composition; a composite depends on its constituent part, and whatever depends on something else cannot be necessarily existent in itself, because it is in need.

[Al-Ghazālī’s discussion of the question of Allah’s attributes]

Abū Hāmid said to them:

“We adopt the position that the essence does not depend on the attributes for its subsistence, whereas the attributes depend on that which possesses them, as is the case with us. There remains, then, your assertion that whatever depends on something else cannot be necessarily existent. In reply, we say: if by necessarily existent you mean that it has no efficient cause, why do you make that assertion?

“Why should it be impossible to say that, just as the essence of the Necessary Existent is eternal and has no agent producing it, so too its attribute is eternal together with it and has no agent producing it? If, however, by necessarily existent you mean that it has no receptive cause, then it is not necessarily existent on this interpretation. Nevertheless, it is eternal and has no agent producing it. What makes this impossible?

“If it is said: ‘The Necessary Existent in the absolute sense is that which has neither an efficient nor a receptive cause. Thus, once it is conceded that it has a receptive cause, it has been conceded that it is an effect,’ we reply: calling the receiving essence a receptive cause is a matter of