If he affirms the former, he is told: If, despite this strength, the thing can either exist or not exist, something must give one alternative preponderance over the other. Otherwise, contingent things would be of two kinds, or have two states: one in which they come into existence without a determining factor, and another in which they come into existence only through a determining factor.

A contingent thing has no existence of its own whatsoever. Rather, its existence is possible and comes about only through something else. Anything characterized by this reality cannot exist except through something else; as long as it is contingent, it exists only through something else.

If that other can either act or refrain from acting, its act is contingent. And what is contingent comes about only through something else.

If it is said, “That other is the agent endowed with power, or the agent endowed with power and will, or something similar,” the reply is: The mere presence of an agent endowed with power and will, if compatible with the act’s existence at one time and its nonexistence at another, leaves the act contingent. It must therefore have a determining factor. Otherwise, if the circumstances are assumed to be identical in every respect, neither alternative can gain preponderance. Without anything giving one alternative preponderance, a contingent thing would have to come about without a determining factor giving it preponderance, which is impossible.

This is precisely the point that those leading authorities of the Sunnah and hadith—and leading philosophers as well—who rejected this position criticized in those speculative theologians who adopted it: the Mu‘tazilites, the Kullābīs, such as the Ash‘arīs, and a group of followers of Ahmad and other imams.

It is the basis of Ibn Kullāb’s position concerning the Quran, which Imam Ahmad and other leading authorities of the Sunnah rejected. It is also the basis of the philosophers’ specious argument in their debate with these theologians concerning the eternity of the world. This has been discussed at length in its proper place.

Since a contingent thing itself is either necessarily existent through something else or precluded from existing by something else, anything whose existence can persist must, while it exists, necessarily persist through something else. It is therefore impossible for it to