a discussion of their fourth claim, which is more plausible than the others: that their demonstrative proof yields knowledge through judgment.
And if they say, “Knowledge through judgment—or through conception—cannot be attained without it,” then they are claiming that all avenues to knowledge are closed to rational human beings except the two methods they have described: definition and syllogism. They also claim that these two methods lead to the knowledge that human beings attain through reason, meaning that any method which leads to knowledge must follow the procedure they have described, and no other. Thus, what they have set out is a rule-based instrument by which methods of acquiring knowledge are weighed, and sound methods distinguished from unsound ones. Observing this set of rules therefore safeguards the mind against error in the reasoning through which a conception or judgment is attained. This summarizes what they have said.
All these claims are false, both in what they deny and in what they affirm. Not all the methods of others that they reject are invalid, nor are all the methods of their own that they endorse sound in the manner they claim. Some of their methods are indeed sound, just as some methods used by others are invalid. No one, whether among them or others, composes a work without its necessarily containing some truth.
The Jews and Christians possess more truth, in proportion to the totality of what they hold, than these men do. Indeed, the Arab polytheists who worship idols, and others like them, possess more truth than is possessed by