that substances are composed of accidents, that if substances are composed of differing accidents, they must themselves differ. Thus we directly perceive differences between certain substances—such as fire, air, water, and earth—just as we perceive differences between blackness and whiteness, heat and cold, moisture and dryness, and all other differing accidents.”

He said: “This is false. As for substances being composed of accidents, this was addressed earlier. As for the differences we perceive between substances, as in the examples given, we do not concede that these arise from differences in the substances themselves. Rather, they arise from the accidents inhering in them; differences between accidents do not indicate differences in the underlying subject itself.”

[Ibn Taymiyyah’s commentary]

I say:

Al-Najjār is not one of the Mu‘tazilah; rather, he is a leading exponent of a doctrine. He disagrees with the Mu‘tazilah concerning divine decree, which he affirms, and concerning other fundamental tenets of theirs, but he