Alternatively, he may mean that one of the two is conclusive. In that case, the conclusive proof takes precedence without qualification. If the rational proof is assumed to be conclusive, it takes precedence because it is conclusive, not because it is rational.
It is thus clear that giving rational evidence precedence without qualification is mistaken, just as making its rational character the criterion for preferring it is mistaken.
[The Second Aspect]
We say: We do not concede that the possibilities are confined to the four alternatives you have mentioned. For one may say that rational evidence takes precedence in some cases, and scriptural evidence in others. Whichever is conclusive takes precedence. If both are conclusive, conflict is impossible; if both are probabilistic, whichever carries greater weight takes precedence.
Thus, the claim that one must either give rational evidence precedence without qualification, give scriptural evidence precedence without qualification, affirm both contradictories, or deny both contradictories is false. There is another possibility outside these alternatives, as we have explained. Indeed, it is the truth about which there is no doubt.
[The Third Aspect. Refuting the Principle That Reason Is the Foundation of Transmitted Evidence]
The Third Aspect
Refuting the Principle That Reason Is the Foundation of Transmitted Evidence
His statement, “If we give transmitted evidence precedence, this would undermine its foundation, which is reason, and would therefore undermine transmitted evidence itself,” is not conceded.
For his statement that reason is the foundation of transmitted evidence may mean either that it is the basis for its being true in reality, or that it is the basis for our acting upon it as valid.
No rational person would maintain the first interpretation. Whatever is established in reality through scriptural evidence or otherwise remains established, whether we know it to be so through reason or some other means, or do not know it to be so through either. For the absence of knowledge is not knowledge of absence, and our lack of knowledge of realities does not negate their existence within us,