flour. Whoever pronounces it with fatha means the act of grinding, just as dhabh (slaughtering) and nahb (plundering) denote actions. Some consider the person who uses this pronunciation mistaken.

These and similar features of Arabic are familiar to those acquainted with the language. They are known sometimes through induction and experience, and at other times through analogy, just as physicians investigate the natural properties of bodies, and as ordinary phenomena are known through experience combining sensory perception and reason. As has been said:

“Through analogy you know what you have not experienced.”

It is well known that, according to the vast majority of rational people, Muslims and others alike, these things have causes and fitting connections. As for any speculative thinker who denies this, there is no point discussing these particular connections with him, for he holds that created things possess no power through which an action occurs, nor any cause that singles out one of two like things. Rather, his fundamental principle is that the Creator’s sheer will singles out one of two like things without any cause or wise purpose.

Such a person therefore says: if a word’s signifying a meaning comes about through Allah’s speech, this is merely a matter of customary association. In his view, the Lord does not single anything out for a cause or a wise purpose; rather, will itself singles out one of two like things without wisdom or cause. If, however, it comes about through a servant’s choice, the cause may be that this particular word, rather than another, occurred to the person assigning it its meaning.

A detailed treatment of these matters belongs elsewhere. The point here is that the argument which