objects of power.

You have said that the object of power must come after the existence of the one possessing power. This type of thing received is an object of power; thus, according to your own statement, its receptive subject must precede the existence of what it receives.

As for precedence: if you mean precedence with temporal separation and an intervening interval, that is disputed. If you mean precedence—even when the object of power that is received follows immediately upon the one who possesses power and receives it, with no interval between them—then no adherent of the religious traditions, nor the vast majority of rational people, disputes this with you. Indeed, no rational person who understands what he is saying disputes it. For an object of power brought about by the beginningless possessor of power through His will cannot be beginningless alongside Him, without His having preceded it. Hence, rational people unanimously hold that anything brought about through power and choice—indeed, anything brought about at all—must have come into existence after not having existed.

(The tenth response: If the occurrence of events one after another is possible, then the Essence is receptive to that; if it is impossible, then the Essence cannot be receptive to it. Indeed, even if receptivity is said to be inseparable from the Essence, it remains conditional upon the possibility of what is received. Thus, the Essence has always been receptive to what can exist, not to what is impossible.

This is the (eleventh response, namely: The Essence has always been receptive, but the existence of what is received is conditional upon its being possible. Thus, the Essence has always been receptive to what can exist, not to what cannot exist.