This applies to anything said to be a single cause from which anything at all proceeds on its own. No one acts alone except Allah, glorified be He.

This exposes the error of those philosophers who maintain that only one thing can proceed from one. They make this a universal proposition in order to include the Necessary Existent under it and say: “Only one noncomposite entity proceeds from Him, namely, what they call the intellect.”

Although the falsity of this claim is known on many grounds, the point here is that this universal proposition holds true in not a single instance outside the very case under dispute. In that disputed case, it is known that the agent is one, but it is not known that He produces only one thing.

Moreover, the oneness with which the Lord rightly deserves to be described is not the unity they claim. The unity they claim applies only to an impossible entity, which can exist only in the mind, not in external reality. For they posit absolute existence, or existence conditioned on the negation of positive attributes, or of both positive and negative attributes.

This can exist only in minds, as they themselves have established in their logic. It is also known through clear reason, and this has been explained in its proper place.

The point here is that they know of no single agent, other than Allah Most High, from which anything proceeds on its own. If they say, “Rays proceed from the sun,” those rays arise only when there is a body capable of receiving them, upon which they are reflected. Their existence therefore has two causes: the sun,