of answering this objection, whether their answers are strong or weak. This indicates that knowledge of this is self-evident.

As for answering each of the cases we have presented, we shall address them later, Allah Most High willing, in the appropriate places.

He said:

“In short, whenever a doctrine entails that a contingent thing can occur without a cause, it is more appropriate to attribute the error to that doctrine than to this self-evident principle.”

[Ibn Taymiyyah’s commentary]

I say:

If he follows their approach in demonstrating that whatever comes into being needs an originator because it is contingent, and neither of a contingent thing’s two alternatives can prevail without a determining cause, then his approach is longer and weaker.

Indeed, the approach he has followed is invalid, as has been discussed at length elsewhere.

That a determining cause is required for something to come into being at one of two equivalent times rather than the other is more evident than the claim that neither of a contingent thing’s two alternatives can prevail without a determining cause. For everyone knows that a contingent thing which does not exist of itself must depend on something other than itself; hence its existence cannot prevail without a determining cause.