The Asharites concede that the speech of the soul does not have any of the abovementioned elements. Thus, there does .not remain any existence whatsoever for the speech of the soul. As for the purport of the declarative sentence, even that cannot possibly reflect the speech of the soul. The reason is that the purport of the declarative sentence, as it is commonly understood, attributes a characteristic to a thing or denies its attribution. It aims, properly speaking, at confirming or denying the existence of a thing. We have established that the structural organization of the declarative sentence, in accordance with its situation, is indicative of the purpose of the speaker in the narration in regard to the attribution, whether affirmative or negative, to the situation. Accordingly, its significance [like the declarative sen‌ tence, consists of] nothing but the utterances that are made up of the conceived signs.
We have established, in another study,٢ that coining a word is an undertaking that
makes a particular utterance or a specific form convey the thing the speaker wishes to convey. This is the purport of the declarative sentence. The speech of the soul, according to those who maintain its existence, is similar to an uttered speech but is different in that it lacks external existence for the purpose of the narration.
As for the creative statements, they, too, resemble the declarative sentences. The distinction, however, between the two is that the creative sentences are not made up of elements which either conform or do not conform with an actual reality of speech. Accordingly, the indispensable elements of such a statement are seven in number. They are exactly the same as the nine elements we identified for the de‌ clarative sentences, but with the exception of the seventh and eighth. As pointed out earlier, none of these elements make up the speech of the soul, as maintained by the Asharites.
It is possible that someone may ask, What is the purpose of the organization of the creative sentence? It is common knowledge among scholars that its purpose is to create a specific idea, such as one suitable for the outside world ( alam al-inshli ). Thus, in the writings of many of these scholars, it is repeatedly mentioned that insha (construction) means the creation of an idea by means of words. We treated this sub‌ ject in our theoretical discussion of the legal foundations of Islamic law, in which we argued that there is no basis for the constructive existence (al-wujud al-inshal) in relation to the postulate that meaning comes into existence through verbalization. In addition, even though an expression and an idea share the same external form, origi‌ nating from the relation cre ted
expression is a self-subsistent one, whereas the existence of the meaning is inciden‌
tal and figurative. It is for this reason that the good or bad sense of the idea is passed on to the expression. In this sense it is correct to say that the idea comes into being through verbalization, but this is not limited to creative sentences; rather, it includes the declarative sentences as well as the terminology.
As for the idea existing without verbalization, this is limited to two kinds [of exis‌
tence], and verbalization has nothing to do with either of them.
The first [is the ideas] real existence (wujud IJ.aqlql), in which it emerges in the order of existing essences and accidents. For this existence to be realized, it is neces‌ sary that the ideas causes and events be fulfilled, and that the expressions that con-