Islam in Crisis - Part 3

Why bother? Just live out a normal life without worrying about it and instead worry about education, healthcare, human rights, peace, justice and prosperity. Why carry unnecessary burden, a burden for no end.

As a human being, a Panjabi, a Pakistani and an American are enough identities for me to be contented with or to worry about.

Dear Mr. Talib,
Your deep insight on these issues is remarkable. You are doing the contemporary Muslim philosophy a great favour by writing down your feelings and sharing your views with all of us.
Here are some of my own abstract thoughts:


- The beginnings of Ash`arism are shrouded in obscurity. It was a gradual shifting of attitude and there was no formal recognition of the existence of this philosophy in the beginning. It is a tendency of human mind to ascribe broad movements to single men. This is the reason why I think this philosophy has been ascribed to the name of Abul Hassan `Ali Ibne Islma`il alAsh`ari.


- Other schools of thought that shared similar philosophy with Ash`arism include Zahirism in Spain, School of Al-Tahawi in Egypt, and Maturidism in Samarqand.


- The above article does not mention a very important content of the debate between the two philosophies i.e. The relationship of attributes of God to his essence. Mu`tazilism insists that the attributes of God such as Knowledge, Power and Life are not independant qualities possessed by him apart from his essence, but are a part of his essence. Al-Ash`ari is reported to have rebutted the Mu`tazilist identification of God`s attributes with his essence in this manner, ``Abul Hudhayl Allaf says that God`s knowledge is God, and so he makes God knowledge. He must be asked to invoke knowledge instead of God, and say in his prayers, `O Knowledge Forgive Me!`.``

A very insightful and well-researched article indeed!

I have a few questions of my own for the author.

Does Mutazilite philosophy acknowledge the limitations of reason? We all know that human beings use the 5 senses to collect data, perform experiments and then prove/disprove theories. Unlike God, humans do not possess knowledge of future. We can only predict an outcome based on past experiences and knowledge, but every now and then predictions go astray because of unforseen/unexperienced phenomenon.

My point is: the Mutazilites exaggerate the power of reason to discover truth. Can we use our 5 senses, scientific methods and reasoning to figure out the exact nature of God Himself? Not really.

Consider the following dilemma: Does God forbid adultery because it is bad? Or is adultery bad because God forbids it?

A Mutazilite would answer ``Yes`` to first question and ``No`` to the second. It would be vice versa for an Asharite.

What we need is a marriage between the two extreme positions. Asharite thought breeds fatalism. Mutazilite thought breeds ``analysis paralysis``. Neither school of thought provides a complete road to truth.

I prefer the Al-Ghazali approach. This offers a compromise between reason and revelation.

In essence, he said that human beings should apply reason to all worldly matters, but not to the nature of God and His explicit commandments.
This is because knowledge of the latter is ``unknowable through human intellect``. Soren Kiekegaard, the famous theologian-philosopher said that some aspects of truth can only be discovered through faith, not reason.

Muhtram Talib Sahib:

Just a point of clarification. In the opening line under Introduction, it was stated, ``..that it (Quran) was created (meaning by it `eternal`), rather than uncreated (i.e. non-eternal) scripture.`` The word created does not mean eternal; it means created. Created is temporal, i.e. created at a certain particular time. Uncreated is eternal. I believe the Arabic word for `created` is `khalq` and for eternal is `qadeem`.

Please do not consider it as adverse criticism. Your article is well researched. With regards.

I agree with #1 sameerJB

At times I wonder whether such debates really serve a purpose and are productive except perhaps for a reaserch paper for some seminary.

For an average everyday person, religion is simly a faith to keep his sanity intact and provide him some kind of a basic frame work of good and bad as sanctioned from the heavens.

Religion is a blind belief and has no logic about it. Otherwise there would be only one religion in the world - the religion that has the best logic to prove it.

Is Quran `` Hadis `` or `` Qadeem `` ? Hadis like incidental or something which will correspond to all the times. Its narrated that Iqbal was once told by his father to read Quran as it is being revealed on urself!!!

