Moreover, if He were described in this way, He would in reality either subsist independently or subsist in another, since it is impossible to posit an existent that subsists neither independently nor in another.

If everything that subsists independently and not in another is impossible, then, if everything that subsists independently is a substance, you must concede that He is a substance.

It may then be said:

It is well known that people employ different conventions in defining the terms “substance” and “accident.” Some call everything that subsists independently a substance, as do various groups among the Muslims, Christians, and philosophers. These people call Him a substance.

Others apply the term “substance” only to that which occupies space. They say that He does not occupy space and therefore is not a substance. This is the position adopted by some Muslim and Jewish theologians and some philosophers.

Some philosophers affirm substances that do not occupy space, but say: “A substance is that which, if it exists, exists without inhering in a subject.” This definition, however, applies only to that whose existence is contingent, not to that whose existence is necessary.

In short, the dispute here is verbal, rather than a dispute over a reality apprehended by reason. The revealed law has addressed neither this term nor others like it, whether to deny or affirm them. It makes no mention of this term that would require examining its meaning. Rational inquiry concerns meanings, not mere terminological conventions. Thus, no substantive question remains here for inquiry, whether scriptural or rational.

This man has offered no rational proof for denying that He is a substance. He has therefore argued that certain consequences necessarily follow from their position without providing any proof that those consequences are false.

They can therefore give him a two-part answer: either this necessarily follows from affirming