Third, it may be said:

If (1) the Kullābiyya and Ashʿariyya adopted this position only because they agreed with the Muʿtazila on the principle that compelled them to do so, then—as noted earlier—they agreed with them that the proof for the temporal origination of bodies is sound. They were therefore compelled to affirm the temporal origination of whatever is never devoid of temporal occurrences.

They then said:

“Whatever temporal occurrences inhere in is never devoid of them.”

If it is said:

“A body is never devoid of motion or rest, for a body must be either moving or at rest,”

they reply:

“Pre-eternal rest cannot cease, because it is a pre-eternal existent (2), and every pre-eternal existent cannot cease. Every body is capable of motion; thus, if motion is possible for it while it (3) is pre-eternal, its motion must (4) be pre-eternal, since pre-eternal rest cannot cease (5). If it were possible for its motion to be pre-eternal (6), this would entail temporal occurrences with no beginning, which is impossible. It therefore follows that temporal occurrences cannot inhere in the Creator, because if they (7) inhered in Him, He would never be devoid of them. Anything capable of receiving something must possess either it or its contrary, and whatever is never devoid of temporal occurrences is itself temporally originated, since temporal occurrences with no beginning are impossible.”

Yet they knew from definitive proofs that speech inheres in the speaker, just as knowledge inheres