the argument.

For if someone says, “The disputed fermented drink is forbidden because it is intoxicating, and is therefore forbidden by analogy with grape wine,” he must establish that intoxication is the basis of prohibition. In analogical reasoning, this is called the “basis,” the “effective cause,” the “indicator,” the “common factor,” the “posit,” and similar terms.

For the analogy to be valid, he must provide evidence that intoxication is the basis of prohibition, such that wherever intoxication is present, prohibition follows. If he formulates the argument syllogistically—“This fermented drink is intoxicating, and everything intoxicating is forbidden”—then intoxication is the repeated middle term in this formulation, just as it is the effective cause in analogical reasoning. In this syllogism, he must establish the universal major premise: “Everything intoxicating is forbidden.” Whatever establishes this proposition in the syllogistic formulation also establishes intoxication as the basis of prohibition in the analogical formulation. There is no difference between them.

If someone says that establishing the attribute’s determining effect and its being the basis of the ruling is the foundation of analogical reasoning, that this answers the “demand for proof” and demonstrates that the attribute, in its full scope, is the basis of the ruling, and that this can be established only through evidence yielding probability, the reply is:

Establishing the universality of the major premise is likewise the foundation of syllogistic reasoning. The minor premise is generally known, just as the presence of the attribute in the case under consideration is known. If establishing the presence of the attribute in that case sometimes requires proof, then, as has been said, so too does