Furthermore, as for these expressions that suggest an unsound meaning, whether they are used with the correct meaning in view or not used at all, neither course does any harm, provided the correct meaning is known and cannot be refuted. This profound point deserves careful attention, for it dispels illusory doubts that have led many people astray.

When we say that “essences” are brought into being, we mean essences existing in external reality, on the basis that the existence of each thing in external reality is identical to its essence. For an externally existing thing is not something other than its existence. It is this externally existing thing that depends upon another, whether it is simple or composite.

A composite existing in external reality does not depend upon an agent because it is composite, but because its reality is dependent and its very being is inescapably needy. It has no subsistence, existence, or actual being except from its Lord. For this same reason, a simple thing depends upon the Maker just as a composite does. As for the “essences” known to the intellect, whether simple or composite, they depend upon an agent only insofar as a servant’s knowledge must have a cause—not because a composite depends upon its parts.

It has thus become clear to you that a composite does not depend upon its parts, either in the mind or in external reality, except in the same sense that a simple thing depends upon itself. A part of a composite is therefore equivalent to the simple thing itself, and each depends upon something else in external reality.

If it is legitimate to say, “It depends upon itself,” then it is legitimate to say, “It depends upon its attribute or its part.” If the former is not legitimate, neither is the latter. Thus, neither the attribute of a thing nor the part of a composite is