 In the Maqāṣid, al-Ghazali restates the basic elements of Avicenna’s deterministic metaphysics and its implication for the nature and domain of divine knowledge. He explains, in light of Avicenna’s conception of being, the manner in which God knows future events. Possible things are necessitated by their causes; when a cause exists, the effect must necessarily follow. As such, knowledge of a cause allows one to predict, beyond doubt, the occurrence of the associated effect or event. Inasmuch as God has complete knowledge of the hierarchy of the causes, He has knowledge of all future events (Maqāṣid: 118; cf. Avicenna  al-Najāt: 587–599)