greater than its rejection of the latter. If the former is acceptable, the latter must be accepted; and if the latter is rejected, the former must also be rejected. Thus, their opponents cannot refute their position while affirming a self-subsisting being that is neither within the world nor outside it and cannot be pointed to.

Ibn Rushd’s statement is correct:

“From the earliest period, the adherents of revealed law consistently affirmed this attribute—the attribute of being above—for Allah Most High, until the Muʿtazila denied it. Later adherents of revealed law then followed them in denying it.”

This exposes the error of those who claim that the dispute over this matter is only with the Karrāmiyya and the Hanbalīs. His statement is more accurate than Ibn Sīnā’s claim that divine teachings prevented the propositions he called “estimative propositions”—such as the proposition that every existent must be capable of being pointed to—from gaining widespread acceptance. Those teachings are merely the teachings of the Muʿtazila, the Rāfida, the Ismāʿīliyya, and those adherents of innovation who agree with them. They are not the teachings of the prophets and messengers—may Allah’s blessings be upon them all.

What Ibn Rushd reports about this community is correct. This supports the view that his reporting of the philosophers’ positions is more accurate than Ibn Sīnā’s.

Careful examination, however, shows that the philosophers hold two positions on this issue. They likewise hold two positions regarding actions and other matters that subsist in His essence.