Bājūrī's Explanation of Tafwīḍ

Bājūrī explains tafwīḍ differently. He adds an additional point. He says that what tafwīḍ, relegation or consignment, basically means is this: because Allah says laysa ka-mithlihi shayʾ, there is nothing like Him, and wa lahu al-mathalu al-aʿlā, and many other verses, it is necessary that any verse which could insinuate likeness to any creature first be turned away from that apparent meaning, and then left to Allah (swt).

So two things are basically being done. It is taken away from this harmful meaning, this problematic interpretation. When, for example, Allah says fa-aynamā tuwallū fa-thamma wajhu Allāh, that in whichever direction you face, you will find the countenance of Allah, the wajh, which means face, of Allah: obviously, taking that in its literal meaning is going to go against laysa ka-mithlihi shayʾ, because people have faces. So to think of this as a limb, as a face, as a limb, is immediately to go against another verse in the Qur'an; and the verses complement each other. This is especially so when the ʿulamāʾ have mentioned that laysa ka-mithlihi is so important, and that this is a mutashābih of the Qur'an. So it immediately has to be turned away from the apparent indication of a limb that one gets. That is turned away.

And even the Salafī interpretations, or commentaries of ʿAqīdah Ṭaḥāwiyyah, make that very clear: it is not a limb, it is not a limb. When the commentator speaks about Allah, about yad Allāh, he says: it is not jāriḥah, it is not a limb. Everybody more or less agrees with that, except the serious Mujassimah: the serious, the true anthropomorphists. They will just say: face. Khalāṣ. A face, separate from the body, different from the body; it is a face.

So according to Bājūrī, the Salaf's opinion was to immediately take it away from the ẓāhir, and leave its knowledge to Allah (swt). Both of those opinions are fine. The first opinion described, which is just to relegate it to Allah, is simply a brief way of saying it; because obviously the Salaf would take away the ẓāhir meaning, the apparent meaning that insinuates a limb, that insinuates a body part, that insinuates a human-like nature. Obviously they would take it away. That is what Bājūrī has explained in more detail. So there is no contradiction between those two interpretations.