How do we respond to those who say that Allah is not in the earth and not in the sky?

The questioner : ... .

The Shaykh : ... It occurred to me while you were telling us about that doctor who claimed that he does not say that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) is in the sky, just as he does not say that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) is in the earth. I said about him that he does not say that Allah is in the earth because he believes in indwelling, but we did not understand from you why he does not say as Allah (Mighty and Majestic) said for the same reason, or for another reason, either one that you did not tell us about or one that we did not hear?

The questioner : He says that the verses that mentioned the height are only in the attributes and not in the essence. This is a detail.

The Shaykh : Do not deviate. I told you the verse. Why does he not say as Allah said ? What is the prohibition for him? We know the prohibition for him is that he does not say Allah is in the earth. He does not say this, and this is the truth without doubt, by transmission and by reason. But my question is: why does he not say as Allah said ? Why does he not say what Allah said? I mean, what is his perspective? What is his interpretation? Did you know it about him or not? I want to know the answer for the sake of being fair to the man, otherwise the word in my heart will not stop with this knowledge. So what is the answer?

The questioner : Our Shaykh, he mentioned in his book that even what ... .

The Shaykh : Please, do not deviate!

The questioner : Good. He is talking about this verse and what is similar to it that speaks about the height and speaks about the height!

The Shaykh : This verse does not speak about the height in its apparent meaning. What would its meaning be?

The questioner : He said it means ... He says about it, meaning exactly like this verse. I do not know!

The Shaykh : May Allah forgive you. We did not benefit from anything. The first time you told me, and the second time you told me about the verse ... .

The questioner : ... .

The Shaykh : My brother, you started the conversation about the verses, so you returned ... May Allah pardon what has passed. Look, our brothers, this verse is either interpreted according to its apparent meaning: As we learned from the scholars of language, it is a preposition of place. So either it remains as a preposition of place, or it is taken out of this meaning and interpreted to mean "upon." If it is interpreted to mean "upon," then the sky is not a preposition of place for Allah, just as the earth is not a preposition of place for Allah. If the problem with that doctor is that he stopped at the apparent meaning of the verse, this is a preposition of place in the Arabic language, then there is no difference for him between one who says Allah is in the earth or Allah is in the sky, because Allah is greater than all of that, and this is a fact. So how do we interpret the verse? The answer, based on its being a preposition of place, is that we say: if we keep it as a preposition of place, we interpret "the sky" to mean the absolute height, not the sky that is preceded by the definite article, which is the seven heavens. In that case, the problem falls from its root, because the problem is based on "in the sky," meaning this sky which is a creation of Allah like the earth. Just as He is not in the earth, He is not in the sky. When the problem is removed, they deny and say, "No, Allah is not in the sky." First, out of respect for the divine speech, it is not permissible to say this. But the obligation is to understand the Quranic verse correctly. So the first interpretation, based on keeping "in" in its place, is that we interpret "the sky" in the Arabic language to mean the absolute height. So if we say that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) is in the absolute height, it means He is not a created thing. The problem falls, and it is not equal to say that Allah is in the sky as it is to say the denied statement that Allah is in the earth. First, because we do not have in the Book or in the Sunnah that Allah is in the earth. This is first. It is not equal to say Allah is in the sky as to say Allah is in the earth, because this is not transmitted. Second, the meaning we interpreted earlier has no prohibition from it, just as the prohibition follows from saying Allah is in the earth. This is if we interpret "in" and make it in its place, then we have interpreted "the sky" to mean the absolute height. In that case, the other verses that establish the height for Allah (Mighty and Majestic) meet with this verse.
Or we can say that here "in" means "upon," and as they also say, as we learned from the scholars of knowledge, that prepositions can take the place of each other, especially in such a place. It is said that "Allah in the sky" means "upon." So here "in" is in the place of "upon." And this has many witnesses in the Book and the Sunnah. So the verse , . So "who is in the earth" does not mean the inside of the earth, but rather upon the earth. "May He have mercy on you, whoever is in the sky" does not mean whoever is in the inside of the created sky, but rather upon the sky. For this reason, you find the deniers of the divine attributes in the present age, and at their head is this fool, truly, the one who called him a fool, denies the authenticity of this hadith, because for him it is the breaking of his back, because "have mercy on whoever is in the earth" he cannot interpret "in" to mean the worms and insects in the earth, but rather these animals that Allah has made submissive for us and created for our sake. So have mercy on whoever is in the earth, and He will have mercy on you, whoever is in the sky. Just as: here means "upon," so means "upon." Therefore, he poured his effort to weaken this hadith, knowing that even those who preceded him to such denial of the divine attributes authenticated it, because hadith-wise they did not find a way to weaken it ... even the Ghumariyyah, which is a sin for them, they authenticate this hadith.

The questioner : Our Shaykh, al-Kawthari denies the authenticity of attributing this hadith. He says the correct text of Muslim does not contain this hadith.

