The eighth response (1) is to say: Your distinction—that the existence of the one possessing power must precede the existence of the object of his power, whereas the existence of the receptive subject need not precede the existence of what it receives—is merely an assertion. You have offered no evidence for either claim, and both matters remain disputed.

Some people say that the one possessing power need not precede the possibility of the existence of the object of his power; indeed, he cannot precede it. Rather, the object of power can exist concurrently with the power of the one possessing it. This is analogous to the object of power existing concurrently with power itself, as the great majority of people, Muslims and others, maintain.

However, the existence of the object of power concurrently with the one possessing power can be understood in two senses:

(The first is that the object of power exists eternally alongside the one possessing power, coexisting with Him in time. This is not maintained by the adherents of the revealed religions or by the great majority of rational people, who affirm that Allah is the Creator of everything: He is eternal, whereas everything besides Him is created and came into being after not having existed. It is maintained only by a small band of philosophers who say that the celestial sphere coexists with Him in time and did not come after Him, while nevertheless regarding it as something He has produced and an object of His power.

As for the object of power following immediately upon the one possessing power, with no interval between them, yet coming after him, this is maintained by most rational people, Muslims and others. They say that the effect of a complete cause comes into existence immediately after that cause is affected. They also say that a complete necessitating cause entails the existence of its effect immediately after it, not simultaneously with it. For people hold “three views” concerning the complete cause: