is a body, though it cannot be split apart and rejoined,’ yet this does not prevent him from believing it to be a body with length, breadth, and depth.” It may be said in reply:

There is no doubt that two things called bodies have something in common and something that distinguishes them. The same applies to what is described as a substance, as occupying space, as self-subsisting, as not dependent on a substrate, as separate from other things, as a locus of attributes or a bearer of attributes, or as a locus of accidents or a bearer of accidents. This is likewise true of such descriptions as “existent,” “established,” “being,” “real,” and other general designations that grammarians call generic nouns. Undoubtedly, the things bearing these designations have something in common and something that distinguishes them.

What is meant by their common aspect is that one of the things so designated possesses something resembling what the other possesses. It does not mean that there is some particular thing in external reality that is itself shared between them, for this is impossible. Every externally existing thing is distinct in itself and has attributes peculiar to it. Nothing else shares its very existence, its essence, or the attributes inherent in it, except in the sense of resemblance. A concept takes shape in the mind that encompasses the two things resembling one another. This is the universal concept, and it has a corresponding expression: the universal term.

This being so, the fact that the celestial sphere shares with other things the designation “body,” while being distinguished from them by its inability to undergo division and dissolution, does not on that account imply that the Creator, in relation to His creatures, is—according to those who explicitly use the term