)" like the created places within the universe. This is outright kadhib (lying) and dishonesty. But if you want to say,

Your saying that "Allaah is over the Throne" necessitates - according to us - that He is in a place/location which is just like the created places and locations within the boundaries of the universe, and thus that would make him a body (jism), since we do not observe anything in the creation to be in a place (makaan) except that it is a body, and the same must be true of Allaah if it is said "He is over the Throne" or "He is above the heaven".

Then that is from justice and honesty and integrity, because it is an honest quotation of their words and their position, and an honest characterization of issue and thus our actual dispute is regarding whether affirming the manifest, clear apparent meaning found in the Book and the Sunnah of Allaah Himself being above His Throne, as agreed upon by the entirety of the Salaf and the Early Ash'aris and many other factions - whether that necessitates the false meaning that you are trying to claim, which is that Allaah is in a place like the created places and thus, is a body like the created bodies.

So that's our real dispute.

And further, you have your response in the sayings of the Early Ash'aris who said Allaah is above the Throne, with His Essence, without mumaassah (touch) or settlement in a place or confinement and the likes of these words - so they specifically rebutted and falsified your claimed necessity. Rather they spoke of Allaah being above the Throne, with His Essence, whilst negating all these things - and so their true and real position was to affirm Allaah being above the Throne, with His Essence, whilst making what they deem to be tanzeeh by negating from Him the necessities of created bodies - and they never ventured with their ilm-kalam into the depths that the later Jahmite Ash'aris ventured - who simply acquired the saying of the Mu'attil Jahmites, 'Allaah is neither within the universe nor outside of it, and nor in contact with it and nor separate from it', and made this to be their creed.

So this is our clear and straight up answer and it constitutes the shoving of your dirty, smelly, sock down your throat and the immediate silencing of your Greco-Jahmic overtures that are nothing but mere introductions to Atheism...

And this is the reality of these people, their own creed cannot be sustained and maintained on its own merits, because it leads to Atheism, and because not even one in a thousand people with sound fitrah (innate, instinctive disposition) would accept it (see al-Ghazali admitting this here), and thus they resort to these games and deceptions,and it is for no other reason than this that Shaykh ul-Islaam Ibn Taymiyyah exposed these people and called his work "Bayaan Talbees al-Jahmiyyah" (An Explanation of the Deception of the Jahmites) - because that is what the bulk of it is - fooling and playing with the terms and definitions of the Metaphysics they took from the Greek Philosophers.

Thus, by necessity they have to characterize the creed that is expressed in the Qur'an and the Sunnah as being intrinsic disbelief - because those whom they are desiring to attack, only speak of that belief through the verbatim expressions of those revealed texts. But they have to do it a manner where they can still pretend to the people that they honor the revealed texts, otherwise what they are calling to, which tends towards Atheism, will be readily apparent to all people. Thus deception is a necessity in their call and in their da'wah, their call and their da'wah cannot exist without it and you can see what amounts to a ready admission of this, and the promotion of what amounts to deception from two of the greatest Imaams of the Ash'arites, al-Ghazali (d. 505H) and ar-Razi (d. 606H) - go and read that here with scans from their actual books.

Then the Jahmee said:

...because being in a location necessitates borders for the thing in that place...

Meaning, that since we only observe and see in the created universe that anything in location must be a body, and since we have permitted for it to be understood that the acquisition of knowledge regarding Allaah too must be subject to the same (metaphysical) rules and classifications, then we have to deny what is in the revealed texts, because that would necessitate He is a body - and this would also invalidate our proof of "hudooth ul-ajsaam", which is demonstrating the createdness of the universe through the qualities (sifaat), a'raad (incidental attributes) and occurrences (hawaadith) in created bodies. So we cannot accept Allah being above His creation, above the Throne. And since we used this Metaphysics to devise a proof to argue for a creator against those atheist Philosophers, using their terminologies and classifications, then we must make any speech about Allah also subject to these same terminologies and classifications upon which we built our proof for the createdness of the universe in order to remain consistent and congruent. Otherwise those poor Philosophers will end up in the casualty department having their sides stitched back up due to extreme laughter, and thereafter they will pound us and make mockery of us, and smirk at our stupidity and the futility in our intellectual proof, which actually negates the very thing we were attempting to affirm.

And pound them they did! For the Philosophers came back and said: Hey you Mutakallimoon! Just like you guys made figurative explanation of the texts of the attributes then we make figurative explanation of both the texts of the Attributes and the texts of the creation and resurrection. So just like the attributes, to you guys, are only figurative and are to be explained away, then likewise the texts regarding the creation of the universe and the resurrection are only metaphors and made-up things that the Prophets spoke with in order to address primitive and gullible people, and thus, we make ta'weel of the texts that speak of creation and resurrection and this all aids and supports our view that the universe is eternal and that the resurrection is not a reality and that the Prophets only expressed the fabrications and inventions of their own minds through the use of metaphors - just like your figurative explanation of the texts of the Attributes supports your intellectual proof for the existence of a Creator.

