Ashras al-Numayrī and his followers. For he maintained that all generated acts have no agent, although they are nevertheless originated events and acts.”

He said:

“I have mentioned this Muslim faction only so that you may know that acknowledging a thing’s origination while denying its originator is a position that has become widespread among Muslims and others. The astonishment and denial of anyone who finds this surprising demonstrate his ignorance, extreme foolishness, and scant attention to the doctrines of earlier peoples and, after them, his own Muʿtazilī masters. Yet the claim upon which the objector relied was his assertion: ‘Everyone who acknowledges an originated, created thing acknowledges the Creator, and everyone who acknowledges an effect acknowledges its agent. If it were conceded that a body is created, there would be no need to undertake a proof establishing the Maker, the Creator.’”

He said:

“Our preceding discussion has already shown his ignorance in this matter and his departure from the correct approach.

“We further say: Suppose the matter is as you describe. What about this would entail that the author of the book was mistaken in undertaking to establish a proof for the Creator? All rational people agree that the dependence of acts upon an agent, and of created things upon a creator, is not something known necessarily or apprehended through the senses. Rather, it is arrived at through investigation and examination—with the exception of a small band whose opinion carries no weight, who have claimed that this proposition is self-evident and that