and thus what prevented their widespread acceptance among those who did not accept them was an innovated practice, not a divinely ordained one, and a religion devised by certain people, not transmitted from any prophet.

There is no doubt that the polytheists and those among the People of the Book who altered their religion have laws and religious practices that they invented and devised. Reasonable people are not obliged to accept these; rather, they must follow what is reliably transmitted from the infallible prophets, may Allah’s blessings and peace be upon them.

Likewise, concerning his statement:

“The philosophical sciences undermine their widespread acceptance.”

The reply to him is:

Others have reported that the ancient philosophers affirmed what these propositions entail, as Ibn Rushd the grandson and others have explained. Indeed, the views transmitted from the early philosophers and their leading authorities—even Aristotle—and from many later philosophers go further than these propositions, affirming temporal occurrences subsisting in the Necessary Being and the consequences of this, as some of the reports from them quoted earlier show.

Concerning his statement:

“One who is dissuaded from this can scarcely overcome his own mind in rejecting it, so powerful is the hold of the estimative faculty.”

The reply to him is:

This shows that these propositions are firmly rooted in the innate disposition, established in one’s natural constitution, and ingrained in the soul. Whoever tries to reject them within himself cannot overcome his own mind and cannot rid himself of them.