When Pharaoh said:
“Who, then, is your Lord, O Moses?” He replied, “Our Lord is the One who gave everything its form and then guided it.”
[Surah Tā Hā: 49–50]
Moses’ answer was therefore addressed to one who feigned ignorance, pretending not to know a truth that he knew. For Pharaoh’s question:
“And what is the Lord of the worlds?”
was a question denying His existence; it was not a request for His quiddity to be defined, as some later scholars supposed. They said that Pharaoh demanded that Moses explain the quiddity, but Moses turned away from doing so because an answer stating it was impossible. This is an error on their part. Pharaoh did not acknowledge the Maker at all; rather, he denied Him, and his question was intended to deny His existence. Hence he said:
“I know of no god for you other than myself.”
[Surah al-Qasas: 38]
And he said:
“I am your lord, the Most High.”
[Surah al-Nāzi‘āt: 24]
Had he acknowledged His existence and sought to know His quiddity, he would not have said this, nor would Moses have answered him with a reply in which His quiddity was not stated (1).
Moreover, the claim that quiddity is what the logicians describe by citing the common essential and the differentiating essential—namely, genus and differentia—is false. This has been discussed at length elsewhere. It has also been shown that a quiddity distinct from external existence is only that which is conceived in the mind, for the mental forms found in minds are not themselves the things existing in external reality.
As for the claim of the adherents of Greek logic that, in external reality, there are a quiddity and an existence distinct from