I think eternal is not ``Qadeem`` . Eternal should be `` Baqa ``
Qadeem like its one and for all. It was created in the very beginning and will reamin like this . No Cahnge. `` Jamood ``

Unfortunately the author is non-interacting type - so probably I would be talking to myself. but anyhoo...

First of all I fail to see the connection between the 9th century philosophical thought and the thought process that is going on today. The questions that were faced by philosphers at that time were open ended questions, which do not have definite answers. If we compare the same questions in the Western thought process we come across what started from the Aristotle`s Prime Mover, progressed to Occam`s Razor, to St. Anselms Ontological Proof, to Pascale`s Wager, to Kant, to Nietscze to Russel and the list just goes on and on. Similarly in Eastern or Islamic thought process what started from Mutazalites & Asharites was passed on to Hanbalis, to Malilkis to Bu Hanifa to Al-Ghazali, to Abdul Qadir Jilani, to Mujadid Alif Saani, to Shah Waliullah to Ali Hajwari, to Allama Iqbal to may be Soroush and then list just goes on and on. The point is that philosophical thought process based on reason and logic did not stop with Mutzallites, but it progressed, it was diversified geographically, liguistically, and culturally. I will post a seprate write up about Mutazalites, which addresses some of the misconceptions reiterated in this article.

One such misconception about Mutazallites is that they reject Hadith or the authority of Hadith. This assertion is not correct. At the time when Ahadith were being collated question was raised to those who were taking part in that endeavor. The question was how a hadith is considered authentic. Mutazallites argued that Ahdith can only be taken authentic if it is verified by at least two independent sources (narrators). The others, especially, Imam Malik, however, argued that a well known hadith which is un-contested may be considered authentic if narrated by one source only. malik`s argument was that when divine order of prohibition of liquor came there was one town crier who roamed around the city of Medina and announced the order of prohibition. People, took his word, and broke down all the containers without verifying from a second source. [Dr. Mohammad Hamidullah, Khutbaat-e-Bahawalpur, he also quotes several other arguments based on ancient sources]. During that time it was a big issue because fiqah (law & jurisprudence0 was being established based on Qura`n and Hadith, and if Mutazzalite approach was taken a good volume of well known ahadith would have been rendered useless.

Another issue that writer has raised is the issue called ``Qaza-o-Qadr`` -i.e. when everything happens by God`s permission then why man should be held liable for his misdeeds. Philosophically, it is a good question. But since acts of deeds and misdeeds may fall into the realm of fiqah (law) so the faqih (jurists) found the answer with in Qura`n. It is Qura`n that stipulates the concept of reward for good deeds and punishment for misdeeds, which means that man has been given some degree of autonomy to chose between right and wrong. God doesn`t interfere in that choice, but since He is All-Knower He knows what that man will choose. And if one looks at the structure of Quran`ic verses one might notice that with each and every verse where there is a mention of a punishment for misdeed there is also a mention of God being Rehman (Compassionate) and Rahim (Forgiver). So man is also given an option to seek forgiveness for his misdeeds, which we all know that it is purely our own prerogative.

I would like to write one more post, separately, that will discuss the issue of lietral vs metaphorical meaning of Quranic verses.

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TALIB sahib,it``s very masterly topic.the more you learn ,the more you will confuse.i am living in confusion and contratation.the only thing i am known so far is,god created this world and send messengers ,time to time to keep the world in order.the basic message of all the messengers is love,peace and truth.we at present time need it badly.different school of thoughts are not going to help us.may be i am wrong.may be some one educate my poor soul?

Re: #3 by HisExcellency

Reason may not be as important as Revelation in percepting the nature of God, but it certainly is a fundamental requirement to percept Revelation itself.

The fact that the Koran often gives logical/philosophical reasons behind the rules it dictates, depicts that God forbids sins because they are bad.

