If he says, ‘Yes,’ he is told:

‘It follows that, when a thing itself changes, knowledge of it must also change; otherwise, it would not be known as it actually is. Thus, one of two things must follow: either eternal knowledge itself changes, or temporally originated things are not known. Both are impossible with respect to Him, glorified is He.’

This difficulty is reinforced by what we observe in the human case: a person’s knowledge relates to nonexistent things on the supposition that they exist, and then relates to them when they actually exist. It is self-evident that these two kinds of knowledge differ; otherwise, he would be ignorant of their existence at the very time they came into existence. Nor is this difficulty avoided by the theologians’ customary response: that He, glorified is He, knows things before they come into being just as they will be when they exist, with their time, place, and other attributes peculiar to each existent thing.

For they are asked:

‘When they come into existence, has a change occurred or not—namely, the thing’s passage from nonexistence into existence?’