Their discussion of the First Cause itself, however, is extremely limited. Thus, they held two views: some affirmed a necessary existent distinct from the celestial spheres, while others denied this. The arguments advanced by those who affirmed it against those among them who denied it were weak. Their early thinkers, such as Aristotle, argued that motion must have an unmoved mover. Yet there is no evidence for this; rather, the evidence refutes it.

Ibn Sīnā followed his well-known method of arguing from existence to the Necessary Being, then claiming that the Necessary Being cannot be multiple or possess any attribute. This, too, is a weak method—perhaps weaker than theirs, or comparable to it, or close to it.

Since their early thinkers said little about knowledge of Allah Most High, and much of what they said was erroneous, their later thinkers discussed these matters more extensively only when they became adherents of religious traditions, embracing the religions of the Muslims, Jews, and Christians. They heard what the prophets had taught concerning Allah’s names and attributes, His angels, and other matters. They therefore sought to derive from their predecessors’ principles and statements something that would accord with what the prophets had brought, recognizing in it profound truth that could not be denied—the noblest and highest form of knowledge. Each thus spoke according to his own efforts: al-Fārābī took one approach, Ibn Sīnā another, Abū al-Barakāt, the author of al-Muʿtabar, another, Ibn Rushd the grandson another, and al-Suhrawardī, who was put to death, another. Others took still other approaches.

Their inclinations vary according to the opportunity they have had to study the writings of the adherents of