whether universal or particular. Since its lack of benefit has been established, its derivative forms—which yield results only by being reduced to it—are all the more clearly without benefit. The point is that this community—praise be to Allah—has always included people who discern and refute the falsehood in the statements of those who uphold it. Through Allah’s guidance, they agree in accepting truth and rejecting falsehood, whether in reasoned judgment or transmitted reports, without being aware of one another’s views or acting in concert. What these thinkers have drawn attention to agrees with what we have pointed out. It shows that logical syllogisms can be dispensed with; indeed, using them merely prolongs and multiplies thought, inquiry, and discourse to no benefit.

The third point:

General, universal propositions do not exist as universals in external reality. They are universal only in the mind, not in concrete existence. Things that exist externally, however, are particular entities. Every existent has a reality peculiar to it, distinguishing it from everything else, which no other thing shares. Consequently, a syllogism cannot establish the existence of a specific, individual entity. They themselves acknowledge this, stating that a syllogism does not indicate a particular entity. They sometimes express this by saying that it indicates only a universal, not a particular.

Thus, syllogistic reasoning does not yield knowledge of any individually existing thing. Yet everything that exists exists as an individual. It therefore yields no knowledge of the realities of existing things, but only unrestricted universals conceived in the mind, not realized in concrete existence. Accordingly, none of the syllogistic arguments that these thinkers call demonstrations establishing the Creator—glorified be He—identifies Him specifically. They indicate only something conceived without qualification, whose conception does not preclude its applying to more than one.