created things, those that have no counterpart, and he imagines origination that has no counterpart. How much more, then, can he imagine what does have a counterpart!

The second answer is that, even if we conceded that conception and imagination do not know this to be possible, this would pose no difficulty—even if the possibility or existence of its counterpart were not known through sense perception or reason. How much less so when this is known! What must be rejected is only what the innate human disposition knows to be impossible, not what mere conception is unable to apprehend.

The fourth response concerns his statement: “We have conceded that He, exalted is He, initially brings entities into being without any pre-existing matter or clay.” We say to him: This argument of yours would benefit you only if what we know through our innate disposition ruled out what we have conceded. How, then, could it benefit you when what we know does not rule it out through immediate knowledge—indeed, when neither immediate knowledge nor rational inquiry rules it out? What, then, if what we have witnessed is its counterpart and resembles it? Indeed, what if what we have witnessed is greater than what we have conceded?

For the entities originally brought into being are only simple entities, such as water and the like. It is well known that originating this composite human being—with his various organs, their functions and faculties, and his various humours, their quantities and qualities—from simple things is a greater manifestation of power and a more profound expression of wisdom than originating a simple thing from nothing. For all these composites come into existence after nonexistence, as do their arrangement and composition; and what they contain in the way of