created, but through an action done on the mind of the one addressed. So God says, “Afterwards He approached the Prophet and drew unto him; until He was at the distance of two bows’ length from him or yet nearer; and He revealed unto His servant that which He revealed.”[59] The speech from behind the veil is one which is performed through the medium of words. This is the real speech, and that is the one which God specially bestowed upon Moses, and so He has said, “And God spake unto Moses, discoursing with him.”[60] Now as to his words, “or by sending a messenger to reveal,” this is the third kind mentioned above, that is, through the medium of some angels. Sometimes God speaks to the learned men, who are the successors of the prophets, by disclosing arguments to them. On account of these causes it is true, when the learned men say, that the Quran is the speech of God. It has now become clear to you that the Quran, which is the speech of God, is eternal, but the words expressing it are created by him, and are not human. From it are excepted the Quranic words which we commonly use in our speech, that is, these words are our own actions, by the command of God, while the words of the Quran are those created by God. He who does not understand these things by this method, cannot understand this argument and cannot grasp as to how the Quran is the word of God. The alphabets used in the Quran are our own invention, by the command of God. We have to respect them, because of them are formed the words created by God, for the purpose which is not itself created. He who thought of words and not of meaning, that is, did not separate them, said that the Quran was created; while he who thought of the meaning which these words express, said the Quran was not created. But the truth lies in the middle of these two extreme views. The Asharites deny that the speaker is the maker of his own speech, for they think that if they admit it, they must also admit that God is the maker of His speech. Again, when they believe, that the speech can only exist with the speaker, they think, they must also believe, taking in view the two foregoing principles, that God is Himself the creator of His words. In this case He Himself becomes the place of created things. So they assert that God is the maker of speech, but it is an eternal attribute in him, like knowledge, etc. This is the time of the speech in our mind, but not of the speech which expresses what we have in our mind, that is, the words. As the Mutazilites thought that speech is the action of the speaker, they said that by speech is meant only the words uttered. So they believed that the Quran is “Created.” Since according to them the word is an action of the speaker, so it is not one of its conditions that it should exist with the speaker. The Asharites on the other hand, insist that it is one of its conditions that it should exist only with the speaker. This is true in both the cases, that is in the case of ideas in our