established, on the basis of the premises he claimed, that there must be an object of love for whose sake it moves. Yet merely being an object of love does not entail being an efficient cause that brings love into existence. This is why they held him to that consequence.

Furthermore, this consequence of his position—whether he accepts it or not—entails the falsity of his view. For if the world is necessary in itself and has no originator, while nevertheless depending upon an object of its love, as Aristotle maintains, it follows that what is necessary in itself depends upon something separate from itself with respect to some of its attributes.

Accordingly, if it is said that the Necessary Being who originates the world depends upon some particular thing in order to originate it, this would not be invalid according to the position to which Aristotle is committed.

Moreover, on this assumption, if what is necessary in itself moves for the sake of something else, it is all the more fitting that it should move for its own sake. Yet Aristotle ruled out the First being in motion by arguments that undermine his own position.

Thābit said:

Aristotle says: “If matters are as those who hold that the world had a temporal beginning suppose, what cause necessitated or prompted the world's being brought into existence after it had been nonexistent for an infinite time? What is this cause that prompted the First Cause to do so? And what was the ordering cause?”

He may be answered as follows:

All this demonstrates the falsity of your position. For one may ask: Either the world is necessary in itself, or it is contingent.

If it is necessary in itself, what cause necessitated or prompted the bringing into existence of the events occurring within it, its determinate motion, and its setting in motion whatever it moves? And what is this cause that prompts what is necessary in itself to