subject are clearer from the standpoint of reason. Indeed, they are correct, whereas this is mistaken, although those scholars fell short in another respect, in seeking to grasp what is clear by means of what is obscure.

As for Ibn Sīnā and his followers, such as al-Rāzī and others, their argument is invalid, and they have not established a necessary existent. Rather, in dividing existence into necessary and contingent, they introduced claims of their own invention, contradicting their predecessors and all other rational people, and undermining the principles they themselves had established through sound reason. For Abū al-Husayn says:

“The proof that whatever comes into being has something that brings it into being is that there are only two possibilities: either it came into being while it was possible for it not to do so, or its coming into being was necessary. If it came into being necessarily, there would have been no more reason for it to come into being at that time than earlier. Thus, its coming into being could not be fixed at any particular time, since it would have been intrinsically necessary.

“If, however, it came into being while it was possible for it not to do so, there would have been no more reason for it to come into being than not to, were it not for something that required it to come into being.”

He has thus explained that if something that comes into being were intrinsically necessary in its coming into being, it would not be confined to one time rather than another, since what is intrinsically necessary is not confined to one time rather than another. If it is not so confined, it follows that it cannot come into being at a particular time, whereas the assumption is that it did come into being at a particular time.

Furthermore, its being assigned to one time rather than another necessarily requires something that determines that assignment. And if its coming into being is contingent, such that it has come into being while it was possible for it not to