If someone says, “Although motion arises within an agent among us, someone else brings it about, whereas none but the Creator of the world Himself brings about His action. This, then, is the difference,” the reply is: This is true, just as our own being was brought into existence by another, whereas He, glorified be He, is eternal, necessarily existent, the Lord and Sovereign of all things. He is the Creator, and everything besides Him is created. This is why the question “Who created Allah?” is the culmination of the questions by which Satan leads people astray, despite their demonstrable invalidity.

Al-Rāzī did not base his argument on His doing something He had not previously done without an external mover. Rather, he argued from His acting without any action occurring within Himself. This is precisely what they dispute with him. Even had he used the former argument, it would not have been sound, since that is the very question of the Maker’s existence. His purpose here is to show that His actions run contrary to the judgment of sense perception and imagination, not to establish His own existence contrary to sense perception and imagination.

Al-Rāzī said: “Fourth: We cannot conceive of an agent performing an act except to secure a benefit or ward off harm, yet we acknowledge that He, exalted be He, is the Creator of the world