Discussion of the three divisions of tawhid (the oneness of Allah).

The Shaykh : I will say a final word. The Muslims today, and by this I mean the common people and the callers to Allah among them, do not at all focus on making Muslims understand the testimony that there is no god but Allah, what it necessitates, and what contradicts and opposes it. They assume that all Muslims, praise be to Allah, are monotheists. They do not remember that tawhid (the oneness of Allah) is divided into three categories according to the precise scholars who understood the Book and the Sunnah correctly, after foreign influences entered the tongue of the Arabs and shirk (associating partners with Allah) and idolatry entered them, which the earliest generations had no experience of. These scholars divided tawhid into three categories: tawhid al-rububiyyah (oneness of lordship). I remind you that tawhid al-rububiyyah is the first tawhid, and it is the foundation of the second and third tawhids that will follow. Did the first polytheists believe in this tawhid? Yes. Did it benefit them in any way? The answer is no. Why? Because they disbelieved in the second tawhid, which is tawhid al-uluhiyyah (oneness of worship). I explained to you earlier how they used to say, "We do not worship them except to bring us closer to Allah." As for their belief in tawhid al-rububiyyah, that is mentioned in texts from the Book and the Sunnah, and there are many, very many texts. Allah the Exalted said, for example, in some of those texts: Thus, they acknowledge that the Creator of the heavens and the earth is the One Lord, with no partner.
And the verses in this meaning are numerous and well-known, but I will mention to you a hadith about how they explicitly worshipped other than Allah Mighty and Majestic, even though they affirmed His oneness in lordship. One of them, when he circumambulated the Ka'bah, would recite the talbiyah (the pilgrim's chant of response) just as our master Ibrahim (Abraham) and Isma'il (Ishmael) and those who followed their path used to recite it, saying: "Labbaik Allahumma labbaik, la sharika laka illa sharikan mamluka laka, la sharika laka illa sharikan mamluka laka" (Here I am, O Allah, here I am. You have no partner, except a partner that You own, You have no partner, except a partner that You own). Up to "You have no partner," this is the talbiyah of the monotheists. But what did they say from their own perspective, their shirk, and their misguidance? They said after "You have no partner": "except a partner that You own and what He owns." So the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), while he was still in Makkah before he migrated to al-Madinah, when he heard them, and he was always calling them, night and day, to worship none but Allah, with no partner, when he heard them saying "You have no partner, except a partner that You own and what He owns," before they said this exception phrase, he would say: meaning, "Enough for you, do not add more, stop at 'You have no partner,' absolutely, absolutely." But they did not care because they were polytheists, so they would say, "except a partner that You own and what He owns." Look at their misguidance. What is the value of this partner who is a slave owned by Allah, who in truth has no partner? That is the far misguidance. Therefore, the scholars divide tawhid into three categories: tawhid al-rububiyyah, which is what the polytheists believed in, as I mentioned; tawhid al-uluhiyyah, which can also be called tawhid al-uluhiyyah, meaning there is no god, meaning no worshipped entity in existence with truth except Allah. They disbelieved in this tawhid, and I have given you sufficient information about it earlier.
The third tawhid is tawhid al-asma' wa al-sifat (oneness of the names and attributes). That is, just as Allah Mighty and Majestic is One in His essence, He is One in His divinity and worship, with no one worshipped alongside Him, so He is One in His names and attributes .