Tahafut_al-Tahafut-transl-Engl-van-den-Bergh

Ghazali says:
I say:
THE SIXTH DISCUSSION
TO REFUTE THEIR DENIAL OF ATTRIBUTES
The philosophers agree-exactly as do the Mu’tazilitesthat
it is impossible to ascribe to the First Principle
knowledge, power, and will, and they affirm that we have
received these terms through the Divine Law, and that they
may be used as verbal expressions, but that they refer to
one essence as we have explained previously, and that it is
not permissible to accept an attribute additional to its
essence in the way we may consider, as regards ourselves,
our knowledge, power, and will, as attributes of ourselves,
additional to our essence. And they affirm that this causes a
plurality, because if these attributes are supposed to occur to
us in the course of our development, we know that they are
additional to our essence, because they constitute new facts;
on the other hand, if they are supposed to be simultaneous
with our existence without any time-lag, their simultaneity
does not prevent them from being an addition to our
essence. ; For when one thing is added to another and it is
known that they are not identical, it is thought, even if they
are simultaneous, that they are two. Therefore the fact that
these qualities would be simultaneous with the essence of
the First does not prevent them from being extraneous to its
essence, and this causes a plurality in the necessary
existent, and this is impossible; and therefore they all agree
in the denial of the attributes.
The difficulty for the man who denies a plurality of attributes consists in
this: that different attributes are reduced to one essence, so that for
instance knowledge, will, and power would mean one and the same thing
and signify one single essence, and that also knowledge and knower,
power and possessing power, will and willer would have one and the
same meaning. The difficulty for the man, however, who affirms that there
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