Muslims believe that Allah is one.

Muslims believe that Allah is one. He has no partner or children. He is the beginning and he is the end. He is omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent. The qur’an says that he is closer to man than his jugular vein, but he cannot be seen by eyes or encompassed by human intellect.

In a supplication, Imam Ali says: "Oh God, verily I ask Thee by Thy Name, in the name of Allah, the All-merciful, the All-compassionate, O the Possessor of Majesty and Splendour, the Living, the Self-subsistent, the Eternal, there is no God other than Thee. " Divine justice: Among Divine attributes the Shi’a put a great emphasis on His justice. Of course, all Muslims believe that God is just (adil), in that God never commits any injustice towards His servants, and He never oppresses any one.

This fact is clearly expressed by the Qur’an: God is not in the least unjust to the servants. (3:182 & 8:51 & 22:10) Your Lord is not in the least unjust to the servants. (41:46) I am not in the least unjust to the servants. (50:29) Surely God does not do injustice to the weight of an atom. (4:40) Surely God does not do any injustice to men, but men are unjust to themselves.

(10:44) [^2] In addition to the importance of Divine justice in itself, the other reason for the emphasis on this doctrine by the Shi’a, is that the Ash’arites, a group of Sunni theologians, believe that there is no objective criteria for morally right or wrong acts. Good is what God acts or whatever is commanded by God. Therefore, whatever God acts or commands is good and just by definition.

They believe that if God had asked us to tell lies telling lies would have become good and if God were to send the pious people to hell that would be just. Of course, they believe that God never does such acts, not because they are wrong in themselves, but because in practice He has said that those acts are wrong. Ash’arites also believe that human beings do not have free-will and it is God who creates their acts without them having any role therein. They are only receptacles of Divine acts.

The Shi’a and some other Sunni theologians, such as the Mu’tazilites, believe that good and bad, or right and wrong are objective, and that there are rational criteria for moral judgements. In other words, they believe in intrinsic goodness and badness. They believe that in reality there is a difference between, say, justice and oppression and it is not arbitrary that God has commanded us to be just and not to oppress anyone even our enemies.