dispensing with an agent.

It is impossible for events to arise successively from a cause that is complete from eternity, with none of its necessary effects occurring later than it. The occurrence of those events must therefore involve something pertaining to the Necessary Existent. This is among the necessary concomitants of the Necessary Existent and depends on nothing beyond the Necessary Existent and what proceeds from it. This contrasts with what subsists in a contingent being: since the contingent being itself depends on something other than itself, whatever subsists in it has all the more reason to depend on something else.

This has been explained at length elsewhere, where it has been shown that their position entails contradiction and is untenable, whether the celestial sphere is assumed to have necessary existence in itself or to be contingent in itself and rendered necessary by another.

The purpose here was simply to draw attention to the various groups’ methods of establishing the existence of the Creator. What the innovators among the speculative theologians and philosophers present is either unnecessarily lengthy or deficient and fails to achieve its intended purpose. The methods brought by the Messengers are the most complete, direct, and beneficial. The innate disposition, perfected by the revealed Law, suffices without these newly devised approaches. Those who follow them miss out on such complete knowledge of Allah’s attributes and actions that they fall far short of the people of faith—even if they are excused on grounds of ignorance. Otherwise, they deserve punishment if they oppose the revealed text through which the proof has been established against them. Thus, they are either deprived or sinful.