When a person moves a rope rapidly, the movement of its parts is continuous, even though it is known that the end nearest his hand moved before the other end. No act can be conceived (1) at all except as coming into being successively, one thing after another. An act that is temporally simultaneous with its agent cannot be conceived at all.

[And if it is said]: (2) “The agent has always been acting,” the only reasonable meaning is that he has always been bringing about one thing after another. It cannot reasonably mean that his particular effect has always been simultaneous with him, without the agent ever having preceded it in time.

Moreover, if the Lord, Exalted is He, brings nothing into existence except by His power and will (3), then whatever He wills comes to be, and whatever He does not will does not come to be:

“His command, when He wills something, is only to say to it, ‘Be!’ and it is.”

[Surah Yā Sīn: 82]

He must therefore will the act before performing it, and the act must precede its effect, even though the will and the act exist when the effect comes into existence—just as stated (4) by Ahl al-Sunnah: power must accompany the act.

But if it is said that the effect has always been inseparable from the agent, there would be no distinction between the attribute subsisting in Him and the effect created [by Him] (5). There would thus be no distinction between His life and His creatures—or even between the Creator and the creature.

People of sound reason know the difference between what an agent does—especially what he does