They ask thee concerning wine and gambling. Say: ``In them is great sin and some profit for men; but the sin is greater than the profit.`` (Koran 2:219)

Osama ben Laden and 6000 deaths in NY are a perfect example of literal following of the text of revelation and ignorance of the reasoning required to percept it.

Given the nature of traditions in Arab society, Mutazililites had no chance to succeed, the challenge from Asharites notwithstanding. The Mutazilites, by the very nature of their reliance on reason, were a challenge to the norms of traditional tribal society that demanded absolute and unquestioned submission and obedience to leadership, be it tribal, political, religion or nationalistic as int he case of Saddam Hussein and other Arab rulers in modern world.

The reason challenged unquestioned authority of the authoritarians. The reason about god or quran would have naturally spilled over into normal lifestyles of people thus weakening the heirarchies of various kinds. The asharites beliefs supported the status quo of the authorities by very nature of eliminating reason from certain esteemed areas of life. Later Ghazali sealed the fate.

The Mutazilites had better chance of succeeding in India or China but the variants of Islam that came to India on the heels of invaders had been compromized and the purpose of Islam in subcontinent was to weaken or soften any resitance to minority culture and rule of Islamic Empires of India. Beyond that point Islam had no use for its promoters in both political and religious heirarchies.

Now in free societies, one does not need to invoke Mutazilites to free themselves from the shackles of medieval and dark age practices of beliefs. One can wake up to reason and logic through looking the world around him/ her. Obe can wake up to reason by actually accepting liberal education and believing in it. One can even completely disregard religosity and all thoughts associated with it or reject everything by simply rejecting the presence of anything like god.

Therefore, except for studying history or for intellectual curiosity, the debate between Mutazilites and Asharites has no meaning for the contemporary Muslims. Not drinking from the polluted river is first step towards cleaning the river. Much less chance of decontamination and more arduous task if the water is consumed with the same intensity and holy fervor as before. Disagreeing to the virulent traits in Islam is not sufficient until they are considered reprehensible.

re: sameerJB and nazarhayatkhan

Another question for the knowledgeable out there:

Under Mutazilite thought, anyone can use his/her reason to distinguish between vice and virtue. But two people may not think the same way, thereby they may arrive at different conclusions about vice and virtue. Since there are more than 1.3 billion Muslims in the world, we may potentially have 1.3 billion different interpretations of vice & virtue.

Doesn`t this result in a decentralization of theology and therefore its corruption?

For example, one Muslim may reason that since he has a high metabolic rate, he can still 2 bottles of beer and offer prayers. Another Muslim may have a slow metabolic rate that would result in intoxication from even half a bottle of beer.

Unless there is a central authority to interpret these issues, religious edicts will run into chaos. Hence we need the institution of ulema.

...yes and when they were debating these........I read it did create such heated debates...with so much involved...the opposite camps were some time trampled over by horses.. being run over them....

...correct me if I am wrong.... the Shite Sunni rift was consolided becouse of it....Yes...that rifts origin were not new....but this kind of debate did augumented this rift... Maybe I am wrong.. but still

...so let Islam remain a pure and simple way of life... acedimic debates asside.... its time to act not debate....

...Let the Muslim re start the process of Tehqeek and Takhleeq instead of Tanqeed and Taqleed.... it will result only in Takhreeb

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#9
Sameer

you had to say something, even if its the most superficial thing to say. I was expecting something more educated from you. FYI, most of these philosophical debates raged at a time when the intellectual center of islam had already moved to `Ajam. The Abbasids, though headquartered in Baghdad, were originally an Ajami phenomena. Add egyptians and Andulusis to the mix and you have a potpourri of philosophies, many of which endured, some as `deviant` as the ex-fatimids Druzes`, and some as puritanical as latter day wahabis..

Thanks for taking the time to write about this subject Rasheed Talib.

There is a little bit more to it than this but with the taking over of

``Islamic`` activism by fascists in the past few decades, thanks in part

to the assistance provided to them by the West, Islam has become

a profession instead of a religion.

It is time we go back to religion again.


Ras