something necessary without a cause, until it is shown that the necessary totality, consisting of cause and effect, is subject to the same reasoning as the contingent totality.”

I say:

When discussing the proof that Abū Hāmid attributed to the philosophers for the impossibility of an infinite regress of causes, Ibn Rushd stated that Ibn Sīnā was the first to introduce this proof into philosophy, presenting it as a method superior to that of the ancients. For he claimed that it was drawn from the essence of existence, whereas their methods were drawn from accidents consequent upon the First Principle.

He said:

“This is a method that Ibn Sīnā took from the dialectical theologians. The dialectical theologian considers it self-evident that what exists is divided into the contingent and the necessary. They assumed that the contingent must have an agent and that, since the world in its entirety was contingent, its agent must be the Necessary Existent. This was the belief of the Mu‘tazilah before the Ash‘ariyyah.”

He said:

“This is a sound argument containing no falsehood, except for their assumption that the world in its entirety is contingent, for this is not self-evident. It was therefore the intention of Ibn