Then the Jahmee elaborated upon the speech of Aristotle that we quoted earlier, when he said:

This is because something in a location is either in all locations, or in some location(s). If it is in some location, but not others, it must be confined by a border and have a size and shape limiting it to that location i.e. it must be a body.

And this is more or less what Aristotle said:

We say that a thing is in the world, in the sense of in place, because it is in the air, and the air is in the world; and when we say it is in the air, we do not mean it is in every part of the air, but that it is in the air because of the outer surface of the air which surrounds it; for if all the air were its place, the place of a thing would not be equal to the thing-which it is supposed to be, and which the primary place in which a thing is actually is...

But when the thing is separate and in contact, it is immediately 'in' the inner surface of the surrounding body, and this surface is neither a part of what is in it nor yet greater than its extension, but equal to it; for the extremities of things which touch are coincident...

...place [makaan] necessarily is ... the boundary of the containing body at which it is in contact with the contained body...

For this reason, too, place [makaan] is thought to be a kind of surface, and as it were a vessel, i.e. a container of the thing. Further, place [makaan] is coincident with the thing, for boundaries are coincident with the bounded.

And after outlining Aristotle's definition of "makaan (place)", the Jahmee continued:

...That is why it makes no sense to say that Allaah is in a place, but is not a body...

Note here that the Jahmee again played his trick which is that he said, "That is why it makes no sense to say that Allaah is in a place, but is not a body", he did not say what is expressed in the revealed texts and what his opponents say, which is "Allaah is above the Throne", or "Allaah is above the heaven", because if he was honest and truthful, he would have said:

That is why it makes no sense to say that Allaah is above the heaven, but is not a body

Or he would have said:

That is why it makes no sense to say that Allaah is above the Throne, but is not a body

And this is in reality what he wants to say, but he can't because his fraud would be manifest and all people of sound fitrah would recognize this as nothing but revilement upon the revealed texts, in which there occurs, "ar-Rahman ascended over the Throne", and "They fear their Lord, from above them", and "He is al-Qaahir, above His servants", and "He who is above the heaven", and "Rather, He (Allaah) raised him (Eesaa) up unto Himself" and so on.

And since he really means to say that Allaah being above His creation necessitates that He is a body, it would mean by default, that the Early Ash'aris were irrational, intellectually deficient, and spoke nonsense, because they held that "Allaah is above the Throne and is not a body", following in that, the creed of Ibn Kullaab, and this would mean that they practiced mere sophistry.

So you can see that these people have permitted deception and lying, and so they replace the true expressions and use their own "loaded" expressions when they want to address the people and deceive them.

Then the Jahmee said:

We do not care about the word body, as much as we care about its meaning. Or put in another way, we care about the word body, because of its meaning.

And regarding this, we say:

What Is Found In The Ash'arite Textbooks Regarding The Ruling on Those Applying The Term jism (Body) to Allaah

Here is what is said in the Ash'arite textbooks (and you can find a complete article on this subject here, with scans of the relevant textbooks):

From al-Eejee in his Kitaab al-Mawaqif (p. 17):

...So the Karraamiyyah, that is, some of them, said, "He is a jism (body), meaning, existent (mawjood)". And (another) people amongst them said, "He is a jism (body), meaning established by Himself (qaa'imun bi-nafsihi)". So there is no dispute with them upon [either] of these two explanations except in the naming, meaning in the application of the word "al-jism" to Him.

And from Sullam ul-Wusool (Commentary on Nihaayat us-Sool) of al-Mutee'i (3/124-125):

...As for the one who said, "He is a jism (body) but not like the [created] bodies", then he has negated [from Him] the necessities (lawaazim) of the [created] bodies, such that nothing remains from them [in relation to Allaah] except the mere naming [with al-jism]. So this, as our Shaykh has said, there is no angle for any differing in this, because nothing remains except merely naming Him with [the word] al-jism (body).

And from Sharh ul-Aqaa'id al-Adhudiyyah of al-Dawwaaniyy (p. 94):

...And in this manner does such a one negate from Him all of the special [qualities] of a [created] body (jism) until nothing remains except the mere label (ism) of a al-jism. And these [people] are not declared disbelievers, as opposed to those who are explicit in affirming Jismiyyah (i.e. a body like the created bodies).

So when we learn what is in the later Ash'arite textbooks and their position on those who explicitly say "Allaah is a body (jism)", and when we learn what the Early Ash'aris were upon, that they held "Allaah to be above the Throne, with His Essence, and is not a body (jism)" - then we come to realize the true nature of the fraud being perpetrated here by the likes of this Jahmee.

More Metaphysics

And the Jahmee also said:

Inshaa'Allaah commentary on this coming shortly.