Muʿjam al-Aḥādīth al-Muʿtabara · Hadith 2

The Book of Divine Unity · Negation of any Possibility of Seeing or Imagining God · Volume 1, book 4, chapter 3, Hadith 2

Original Arabic text

[231/2] الكافي: وعنه، عن أحمد بن إسحاق قال: كتبت إلى أبي الحسن الثالث عليه السلام أسأله عن الرؤية وما اختلف فيه الناس فكتب: لا تجوز الرؤية ما لم يكن بين الرائي والمرئي هواء ينفذه البصر فإذا انقطع الهواء عن الرائي والمرئي لم تصح الرؤية، وكان في ذلك الاشتباه، لان الرائي متى ساوى المرئي في السبب الموجب بينهما في الرؤية وجب الاشتباه وكان ذلك التشبيه لان الاسباب لابد من اتصالها بالمسببات

Published English translation

2. [2/231] al-Kafi: From him (Ahmad b. Idris) from Ahmad b. Ishaq who said: I wrote to Abi al-Hasan the Third عليه السلام asking him about the vision (of God) and the differences of people about that - he wrote: Vision is impossible when there is no air between the viewer and the viewed. Air which the eye can penetrate through. If there is no air between the viewer and the viewed - vision cannot take place. And this (needing air in between) would entail likening (Allah to His creatures). Because whenever the viewer becomes equivalent with the viewed in terms of sharing the condition necessary for vision between them (to occur) then they would necessarily be alike (in some manner) and that would be anthropomorphism. For causes are necessarily linked to effects.

Narrator and transmission

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Attributed scholarly assessments

Shaykh Asif al-Mohseni: معتبر

Muʿjam al-Aḥādīth al-Muʿtabara

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translator: Ammaar Muslim
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