caused.

He did not mention this position in his survey of doctrines, although it is among the best-known positions attributed to the leading philosophers and the strongest of their positions in terms of proof and evidence. It is not subject to the objections raised against the others, and he cannot refute it using the arguments with which he refuted their other positions. Indeed, his sound argument points only to this position: its proponents can affirm a newly occurring cause for newly occurring events and regard the agent as inactive. They do not maintain that the celestial spheres are eternal and that events occur within them without a newly occurring cause, nor do they contradict the well-known revealed texts transmitted from the prophets, may Allah’s blessings and peace be upon them.

Their position was therefore closer to reason and revelation than the positions he mentioned.

He said:

“Some of them agreed that the Necessary Existent is one, but then differed. One group maintained that He had always existed, with nothing existing from Him; then He began to act and willed something to exist from Him. Otherwise, an infinite number of newly occurring states of many different kinds would have actually existed in the past. For each one of them existed, and therefore all of them existed. Thus, an infinite succession of things would constitute a totality bounded within existence.

They said that this is impossible. Even if it is not a totality encompassing all its parts simultaneously, it is effectively such a totality. And how can any one of these states be