CHAPTER 69

The philosophers, as you know, designate God, may He be exalted, as [88b] the first cause and the first ground.1 On the other hand, those who are generally known as Mutakallimūn avoid these designations very deliberately and designate Him as the maker² and think that there is a great difference between our saying cause and ground and our saying maker. For they say that if we say that He is a cause, the existence of that which is caused follows necessarily, and that this leads to the doctrine of the eternity of the world and of the world necessarily following from God. If, however, we say that He is the maker, it does not necessarily follow that that which is made exists together with Him. For the maker sometimes precedes the act of making. But they only consider a maker as preceding the act of making. Now this is the assertion of people who do not make a distinction between what is in potentia and what is in actu.

But you know that, regarding this subject, there is no difference between your saying a cause and your saying a maker. For if you regard the cause as being likewise in potentia, it precedes its effect in time. If, on the other hand, it is a cause in actu, its effect exists necessarily in virtue of the existence of the cause as a cause in actu. Similarly if you regard a maker as a maker in actu, the existence of that which is made by him follows necessarily. For before he builds a house, a builder is not a builder in actu, but a builder in potentia; just as the matter of a particular house, before it is built, is matter in a state of potentiality. However, when a builder builds, he is a builder in actu, and then the existence of a built thing follows necessarily. Thus we have gained nothing by preferring the term “maker” to the term “cause and ground.” The whole purpose here is to show the equivalence of those two terms. For just as we designate Him as a maker—even if that which is made by Him be nonexistent—because there is no impediment hindering Him from accomplishing the act of making whenever He wills to, we are also permitted to designate Him in very [89a] same sense as a cause and a ground—though that which is caused be nonexistent.

In fact the philosophers were induced to designate Him, may He be exalted, as a cause and not as a maker, not because of their generally known opinion with regard to the eternity of the world, but because of other notions of which I will give you a summary account. In natural science, it has been made clear that there are causes for everything that has a cause; that they are four: namely, matter, form, the efficient cause, and the end; and that some of them are proximate causes and others remote ones. Every cause belonging to one of these four is designated as cause and ground. Now one of the opinions of the philosophers, an opinion with which I do not disagree, is that God, may He be held precious and magnified, is the efficient cause, that He is the form, and that He is the end. Thus it is for this reason that they say that He, may He be exalted, is a cause and a ground, in order to comprise these three causes—that is, the fact that God is the efficient cause3 of the world, its form, and its end.

My purpose in this chapter is to make it clear to you in what respect it is said of Him, may He be exalted, that He is the efficient cause, that He is the form of the world, and that He is its end. You should not busy your mind at this place with the subject of the temporal creation of the world by Him or of its necessarily proceeding from Him, as is the opinion of the philosophers, for there will come subsequently a long discussion of that problem appropriate to the subject. The subject here, on the other hand, is God’s being the efficient cause4 of the partial actions occurring in the world, just as He is the efficient cause of the world as a whole.

I shall accordingly say: It has been made clear in natural science that for every one of the four kinds of causes one also needs to seek a cause. Accordingly, with reference to every generated thing, there are to be found four causes proximate to it, and there are to be found causes for these causes and causes for the causes of the latter until one arrives at the first causes. For instance this effected thing has a certain N as its efficient cause, [89b] and this efficient cause in its turn has an efficient cause; and this continues until the first mover is attained, who is in true reality the efficient cause of all these intermediaries. For if the letter Alif is moved by the letter Bā, and the latter is moved by the letter Jīm, which is moved by the Dāl, moved in its turn by the letter Hā, this process cannot go on endlessly. Thus we have to stop for instance at the letter Hā. And there is accordingly no doubt that the letter Hā is the mover of Alif, of Bā, of Jīm, and of Dāl. And it is truly said with reference to the motion of Alif that it is due to an action of Hā. In this way every action that occurs in Being is referred to God, as we shall make clear, even if it is worked by one of the proximate efficient causes; God, considered as efficient cause, is then the remotest one.5

