the first party in their belief in theology and the sayings of those who transmitted the articles agreed without hesitation that they are believers in two ancient gods whose existence has no beginning in terms of time except that one of them is the cause of the existence of the second and the name of the cause is the previous and the name of the effect is the next and that the previous created the world by means of the next not by itself and the first may be called the mind and the second the soul and they claim that the first is complete in action and the second in addition to it is incomplete because it is its effect and perhaps they have confused the common people citing verses from the quran as evidence for this such as the most highs saying {indeed it is we who sent down} {and we have divided} and they claimed that this is a reference to a group that does not come from one person and for this reason he said {glorify the name of your lord the most high} a reference to the previous of the two gods for he is the most high and if there were not another god with him who also has the highest the use of the most high would not have been consistent and perhaps
الطرف الاول في معتقدهم في الالهيات وقد اتفقت أقاويل نقله المقالات من غير تردد انهم قائلون بإلهين قديمين لا أول لوجودهما من حيث الزمان الا ان احدهما علة لوجود الثاني واسم العلة السابق واسم المعلول التالي وان السابق خلق العالم بواسطة التالي لا بنفسه وقد يسمى الاول عقلا والثاني نفسا ويزعمون ان الأول هو التام بالفعل والثاني بالاضافة اليه ناقص لانه معلوله وربما لبسوا على العوام مستدلين بآيات من القرآن عليه كقوله تعالى {إنا نحن نزلنا} و {نحن قسمنا} وزعموا ان هذه إشارة الى جمع لا يصدر عن واحد ولذلك قال {سبح اسم ربك الأعلى} إشارة الى السابق من الالهين فانه الاعلى ولولا ان معه إلها آخر له العلو أيضا لما انتظم إطلاق الأعلى وربما