after being black, and turns black after being white, through the influence of a cause that draws near after being distant, this occurs either through the thing’s movement toward the cause or through the cause’s movement toward it. Water, for example, becomes hot after having been cold through the heat of a fire that comes near it, either through the fire moving toward it or through the water itself moving toward the fire.

Likewise, that which becomes white after having turned black moves toward the blackening agent, or the blackening agent moves toward it. On this account, locomotion precedes all other motions, and continuous, perpetual circular motion precedes interrupted rectilinear motion with its definite beginning and end.

It is in this sense that one may rightly say that circular motion precedes all other motions and changes. This holds true of bodies subject to generation and corruption, with respect to limited changes in qualities perceptible to sight and touch, in shapes and magnitudes, and in whatever follows from or is connected with them. As for souls, intellects, and Allah Most High, none of this follows from this explanation.

He said:

“More remarkable still is his statement that He grows weary, where he says: ‘If this is so, weariness and fatigue must inevitably afflict Him because of the succession of intelligibles.’ Yet he himself says in On the Heavens that the heavens do not tire from their continual motion