Daf' Shubah al-Tashbih

In the polemic, Ibn al-Jawzi distinguishes between anthropomorphic interpretation of ambiguous Qur'anic verses and hadith, and traditional interpretation. He writes in Kitab akhbar as-Sifat:

The imam Ahmad used to say "Let the texts of scripture stand as they are." Some of his leading disciples followed this principle ... However, three persons whom we have already mentioned viz. Ibn Hamid, the Qadi [Abu Ya'la], and Ibn az-Zaghuni are well known as advocates of a method of interpretation that takes sense experience as its point of departure.[4]

He writes elsewhere in the polemic:

I say to my fellow Hanbalis: You are proponents of scripture and tradition ... Has anyone ever reported to you that Ahmad taught God's [istawa'] on the throne is one of the attributes of his essence or an attribute of action? On what grounds do you justify venturing into [a discussion] of such matters?[5]

Ibn al-Jawzi states, in as-Sifat, that God neither exists inside the world nor outside of it.[9] To him, "being inside or outside are concomitant of things located in space" i.e. what is outside or inside must be in a place, and, according to him, this is not applicable to God.[10] He writes:

Both [being in a place and outside a place] along with movement, rest, and other accidents are constitutive of bodies ... The divine essence does not admit of any created entity [e.g. place] within it or inhering in it.[11]

• Asas al-Taqdis
• Al-Sayf al-Saqil fi al-Radd ala Ibn Zafil