in the first sense, his claim is not accepted. But if he means that Allah is separate from created things, the meaning is accepted, even if the expression itself is not used.

Once this is clear, if someone says, “This division is self-evidently known,” and is told, “This is only conceivable of something that occupies space or has a direction,” this does not undermine what is self-evidently known. Rather, he replies: “Either this is a necessary consequence or it is not. If it is not, the objection falls away. If it is, then a necessary consequence of a self-evident truth is itself true.” For when self-evident propositions entail certain consequences, this establishes the truth of those consequences. One cannot argue that those propositions are false by denying their consequences, because that denial rests on inference, and inferential reasoning cannot undermine self-evident knowledge.

As for his statement, “If an existent is posited that neither occupies space nor is in a direction, this division is valid in its case,” the reply is: its validity on this assumption does not entail its validity in reality unless the assumption itself holds true in reality. Yet this division rules out that assumption’s holding true in reality. If the division is self-evidently known, it necessarily follows that this assumption is false. An attempt to establish this assumption through inferential reasoning is therefore unacceptable, because it entails undermining self-evident knowledge through inference. If there is no way to establish this assumption, the division is not undermined by its being invalid on the supposition that the assumption holds true. For this amounts to the division being invalid on the supposition that something holds true which has not been established and cannot be established.