Sa’id Qumi’s Negative Theology and the Issue of Divesting God of His Attributes

According to Sa’id Qumi’s negative theology, God has no attributes, neither essential nor non-essential, and there is no congruity between Him and His creatures. Therefore, the words attributed to the Creator and creatures are affirmative for creatures, but negative for the Creator. As an example, His existence is synonymous with His not being non-existent. Therefore, we do not have any understanding except the negative one. However, the affirmative understanding of the Creator leads to divesting God of His attributes. This article aims to examine Sa’id Qumi’s solutions and to evaluate whether his solution logically eliminate the issue of divesting God of His attributes. Sa’id Qumi has proposed four solutions: (1) Replacement of positive knowledge with the negative one; (2) Propounding God as attribute Endower, not the endowed; (3) God has essential reality which is not the subject to our perceptual powers; (4) The replacement of negative understanding of titles and attributes with positive understanding of the Creator’s essence. Rational evaluation shows no solution can eliminate the issue of divesting God of His attributes in Sa’id Qumi monotheistic thought.