Ibn Sīnā and his followers, for their part, say:

Necessary existence is existence qualified by the negation of affirmative determinations, but not negative ones. Such existence is further removed from existence in external reality than that which is qualified by the negation of both existence and nonexistence, even though the latter is impossible with respect to anything, whether existent or nonexistent.

I therefore said to those who claim to be rigorous investigators:

You have based your position on the laws of logic. Yet this absolute existence, taken on condition that it remain absolute and qualified by the negation of both contradictories, does not exist in external reality (* by the agreement of all rational people; it is merely posited in the mind. For if we conceived of a human being in absolute terms and stipulated that this human being be neither existent nor nonexistent, neither one nor many, it would not exist in external reality. Rather, we would merely suppose it in the mind, just as we suppose the conjunction of *) (1) the two contradictories. Thus, supposing the negation (2) of both contradictories is like supposing their conjunction.

For this reason, these people sometimes describe it as conjoining both contradictories or as refraining from affirming either, as Ibn ʿArabī and others often (3) do. At other times, they combine the two approaches, as is also found in the statements of those associated with “al-Bitāqa” and others.

If, despite this, they say that it is the originator of the universe while stipulating that it can be described neither by affirmation nor by negation (4), this is a contradiction, for its being an originator cannot fall outside these two alternatives.

Likewise, if they say that it is existent and necessary while stipulating that it be divested of both contradictories, this is a contradiction.