of all their causes belongs originally to God. Neither the servant nor any creature has any original involvement in them, except insofar as it is a manifester or something manifested. The written form muẓhir/muẓhar can be an active or a passive participle[39].
If something in a craftsman’s workmanship is defective because the instrument fails to assist him, despite his knowledge of the craft, it is said, “He has been deficient in such-and-such,” or he is asked, “Why were you deficient in it, when we know that you understand it?” He says, “The instrument did not assist me in bringing forth what was in my knowledge.”
The made thing says, “He did not fall short,” because its entity has appeared, not because of the maker’s intention. In respect of the workmanship in the made thing, nothing is defective. But in respect of a made thing other than what was intended, when the maker is a creature, there is a defect.
If, however, it is the Creator, nothing in the workmanship is defective, because everything is intended, since the attachment of the will falls short of nothing. Everything that occurs and does not occur is therefore willed by the Real.
God willed to bring a certain accident into existence and did not will to bring into existence a locus in which that accident would subsist. That accident could not be brought into existence without the locus. The locus must therefore exist, since the accident must exist.
The accident exists through a voluntary bringing into existence, while the locus exists through a nonvoluntary bringing into existence. Nor may the (bringing into existence) be called compelled, since that accident had to exist. The compulsion of engendered existence (comes) from the reality of this established absence of choice. Be discerning.
If you do not know things from the perspective of their realities, you will not know that the world came forth upon the form of
Notes
[39]
(The written form admits two vocalizations expressly indicated by the context: muẓhir, an active participle, and muẓhar, a passive participle.)
Translator’s note TN3123-1: The contrast between a nonvoluntary bringing into existence and a compelled one is explicit in the supplied passage and is preserved. The example treats the locus as necessary for the willed accident, while distinguishing this from the accident’s direct objecthood for the will.
Translator’s note TN3123-2: The sentence contrasting workmanship and the made thing is compressed. It is read here as distinguishing the thing’s actual realization from a created maker’s failure to produce the different thing he intended.
