Most speculative theologians relied on this argument, including Abū al-Ma‘ālī and the Mu‘tazilīs and Ash‘arīs before and after him. They mentioned that Yahyā al-Nahwī and other earlier thinkers had relied on it. They thought that what is infinite cannot have elapsed and passed away, since whatever has elapsed and passed away has reached an end. How, then, can it be said to have no end? They were confused by the word “end,” owing to its ambiguity and potential for confusion. For the past has a last point that it reached, and it is therefore finite in this respect, without dispute. In this sense, it is said to have passed away and elapsed, to be over and exhausted. The disputed sense, however, is that it has no beginning—that is, its individual events have always followed one another in succession.

As for the substantive dispute, it concerns whether it is conceivable for something assumed to have no beginning, and no limit in the direction of its beginning, to come to an end. Undoubtedly, the proponent of the argument offered no proof that this is impossible. Instead, he used the expression “what is infinite.” Yet the expression “what is infinite” is ambiguous: it may mean something that has no end in the future, in the direction of its last point. If it is said, “This comes to an end,” that would be