His Mind Did Not Imagine What He Saw

Now to what Imam al-Ṭaḥāwī says our belief should be, in number 48. He has said this in such a beautiful way: he has told us exactly what we have to believe in, without mentioning the details that come from perhaps weak hadith, and so on.

Article 48. The Ascension is true. The Prophet (peace be upon him) was taken by night, and ascended in person and consciously to the heavenly realm, and from there to wherever God willed, in the celestial heights. Allah honoured him with what He willed, and revealed to him that which He revealed. His mind didn't imagine what he saw.

Allah honoured him with what He willed: again, that is very vague, because there are differences of opinion as to exactly what kind of interaction he had. Allah honoured him with what He willed, and revealed to him that which He revealed. His mind didn't imagine what he saw: that is to prove that this was physical. This was not a dream ascension.

Our belief is that the Prophet (peace be upon him) went with his physical body. Now, there are narrations in which he had a dream about it. Those were to prepare him for the physical realm. A number of times he had dreams in which he was shown many things (and there is a lot of detail about those), in which he was shown the punishments, and so on and so forth. Then he was physically taken in that one night, and when he came back…

Obviously, another proof of this is that had it been in his dream, or a spiritual one only, the people of Makkah would not have had a problem with it, because people see all sorts of dreams. In dreams they can go around the world so many times, and go way beyond. But because he was claiming this to be physical, there was such a great protest against it by the people of Makkah: how can you do this in one night? And so on and so forth.