and the argument from origination is more complete and clearer, for what is known to be contingent is that which is known to have come into existence after not existing, or to have ceased to exist after existing.

This is what rational thinkers agree is contingent, and what unquestionably deserves to be called contingent. It is originated; thus, every contingent being is originated.

As for positing a contingent being that has always been necessary through another, most rational thinkers have rejected this—even those who affirm the beginninglessness of the world, such as Aristotle and his early followers. Even those who made this claim—Ibn Sīnā and his followers—do not classify this as contingent. Rather, for them, the contingent is that whose existence and nonexistence are both possible, so that it exists at one time and does not exist at another.

It was only Ibn Sīnā and his followers who classified this as contingent, despite his self-contradiction and his explicit statements to the contrary, when they adopted the method of arguing from what exists to the Necessary Existent in order to establish His existence. They said that everything other than Him is contingent in itself and necessary through another, and held the world to be beginningless and eternal while also being contingent in itself.

This contradicts the position of their predecessors, the positions of the leading authorities of other schools, and their own explicit statements. This is among the points on which Ibn Rushd and others criticized Ibn Sīnā. A detailed discussion of it belongs elsewhere.