The Shaykh : He went ... to something other than the two hadiths you mentioned. You took me to the hadith of the girl! I had not brought up the hadith of the girl. The important thing is that this hadith was authenticated by a group of scholars, and he denied its authenticity because it is stronger in indicating the meaning than the hadith of the girl. Now, the professor has a virtue in that he reminded me of the hadith of the girl. This one is more explicit in indicating the correct meaning of the verse, because in the hadith of the girl, she was told and she said, "In the sky." So she answered with the Qur'anic answer. But she is an Arab; she understands what "in" means. It does not mean "worms in their burrows" and so on. No, the important thing is this hadith: "Who is in the sky?" That is where I ended what I wanted to say in commenting on what you may have heard from that doctor regarding the interpretation of this verse. But what I want to say is that this doctor and his like err because of the initial interpretation of "in" as "upon" in its literal sense, and then their negligence of the original meaning of the word "sky," which is "height." So when they fall into this negligence, they look and say, "We cannot say that Allah is in the belly of the sky, meaning the created sky surrounds Him." We agree with them on this, but they stray from the truth by their false understanding and turning away from it. Then they find no refuge in knowing the correct opinion or understanding. Why? Because they also understand that when we interpret "upon the sky," the problem remains for them and in their minds, because they imagine that above the sky is the Throne, and above the Throne, if we say "Allah is above the Throne, He rose above it" as Allah said, and we interpret it as "upon" as is the Salafi interpretation, then this also places Him in a location. And here their misguidance begins. So what I want to remind you of now is not to get entangled in a wrong understanding that imagines the verse means that Allah is in His essence in the belly of the sky. No, rather, Allah is in His essence above the absolute height, and the absolute height is above the Throne. Above the Throne, there is no place. From here they strayed, imagining that above the Throne is a place, so they placed Him in a place. And there is no difference then between a place above the Throne, a place above the seven heavens, a place above the lowest sky, or in the lowest sky, or on the earth, or in the earth. All of it is not befitting of Allah (Mighty and Majestic). We say all of it is not befitting except the being above the Throne, because above the Throne there is no place. And we know, as they know, but they neglect or feign ignorance: . So when Allah was and there was nothing with Him, we and they agreed, or they agreed with us, that when Allah was and had not created anything, He was not in a place. And if someone named that state—I call it a place to repeat the words—if someone named that state in which Allah was a "place," that is a convention, because "place" is derived from "existence" . So Allah was and there was nothing with Him, then He created the creation. With the existence of the creation and the creation of the creation, place came into being. But Allah did not come into being in this place, because Allah was before place and was before time. So if we say "The Most Merciful is above the Throne, He rose above it," and we cite all the verses and hadiths that establish the attribute of height, that does not mean we assign a place to Allah, nor does it mean we made Him contained by a created thing. Consequently, it does not mean what this fool and his like attribute to us, that we ascribed a body to Him. Glory be to Allah! Did you ascribe a body to Him when you said with us that Allah was and there was nothing with Him? Was He a body? So from this perspective, as He was in the perspective that He has no body and there is nothing like Him, He is now, after the creation of the universe, as He was before the creation of the universe. The only thing is that we differ from these misguided ones because we affirm the existence of the Lord of the worlds above the creations, above the Throne, He rose above it. As for them, it is enough to quote what that wise prince said when he heard the scholars opposing the call to the truth, the call of the Salaf, the call of Ibn Taymiyyah (may Allah have mercy on him), which he revived through his struggle. Ibn Taymiyyah, this is the summary of his views. As for those, they said, "No, Allah is free from place. Allah is not above, not below, not right, not left, not front, not back, not inside the world, not outside it." That prince said, "These are a people who have lost their Lord." Indeed, I say, if it were said to the most eloquent of those who speak Arabic, "Describe for us the non-existent," he would not be able to describe it except as these fools describe their Lord... In the face of these facts, he cannot say, as the Mu'tazilah say, as the Asha'irah say, as the Maturidiyyah say, that Allah is in every place. This is the most foolish thing that can be said regarding the Lord of the worlds, who is free from all imperfections.
This fool and some of his sheikhs found that this statement is not acceptable. So what do they say? They say, "He exists in a non-place." This is a subtle deception. He exists in a non-place, but ask him, "Where is He?" There is no answer. And so they weaken the hadith of the girl because it contains the question, "Where is Allah?" The answer is, "In the sky." They say that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) exists but in a non-place. In reality, this answer leads to what we mentioned of the statements of those fools: not above, not below, not right, not left, and so on. And so, if you are afflicted with this fool or some of his followers, know how to handle the shoulder. When he tells you, "He exists but is not in a place," and you ask, "Where is He?" he tells you, "This question is not valid." Why is it not valid when it is valid in the authentic hadith? He says, "This hadith is weak." Who weakened it? The Dajjal of the last age, who is this fool. But in reality, he is preceded by al-Kawthari. And I refuted al-Kawthari in the introduction to my explanation of the Tahawiyyah. This one, known as Abu Ghuddah, who claims affiliation with al-Kawthari due to his intense ignorance of him and his imitation of him, belongs to his school. Al-Kawthari said, "So he took some formal objections against me that I say, 'Authentic, narrated by al-Bukhari and Muslim. Authentic, narrated by al-Bukhari.' This means that a hadith is not authentic until al-Albani authenticates it."
So this means that there are many hadiths that al-Albani weakens from what al-Bukhari and Muslim narrated. So I slapped him that slap, saying, "Look, your sheikh al-Kawthari explicitly states that such-and-such hadith and such-and-such hadith and such-and-such hadith, despite being narrated by the two sheikhs or one of them, is a weak hadith."
... So the point is that al-Kawthari weakens this hadith, the hadith of the girl, and al-Ghamari, this one named Abdullah, also weakens this hadith. And one of the worst things I recently read in the Tafsir al-Bahr al-Muhit by Abu Hayyan is that he interpreted the previous verse

The questioner : Our sheikh, you have elaborated on the issue of the preposition and criticized what al-Razi fell into. Al-Razi fell into a great issue and long pages in the interpretation of the verse. He said regarding the preposition and began to deny, or said the intended meaning is Allah (Mighty and Majestic), and said it is the command of Allah or the angels of Allah...