a matter of inference and reasoning from evidence, not of a cause that actually brings about its nonexistence in external reality. And Allah knows best.

Moreover, what is self-evident is that one of two things identical in every respect cannot prevail over the other without a determining cause. This accords with the example he mentioned: neither pan of a balance can outweigh the other without a determining cause. This is known through clear reason.

That being so, the approach of those theologians who said, “It cannot be assigned to one time rather than another without something that singles out that time”—as stated by al-Qādī Abū Bakr, al-Qādī Abū Ya‘lā, Abū al-Husayn al-Basrī, Abū al-Ma‘ālī, Ibn ‘Aqīl, Ibn al-Zāghūnī, and other Muslim speculative thinkers like them—is better than the approach of those who argued that neither of a contingent thing’s two alternatives can prevail over the other without a determining cause.

The latter approach was adopted by Ibn Sīnā, al-Suhrawardī, who was executed, al-Rāzī, al-Āmidī, and others like them. They based their argument on the claim that neither of a contingent thing’s two alternatives—existence and nonexistence—can prevail over the other without a determining cause.

It is evident that the principle that neither of two alternatives can prevail over the other without a determining cause is clear when the two are identical in every respect, as in their example of the two pans of a balance. For if we suppose them to be equal, neither can outweigh the other without a determining cause.