loved. Yet they have established no proof of this, nor that He is loved for His own sake. Thus, what they have attributed to Him amounts to utter deficiency—indeed, nonexistence.

[Continuation of Thābit ibn Qurra’s statement and Ibn Taymiyyah’s response]

Thābit said:

“There is, then, nothing that naturally draws this essence without its volition, nor is there anything that calls this essence to a state or condition of which it is not itself the first principle and cause.”

They may be answered as follows:

First: You have established no proof of any of this.

You have not made it an agent that does anything, nor attributed any causal influence to it whatsoever. It is therefore neither the principle nor the cause of anything, except insofar as it is merely loved. Yet being loved does not entail that it brings anything into being or originates anything.

If that is so, what prevents something else from drawing it and calling it to something? What prevents it from loving something else? You have offered no argument whatsoever to establish that this is impossible.

When Muslims and adherents of other religions declare Allah free of any need for anything besides Him, they affirm that He is the Lord, Sovereign, and Creator of all besides Him.

You, however, have not established that He is the Lord, Sovereign, and Creator of everything besides Him.

You therefore have no proof that He is free of need, especially since your position requires you either to regard the world as necessarily existent in itself while dependent upon Him—in which case something necessarily existent in itself would depend upon another—or to regard it as contingent and thus necessarily requiring an agent. In the latter case, the First would be an originator and an agent that brings something else into being. Being an agent, as they have described it, entails having action and will, which contradicts their position.