There is no necessary relation of mutual implication between the world’s beginninglessness and the permissibility of infinite regress.

They directed this argument specifically against the Muʿtazilah and their followers among the Kullābiyyah and others who agreed with them in denying acts subsisting in Allah, or in denying both His attributes and His acts. They said to them:

“You have posited an essence eternally devoid of action. It is therefore impossible for anything to originate from it, since that would entail giving preference to one possibility without anything to determine that preference.”

The way to refute these philosophers is to say: If a successive infinite regress of effects, one after another, is impossible, their argument fails. If it is possible, then everything in the world could come into being on the basis of preceding occurrences: either realities arising successively outside the essence of Allah Most High, or matters subsisting in His essence, as maintained by the people of hadith and those who affirm the divine attributes. They say, “He has always been One who speaks whenever He wills and does whatever He wills.” Or there may be some other explanation, as proposed by al-Urmawī and others.

In short, there are numerous possible suppositions concerning an infinite regress of occurrences. Whichever is posited, it is easier to accept than the claim that the heavens and the earth are beginningless and that Allah did not create the heavens, the earth, and all that lies between them in six days. These philosophers conduct their inquiries through reason alone, yet nothing in reason requires preferring the beginninglessness of the celestial spheres over all the other suppositions. As for anyone who acknowledges transmitted revelation—as some of these philosophers acknowledge revealed religious laws—whatever supposition he adopts would be closer to revelation than their claim that the celestial spheres are beginningless.