Hence, the appearance of specific phenomena at a definite...

Hence, the appearance of specific phenomena at a definite time without the mediation of preparatory agents and specific temporal and spatial conditions cannot take place, although the entire world of being is the creation of God the Exalted, and He is the only one who gives being to existents, as will be explained in the proper place.

Moreover, with the denial of the existence of matter, no room remains for the soul as a substance attached to matter, and it would have to be considered an intellectual substance and a completely immaterial thing, while completely immaterial things cannot be the objects of accidents or of alterations. It is to be concluded that the belief in a material world, in addition to being spontaneous ( irtikāzī ) and in a sense ‘innate’ ( fiṭrī ), is also necessitated by rational proof.

In this regard, some Western thinkers have proclaimed that what is provable about the material world is only those accidents which may be the objects of sense experience, and that corporeal substance is not provable.

For example, when an apple is the object of sense perception, by means of the eyes we see its color and shape, we smell its fragrance, by touching it we perceive its smoothness, and by eating it, its taste, but there is no sense by which we perceive that there is something called the substance of apple, the locus of its accidents, in addition to the color, shape, smell, taste and things like that.

In retort to them it must be said that although we do not have a sense for perceiving substance, by reason itself we understand that objective existents are either accidents or substances, where by accident is meant a state or attribute for something else, something that needs a subject to which the attribute applies, while a substance is something which does not need an objective subject of attribution.

Hence, if that which relates to sense perceptions is an accident, inevitably it will be in need of a substantial subject, and if it does not need a subject, then it itself will be a substance. In any case, there is no rational alternative to accepting the existence of material substance. However, it is another matter to identify objective substances and accidents which we presently have no intention to investigate.

Psychic Substances In Lesson Thirteen we mentioned that presentational knowledge of the soul is the same as the existence of the soul itself, and that every human being possesses this knowledge to a greater or lesser extent.