Similarly we find, when attentively investigating the natural forms subject to generation and corruption, that they are inevitably preceded by another form that gives that particular matter the disposition required for the reception of that particular form; that second form is in its turn preceded by another form until we finally come to the ultimate form that is necessary for the existence of the intermediate forms, while the latter are the cause of the proximate form. This ultimate form for all that exists⁶ is God, may He be exalted. You should not think that our saying of Him that He is the ultimate form of the whole world refers to the ultimate form of which Aristotle says in the “Metaphysics” that it is not subject to generation and corruption; the form mentioned there is a natural one and is not a separate intellect. For our saying of Him, may He be exalted, that He is the ultimate form of the world does not denote that there is an analogy between Him and the form endowed with matter in its being a form to that particular matter,7 so that [90a] He, may He be exalted, would be a form to a body. It was not said with reference to this point of view. One should rather consider that just as every existent thing endowed with a form is what it is in virtue of its form—in fact its being passes away and is abolished when its form passes away—there subsists the very same relation between the deity and the totality of the remote principles of existence. For the universe8 exists in virtue of the existence of the Creator, and the latter continually endows it with permanence in virtue of the thing that is spoken of as overflow—as we shall make clear in one⁹ of the chapters of this Treatise.¹⁰ Accordingly if the nonexistence of the Creator were supposed, all that exists would likewise be nonexistent; and the essence of its remote causes, of its ultimate effects, and of that which is between these, would be abolished. God has therefore, with reference to the world, the status of a form with regard to a thing possessing a form, in virtue of which it is that which it is: a thing the true reality and essence of which are established by that form. Such is the relation of the deity to the world. In this respect it is said of Him that He is the ultimate form and the form of forms; that is, He is that upon which the existence and stability of every form in the world ultimately reposes and by which they are constituted, just as the things endowed with forms are constituted by their forms. Because of this notion, God is called in our language the Living of the worlds, meaning that He is the life of the world, as shall be made clear.¹¹

Matters are similar with regard to every end, for when a thing has an end you should seek the end of that end. You say, as it were, for instance that a throne has wood as its matter, a carpenter as its efficient cause, squareness of a particular shape as its form, and to be sat upon as its end. You should consequently ask: what is the end of sitting upon the throne? Thereupon it will be said that it consists in the lifting up, and the being elevated above the earth, of the sitter upon the chair. Thereupon you will ask again, saying: what is the end of being lifted up above [90b] the earth? Thereupon you will receive the answer that it consists in the magnification of the sitter in the eyes of those who see him. Thereupon you will ask: what is the end of his being great in the opinion of those who see him? Thereupon you will receive the answer that it consists in his being feared and regarded with awe. Thereupon you will ask, saying: what is the end of his being feared? Thereupon you will receive the answer that it consists in his orders being obeyed. Thereupon you will demand: what is the end of his orders being obeyed? Thereupon you will receive the answer that it consists in the prevention of harm being done by some people to others. Thereupon you will further demand to know the end of this. Thereupon you will receive the answer that it consists in the permanence of their existence in an orderly fashion. This should be done with regard to every end occurring in time until one finally arrives at His mere will,12 may He be exalted—according to a certain opinion, as shall be made clear so that ultimately the answer will be: God willed it so; or—according to the opinion of others, as I shall make clear—one finally arrives at the decision of His wisdom so that ultimately the answer will be: His wisdom decided it so. Thus according to these two opinions the order of all ends is ultimately due to His will and wisdom, as to which it has been made clear, according to our opinion, that they are identical with His essence: His will and His volition or His wisdom not being things extraneous to His essence. I mean to say that they are not something other than His essence. Consequently He, may He be exalted, is the ultimate end of everything; and the end of the universe¹³ is similarly a seeking to be like unto His perfection as far as is in its capacity. This, as shall be made clear,¹⁴ is the meaning of His will, which is His essence. In virtue of this it is said of Him that He is the end of the ends. Thus I have made clear to you in what respect it is said of Him, may He be exalted, that He is an efficient cause, a form, and an end. For this reason the philosophers designated Him as a cause and not only as a maker.¹⁵

Know, however, that in some people¹⁶ from among the Mutakallimūn engaged in speculation, ignorance and presumption reached such a degree that finally they¹⁷ said that if the nonexistence of the Creator were assumed, the nonexistence of the thing that the Creator has brought into existence—they mean¹⁸ the world—would not follow necessarily. For it does not necessarily follow that [91a] that which has been effected passes away when the maker19 has passed away after having effected²⁰ it. Now that which they have mentioned would be correct if He were only the maker²¹ and if the thing that He effected had no need of Him for its permanence to be lasting, as in the case of the carpenter upon whose death the chest does not pass away for he does not continually endow it with permanence. Now as He, may He be exalted, is also the form of the world, as we have made clear, and as He continually endows the latter with permanence and constant existence, it would be impossible that He who continually endows with permanence should disappear and that which is continually endowed by Him and which has no permanence except in virtue of this endowment should remain. This is the measure of the vain imagining necessitated by the opinion that He is only a maker²² and not an end or a form.