between them and the essence of the Creator. Why, then, could that feature not be what makes something amenable to classification as either spatially coincident or spatially separate? On this supposition, the objection falls away, since substances and accidents have nothing in common except temporal origination.
The sixth question: We concede that the classification is exhaustive. Why, then, could temporal origination not be the basis of this judgment?
His first statement is: “Temporal origination is a quiddity composed of nonexistence and existence.” We reply: Everything temporally originated can truly be said to have the capacity for nonexistence and existence. Moreover, for something to be classified as spatially coincident or spatially separate means that it has the capacity to fall into either of these two categories. If this capacity is an existent attribute, it is so in both cases; if it is nonexistent, the same applies. There is nothing implausible in accounting for one nonexistence by another.
As for his second statement, “If temporal origination were the basis of this judgment, ignorance of a thing’s temporal origination would necessarily entail ignorance of this judgment,” we reply in two ways.
First: Why do you say that ignorance of the cause necessarily entails ignorance of the effect? Do you not see that a person’s ignorance of the causes of illness and health, and the ignorance of those who deny accidents concerning the properties responsible for changes in the states of bodies, do not entail their ignorance of those changes? Likewise, an eternalist’s ignorance that Allah, exalted is He, has the power to create and bring into being does not entail