Darʾ Taʿâroud al-ʿAql wa-n-Naql - Ibn Taimiya - (10/116)

Darʾ Taʿâroud al-ʿAql wa-n-NaqlIbn Taimiya

dependent on anything other than Him. He has no partner in any respect. He Himself is therefore the complete and sufficient ground of all His attributes, and, with His attributes, He necessitates all that He brings into being. If He knows Himself, He cannot know His essence without knowing His attributes, for that would not be knowledge of Himself: an essence stripped of attributes is not His essence and has no existence. His knowledge of His attributes necessarily entails knowledge of His actions; otherwise, He would not know His attributes. For He cannot know Himself to be the Creator of the world without knowing the world. Knowing Himself to be the Creator of the world without knowing the world would be like His being the Creator of the world without the world existing. Since the latter is impossible, so too is the former.

Even if the attributes were hypothetically denied, knowing Himself to be the Creator of the world would still entail knowing the world.

They express this by describing Him as a cause and a principle, and by similar expressions that both they and Muslims use. The same applies to His being an originator and an agent: His knowledge of Himself entails His knowledge of Himself as an agent; otherwise, He would not know Himself.

Knowing Himself to be an agent entails knowing what He brings into being, just as the reality of His essence entails the reality of His being an agent. For His essence, which acts to bring the world into being, cannot exist without being an agent, nor can its action exist without the world.

Whether the act is eternal in its particular instance or in its kind, or temporally originated in both respects, is a separate question, as is whether His knowledge is eternal or temporally originated, one or multiple. The purpose here is to establish that He knows everything that exists, since everything that exists is brought into being by Him. This encompasses His knowledge of every existent; and since every existent is a particular, it entails His knowledge of every particular.

موقوفاً على شيء سواه، فلا شريك له بوجه من الوجوه، فهو نفسه موجب تام لجميع صفاته، وهو بصفاته موجب لجميع مفعولاته، فإذا كان عالماً بنفسه، لم يكن أن يكون عالماً بذاته دون صفاته، فإن ذلك ليس علماً بنفسه، فإن الذات المجردة عن الصفات ليست ذاته، ولا وجود لها، وإذا علم صفاته لزم من ذلك علمه بأفعاله، وإلا لم يكن عالماً بصفاته، لأنه إذا علم أنه خالق للعالم، لم يعلم كونه خالقه، إن لم يعلم العالم، وإلا فالعلم بكونه خالقاً للعالم، مع عدم العلم بالعالم، بمنزلة كونه خالقاً للعالم بدون وجود العالم، وهذا ممتنع فذاك ممتنع. ولو قدر نفي الصفات فالعلم بكونه خالقاً للعالم يوجب العلم بالعالم. وهم يعبرون عن ذلك بكونه علةً ومبدأً، ونحو ذلك من العبارات التي يشترك فيها هم والمسلمون. وكونه مبدعاً وفاعلاً، فالعلم بنفسه يوجب العلم بكونه فاعلاً، وإلا لم يكن عالماً بنفسه. والعلم بكونه فاعلاً يوجب العلم بالمفعول، كما أن يحقق ذاته تحقق كونه فاعلاً، لأن وجود ذاته الفاعلة للعالم، بدون كونها فاعلة ممتنع، ووجود فعلها بدون العالم ممتنع. وكون الفعل قديم العين أو النوع أو حادثهما مسألة أخرى، وكون العلم قديماً أو حادثاً، واحداً أو متعدداً، فالمقصود هنا إثبات أنه عالم بكل موجود، إذ كل موجود مفعوله، وهذا يتناول علمه بكل موجود، وكل موجود جزئي، فهو يقتضي علمه بكل جزئي.