ভূমিকা

Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books Knowing Islamic Sciences [theology (kalaam)] Lesson Six: The Ash’arites As we have already explained in the previous lessons that the ideas that led to the emergence of the Mutazilite School of Thought can be traced back to the second half of the first century of the Islamic era. In an attempt to understand the fundamentals of religion and propagating them, they advocated an approach that was a mixture of logic and deduction.

It goes without saying that the first parameter in this approach was giving precedence to the independent judgement of reason over any other thing. It is obvious too that the wider general public are not concerned with reasoning and examination, considering “practicing religion” synonymous to “worship”, and the manifest, or exoteric, meaning of Qur’anic verses and hadiths (Prophetic traditions), especially the latter, as a forgone conclusion.

They even believe that any reasoning or exerting effort in this regard is a kind of rebellion against religiousness. This is particularly so, when the ruling establishment encourages this type of thinking; more so, if some of the clergy are proponents of such strand of ideas, and worse still if some are pseudo-clerics. Examples of these abound.

The intolerance shown, and harsh smear campaigns waged, by the Ikhbaris [a Shia sect that depends solely on reported tradition (Akhbar) in formulating its juridical rulings ] against the fundamentalists and the mujtahids [jurists, who depend on reason, in addition to other tools of jurisprudence, such as the Qur’an, and Sunna “Prophetic tradition”, in arriving at religious judgements ] is one such example.

Another is the attack by some jurists and speculative theologians on the philosophers in the Islamic world. The Mu’tazilites had made great leaps in understanding Islam, propagating and defending it against the Dahriyeen [ proponents of the doctrine of the eternity of the world, a materialistic, atheistic trend in medieval Islam ], Jews, Christians, Magians, Sabians, and others. They were responsible for educating scores of propagators and sending them far and wide to promote Islam.

They, nevertheless, were threatened from within the camp of Islam at the hands of Dhahirites, i.e. Ahlul Hadith , or Ahlus Sunna . They were fatally stabbed in the back, so much so that they waned and eventually died out. In the beginning, i.e.