A dialogue between the Shaykh and his students in a debate that took place between Shaykh Ali Hasan and Abd al-Rahman al-Suqaf (regarding a statement by Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah).

The Shaykh : onAl-Halabi : ... He turns the issue upside down, meaning he turns it around on us; so he read to us the words of Ibn Abi al-‘Izz al-Hanafi in his commentary on the hadith of Imran ibn Husayn, and that he has two positions regarding his commentary on the hadith of Imran ibn Husayn:
The first position is that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) was asked about this visible world; and the second position is that he was asked about the origin of creation. He said: So he answered them regarding this visible world, not regarding the origin of creation. He wanted to apply the statement we made to this statement, by saying that every statement by Shaykh al-Islam is about this visible world, not about the origin of creation. Do you see, our Shaykh? So we told him: No, this statement, meaning this statement is something you are imposing on him; there is an imposition here, and he is investigating a specific issue here, whereas there he is not investigating a specific issue but a general one. Here he is investigating the commentary on this hadith: was he asked here about this world or about the origin of creation? He preferred one view, and there is disagreement on this issue. As for the original issue for which the texts are general and explicit, it is that everything other than Allah is created, and all the words of generality include this visible world, what came before it, and what came after it, and so on. He ended the session, of course, by ruling that it is necessary to clarify this matter by bringing words that make it clear that the type is created and originated, just as the individuals or children are created and originated. Of course, before that he had said: The texts that Ali brought are strong and explicit, and so on. But those texts remain problematic. So I stood up and said to him, earlier in a place where he mentioned something like this before we ended the session: I said to him: Glory be to Allah, as long as they are explicit texts and those are texts you call problematic; the principle is to apply the explicit to the problematic, not the other way around. But, glory be to Allah, as they say: he missed this just as he missed it at the end of the session. So during, I mean, these days, our Shaykh, or rather during one day, I mean I was only able to do it today, I collected several issues from the words of Shaykh al-Islam (may Allah have mercy on him).