with a number of unsound arguments, whose refutation we have set out at length elsewhere; they said: The celestial sphere moves only on account of its relation to Him, even though He is not capable of moving the sphere and in fact has no awareness of it. This was how the philosopher Ibn Rushd and the like expressed the matter: they said, “He commands the sphere to move, and the sphere persists by obeying the command of Allah.” Yet, in their doctrine, He has no will and no knowledge of what He is “commanding”; His so-called command is simply the sphere’s attempt to emulate Him, just as a beloved is said to “command” his lover to love him even though the beloved has neither awareness nor desire for that love.

Then, were it conceded that He is indeed the one issuing the command, the only result of that command would be the mere motion of the sphere. For this reason they likened it to a sultan who issues an order to his army and the troops comply; they therefore treated the motions as effects only in that figurative sense. They did not affirm that He originated anything whatsoever of the spheres, the elements, the composites, the intellects, or the souls—He did not originate their essences, their attributes, or their actions. His utmost role, they say, is simply to command them to move, like a king commanding his soldiers, while in their view He is not truly a commander at all and has no knowledge of any of the existents. The most Aristotle and his followers claim is that the sphere needs Him only inasmuch as it imitates Him; to maintain that He is a necessitating cause for the sphere is an idea espoused only by some of their later adherents, such as Ibn Sīnā.

As for al-Fārābī, he is the one who expanded this doctrine most widely.