that these subsist in Him successively, he is like someone who says that words and acts subsist in Him successively.

Whoever says that they are all beginningless—as does a group who say that an unlimited number of instances of knowledge subsist in Him at a single instant, a view held by Abū Sahl al-Su‘lūkī and others—resembles someone who says that an unlimited number of letters subsist in Him at a single instant.

However, it may be said that instances of knowledge concerning their objects, and wills directed towards their objects, can coexist without incompatibility, just as the meanings of speech can coexist. The coexistence of letters, by contrast, is like the coexistence of sounds, and the coexistence of sounds is like the coexistence of movements.

In summary, realities are either alike or unlike. If they are unlike, either they can coexist in a single locus at a single time, or they cannot. The first category comprises unlike realities that are not mutually incompatible, such as knowledge and power, or taste and colour. The second comprises mutually incompatible realities, such as blackness and whiteness, or incapacity and power.

Such things as knowledge of its objects, power over its objects, and will are not mutually incompatible; rather, there can be a coexistence of