A dispute has taken place about what has been regarded as...

A dispute has taken place about what has been regarded as confirmative attributes, that is, whether they are among the self-confirmative attributes from which a Name is derived, or if they are confirmative through actions, such as speech and will, so much so that some of those counted as self-qualities in some methods are not among the qualities of the self at all, such as His being Truthful, but are qualities relevant to actions. You will come to know the difference between them.

Entitative and Operative Attributes Logicians have categorized His Attributes, Praised is He, into entitative and operative. The first suffices to describe the entity, if we suppose we can only describe the entity, such as might, life, knowledge, etc. The second depends on describing the Self, if we suppose all others are beyond the Self, i.e. they resulted from His actions, the most Praised one. Operative attributes are derived from the position of action.

In other words, the Self is described by these attributes when observed with the action, such as beings, sustenance and such actions that are superfluous on the self, due to being derived from the action. The meaning of “being derived” is that we notice the blessings people enjoy and attribute to Allah, Praise to Him, calling them “sustenance,” the sustenance that He, Praise to Him, provides, for He is the Sustainer.

Similarly are mercy and forgiveness, for they are attributed in the same way that we have explained. There is another definition for distinguishing the self’s attributes from those of the action. Everything that takes place to the self on a unison order (always positively) is one of the attributes of the self. What takes place on the self on both ways, the negative once and once the positive, is one of the attributes of actions.

In the light of this distinction, knowledge, might and life are not attributed to Him, Praised is He, except in one way which is the positive one. But creating, sustaining, forgiving and affording mercy are attributed to Him once positively and once negatively. You once say that He created this and not that, He forgave one who sought His forgiveness and did not forgive one who insisted on sinning, etc.

Briefly, one who has self-attributes cannot be characterized as having their antitheses, nor can he be free of them, whereas one who has operative attributes can be characterized as having their antitheses as well. Moreover, the operative attributes are existentialist considerations.