And indeed, the notion that something contingent could come to be without an agent who brought it about is, by sheer rational necessity, known to be impossible. This awareness is embedded in the very nature of the children of Adam—even in young children.

Take the example of a child who is struck and asks, “Who hit me?” If he were told, “No one hit you,” his mind would not accept that the blow occurred without a doer.

In the same way, were anyone to claim that handwriting, or a building, or a planted tree, or anything of that sort could appear without a maker, sensible people would regard him as either insane or a sophist, comparable to someone who denies self-evident sciences and necessary knowledge.

It is likewise certain that a contingent being did not bring itself into existence. Before it existed, it was nothing, and a non-entity cannot produce anything—much less produce itself.

Therefore, your statement that “it did not originate from its own essence because of the opposition and change found within it” is an invalid explanation. Our certainty that it was not self-caused is not based on the oppositions and fluctuations it contains; rather—whether its parts are identical, diverse, or mutually contradictory—we know by plain reason that what is originated cannot originate itself.

This is among the clearest and most evident truths to the intellect, just as it is known that non-existence cannot create existence and that the producer of existing contingents cannot himself be non-existent.

Fourth Point: You have advanced an argument to show that it did not create itself, namely