one term points to the remote genus directly while indicating the proximate only by implication, and at other times the reverse.

When they say, “It is better for the definition to point to the proximate genus directly, because that genus is more specific to the thing defined, and the more specific it is the sharper the distinction,” we reply: neither of the two formulations has a special claim to portraying the essence; the difference is simply that one affords a fuller differentiation.

So much for the meaning he advanced in defining khamr. According to the Sacred Law, khamr is the name of anything that intoxicates, whether liquid or solid, food or drink, as the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said:

“Every intoxicant is khamr.”

Hence, were the khamr to be solid and someone ate it, it would still be khamr by the unanimous agreement of the Muslims.

As for the second point, his statement, “A concomitant that never separates a thing, whether in reality or in the mind, is almost indistinguishable from an essential attribute,” is correct; indeed, in truth there is no difference between them except by sheer convention and terminology, as we have shown elsewhere. In this logical nomenclature they have separated what is identical and equated what is different.

Such a convention runs counter to plain reason, yet it underpins their entire craft of so-called “real” definitions; the craft is therefore unsound, for distinctions among realities cannot rest on a mere stipulation but on the realities themselves. Between what they call “essential” and what they call “inseparable concomitant of the essence,” whether in existence or in the mind, there is no real external difference. The distinctions are purely conceptual, dependent on convention, the choice of the one who posits them, and what he imagines in his mind. We have treated this at length elsewhere, citing the words of their leading authorities and explaining them.

In summary, their position reduces to this: what they name a “quiddity” is simply what the mind conceives, and the parts of that quiddity are those very conceived elements. Thus, if the mind conceives a body that is growing and sensitive