Our aim, in seeking (1) to demonstrate the origination (2) of the world, becomes clear through the modes (3).

Should we undertake a rebuttal of the Muʿtazilites on the points where they differ from us, we would rely on two considerations. The first is to invoke the consensus (4) that once a thing has been qualified by accidents it is impossible for it to be stripped of them. We therefore say: Every enduring accident departs from its locus only when its opposite arises, and an opposite can supervene (6) only in the absence of that which it negates—according to their own position. Thus, when whiteness disappears, why should it not be possible that no colour come to be (7) after its disappearance, if it is permissible (8) in the first place to posit a state devoid of colours altogether? This line of reasoning runs (9) consistently through every genus of accidents, and the method (10) is uniform.

We say also (11): What indicates the impossibility of temporal events inhering in the Essence of the Lord—glorified and exalted is He—is that, were they to inhere in Him, He would never be free of them; and that (12) would entail