Thus, if one says, “Blackness exists,” then, according to their position, we have made everything that exists like blackness. And if we say, “Whiteness does not exist,” we have made everything nonexistent like whiteness. Clearly, this is utterly absurd, and this alone suffices to disgrace the party of heresy.

If no such consequence follows concerning blackness—which undoubtedly has its counterparts—then, when it is said of the Creator of the world that He exists and is not nonexistent, is living and does not die, and is the Self-Subsisting Sustainer whom neither drowsiness nor sleep overtakes, how could it follow that He is like every existing, nonexistent, living, and subsisting thing; or like everything of which nonexistence is denied, everything of which the attribute of nonexistence is denied, and everything of which death and sleep are denied, such as the inhabitants of Paradise, who neither sleep nor die?

The reason is that these general, univocal terms—which grammarians call generic nouns—are used in one of two ways. This holds whether their meanings apply equally to their respective subjects or vary in degree, as with blackness and the like; and whether they are called “graded” terms, with graded terms regarded as a kind of univocal term.

They may be used in an “unrestricted and general” sense, as when it is said: “What exists is divided into necessary and contingent, eternal and originated, creator and created; and knowledge is divided into eternal and originated knowledge.” Alternatively, they may be used in a “specific and determinate” sense, as when one speaks of Zayd’s and Amr’s existence, Zayd’s and Amr’s knowledge, or Zayd’s and Amr’s essence.

When used in a specific and determinate sense, they denote what is peculiar to the entity named; they do not denote anything in external reality that it shares with another. For what is peculiar to the entity named is not shared between it and anything else.