the modes, whereas it is impossible for it ever to lack colours.(1)
He added(2): Every opponent of ours nevertheless concurs with us(3) that once a substance has come to possess an accident it cannot thereafter be stripped of it,(4) so the debate must now be directed against the heretics in regard to the modes. On this point the evidence is grounded in sheer necessity, for by the intuitive judgment of reason(5) we know that substances capable of aggregation(6) and separation cannot even be conceived(7) as being neither in contact(8) nor apart.
This becomes clearer when we observe that, were they supposed to have been aggregated from pre-eternity, the mind could not conceive of that aggregation(9) except as having been preceded by an earlier separation, supposing their existence before the conjunction; likewise, whenever separation supervenes upon them, we are compelled to recognize that such separation is preceded by aggregation.
Regarding al-Kaʿbī and his followers, see: al-Baghdādī, Taʾrīkh Baghdad, vol. 9, p. 384; Ibn Ḥajar, Lisān al-Mīzān, vol. 3, pp. 255–256; al-Qāḍī ʿAbd al-Jabbār, Ṭabaqāt al-Muʿtazila, p. 283; al-Isfarāʾīnī, al-Tabsīr fī al-Dīn, pp. 84–85.
(1) In all manuscripts: al-khulūʿ ʿan al-akawān (detachment from existents). In the Ṭ, Ṣ, R, and H editions of Darʾ Taʿāruḍ al-ʿAql wa-al-Naql: al-ʿurw ʿan al-akawān. In the m and q editions of the same work: al-ʿurw ʿan al-aʿrāḍ. The reading supported by al-Irshād and adopted by the editor of Darʾ is printed in vol. 2, p. 190.
(2) It reads “addition by the Shaykh,” and the text is continuous with what precedes.
(3) In al-Irshād: yuwāfiqnā (he agrees with us).
(4) In the original edition: inda (with). The reading attested in manuscripts S, T, and al-Irshād.
(5) In all copies: al-maʿqūl (the rational). The variant found in the marginal notes of al-Irshād (note 3) may be more appropriate.
(6) In the original edition: lil-ijmāʿ (by consensus). The reading attested in S, T, and al-Irshād.
(7) In manuscript S: naʿqil.
(8) In all manuscripts: mamāsah. The reading supported by al-Irshād and Darʾ Taʿāruḍ al-ʿAql wa-al-Naql (vol. 2:190).
(9) In the original edition: ijtimāʿihimā (their conjunction). The reading attested in S, T, and al-Irshād.