The Meccan Revelations

Manuscript volume 5 · Page 104

Konya manuscript

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Arabic

نفي ما أثبته القائل، فيقول: «ما زيد بقائم». ويسمى مثل هٰذا زائدا، لأن الكلام يستقل دونه.

ولكن متى إذا قصد المتكلم خلاف التبعيض وأتى بذٰلك الحرف للتأكيد، فإن قصد التبعيض لم يكن زائدا ذٰلك الحرف جملة واحدة. والصورة واحدة في الظاهر، ولكن تختلف في المعنى، والمراعاة إنما هي لقصد المتكلم الواضع لتلك الصورة.

(التمكن والاختيار ومناط التكليف)

فإذا جهلنا المعنى الذي لأجله خلق سبحانه التمكن من فعل بعض الأعمال، نجد ذٰلك من نفوسنا ولا ننكره، وهي الحركة الاختيارية، كما جعل سبحانه فينا المانع من بعض الأفعال الظاهرة فينا، ونجد ذٰلك من نفوسنا كحركة المرتعش الذي لا اختيار للمرتعش فيها، لم ندر لما يرجع ذٰلك التمكن الذي نجده من نفوسنا: هل يرجع إلى أن يكون للقدرة الحادثة فينا أثر في تلك العين الموجودة عن تمكننا، أو عن الإرادة المخلوقة فينا، فيكون التمكن أثر الإرادة لا أثر القدرة الحادثة؟

من هنا منشا الخلاف بين أصحاب النظر في هذه المسألة، وعليه ينبني كون الإنسان مكلفا لعين التمكن الذي يجده من نفسه، ولا يحقق بعقله لما ذا يرجع ذٰلك التمكن، هل لكونه قادرا أو لكونه مختارا؟ وإن كان مجبورا في اختياره.

ولكن بذٰلك القدر من التمكن الذي يجده

English

the negation of what the speaker affirmed, saying, “Zayd is certainly not standing.” An element of this kind is called additional because the utterance stands on its own without it.

But when does this apply? When the speaker intends something other than the partitive sense and introduces that letter for emphasis. If he intends the partitive sense, the letter is in no respect additional. The outward form is the same, while the meaning differs. What must be considered is the intention of the speaker who sets down that form.

(Capacity to Act, Choice, and the Basis of Obligation)

We may be ignorant of the meaning for which He, glory be to Him, created the capacity to perform certain acts. We find this capacity within ourselves and cannot deny it. It is voluntary movement. Likewise He, glory be to Him, placed within us a restraint upon certain acts that occur outwardly in us. We experience this within ourselves, as in the movement of a person who trembles and has no choice in the trembling. We do not know what accounts for this capacity that we find within ourselves. Does it go back to originated power in us having an effect on the particular thing that comes into existence from our capacity? Or does it go back to the will created within us, so that the capacity is an effect of the will rather than of originated power?

This is the source of disagreement among the people of inquiry on this question. On it rests the fact that a human being is subject to obligation by virtue of the very capacity he finds within himself, though by his intellect he does not ascertain whether that capacity goes back to his having power or to his having choice, even if he is compelled in his choosing.

Yet by that measure of capacity which he finds

Notes

Translator’s note TN1380-1: The example contrasts chosen bodily movement with involuntary trembling. The fact that a person experiences the capacity for choice is distinguished here from the disputed question of what gives rise to it.

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Cairo source reference

Ibn al-Arabi, The Meccan Revelations — Manuscript volume 5 · Page 104 — https://www.futmak.com/english/konya/pages.php?id=1380&text=both