has wills that arise, while the objects willed come into existence, and they could have maintained that temporal events may subsist in the Eternal. They would then have retracted the assertion:

(* that (1) the eternal will itself singles out one of two identical possibilities at a future time, as well as their assertion *) (2)

that temporal events come into existence without a newly occurring cause. On this supposition, they would not have held that anything in the world is beginningless. Rather, they would have said:

Everything other than Allah is temporally originated, coming into existence (3) after it had not existed.

This would necessarily follow on this supposition. For in that case, if no temporal event could occur except through a [newly occurring] (4) cause, and one of two times could not be preferred over the other for something to occur in it except through a preponderating factor requiring it, then the object willed could be delayed after the will only because it could not then exist. [For] (5), if [the object willed] (6) could both accompany the will and be delayed after it, singling out one of the two times for bringing it into existence would amount to singling it out without a specifying factor.

Thus, it is known that, on this supposition, one of two alternatives must hold: either the object willed must (7) accompany the will, or the object willed is impossible (8); that it must accompany the will if it is possible; and that it can be delayed only because it cannot accompany it—either (9) because it is impossible in itself or because its necessary consequences are impossible.