have one. If they have a cause, that cause is either the aggregate itself, some part of it, or something external to it. All these possibilities are impossible except the last.

The first possibility—that they require no cause at all, so that the aggregate would be necessary and uncaused—is untenable, since it is necessary only through its individual members. Whatever is necessary on that basis is an effect, necessary through something else.”

Some, such as al-Rāzī, formulate this argument in two ways:

The first is that the aggregate is composed of individual members, which are other than the aggregate itself; whatever depends upon something other than itself cannot be necessary in itself. This is a weak formulation, because, if each part were assumed to be necessary in itself, that would not preclude the aggregate from being necessary in itself. An aggregate of things necessary in themselves may well have no need of anything external to it, and this is what is meant by its being necessary in itself. This, however, is of the same kind as their argument for denying the attributes by denying composition—an untenable argument.

The second way:

Each individual member is contingent, not necessary, and the aggregate exists only through those members. Whatever exists only through what is contingent has all the more reason to be contingent. And this