that instant is taken to lie in the past or the future, let alone to be beginningless. Whatever entails successive temporal events likewise cannot exist at a single instant, let alone be beginningless. Thus, this is not even possible, much less a perfection. Yet bringing temporal events about one after another is more perfect than being wholly inactive with respect to bringing them about, such that nothing comes into existence after not having existed. An agent capable of acting is more perfect than one incapable of acting.

If it is said:

“He cannot bring temporal events into existence; rather, His effect is inseparable from His essence,”

this would constitute a deficiency in comparison with one who is capable of acting successively.

Likewise, if it is said:

“Making one and the same thing simultaneously moving and motionless, existent and nonexistent, is an attribute of perfection,”

it is replied:

“This is intrinsically impossible.”

Likewise, if it is said:

“Originating something that is beginningless and necessary in itself is an attribute of perfection,”

it is replied:

“This is intrinsically impossible, for its being originated entails that it is not necessary in itself but necessary through another.”

Thus, to say, “It necessarily exists in itself, although it exists only through another,” is to combine two contradictions.

Likewise, if it is said:

“As for the acts subsisting in Him and the effects existing separately from Him, if His being characterized by them is an attribute of perfection, then He lacked that perfection in pre-eternity; but if it is an attribute of deficiency, then He must be characterized by deficiencies,”

it is replied:

“The acts connected with His will and power cannot each be beginningless.”