This entry focuses on the historical sources and formative moments inthe development of Islamic theology and philosophy of religion. Whilemost of the thinkers and ideas are from the classical period of Islam(ca. 800–1300) in a few cases we have extended our survey to theseventeenth century to include influential post-classical thinkers,like Mulla Ṣadrā. Despite this limitation, the periodcovered was one of the most intellectually robust periods in thedevelopment of Islamic philosophy of religion. While most of thetopics covered in this entry are common to philosophy ofreligion—such as the existence of God, God’s relation tothe cosmos, the issue of evil and the like—Muslims and thoseunder the influence of Islam frequently imprinted these issues withtheir own unique stamp. Such unique moments include the thoroughlydeveloped occasionalism of Muslim theologians, the development byphilosophers and theologians of a Necessary Being theology and evenframing the problem of evil differently from the one frequently seenamong contemporary western philosophers of religion.

• 1. Faith and Reason
  • 1.1 Reason and religious knowledge
  • 1.2 The role of reason in justifying specific beliefs
    • 1.2.1 Reason and justified religious beliefs
    • 1.2.2 Reason and interpreting (taʾwīl) religious sources
  • 1.3 Conflicts between religious teachings and science/philosophy
• 2. Proofs for the existence of God (Allah)
  • 2.1 An argument from temporal coming-to-be (hudūth)
  • 2.2 An argument from necessity/possibility (wujūb/imkān)
  • 2.3 An argument from knowledge by presences (ʿilm ḥuḍūrī)
• 3. God and the universe: creation and conservation/maintenance of the universe
  • 3.1 Creation
    • 3.1.1 Creation as emanation (fayḍ)
    • 3.1.2 Creation as origination (ịdāth) after non-existence
    • 3.1.3 Creation as manifestation (maẓhir) of a single reality
  • 3.2 God’s conservation of the universe
    • 3.2.1 Essential causation and providence
    • 3.2.2 Occasionalism
• 4. Prophecy and Miracles
  • 4.1 Prophecy
  • 4.2 Miracles
• 5. The Problem of evil
• 6. Religious/theological language
  • 6.1 Early approaches to theological language
  • 6.2 Theological language and the divine attributes
    • 6.2.1 The Muʿtazilites and theological language
    • 6.2.2 Ashʿarites/Maturidites and theological language
    • 6.2.3 Philosophers and theological language
• 7. Ethics in Islam
  • 7.1 The Muʿtazilites on the morally right and wrong (al-ḥusn wa-l-qubḥ)
  • 7.2 Responses to the Muʿtazilites
• Bibliography
  • Primary Sources
  • Secondary Sources
• Academic Tools
• Other Internet Resources
• Related Entries

1. Faith and Reason

A foundational question in the philosophy of religion concerns therelation between faith and reason. As with perhaps all religions, thespectrum of Muslim responses is broad. Before looking at theseresponses, it is important to note that ‘reason’ is usedin two distinct senses. In one sense, reason refers to the ability,power or faculty by which we understand, judge and explain things.Reason in this sense corresponds with our intellect(ʿaql). In a second sense, reason refers to thephilosophical and scientific explanations and theories about thethings that the intellect understands, judges and explains. In thissense, reason corresponds with science or philosophy. Analogously,‘faith’ has at least two meanings. In one sense, it mayrefer to an epistemic notion and mean to believe or to trust insomething, perhaps uncritically (taqlīd), usually basedon the authority of some (religious) source. In a second sense, faithmay refer to a particular religion, understood as the body ofknowledge encompassed in one’s sacred scriptures and religioustraditions as in the sense of the ‘Islamic faith’. Thesedifferent senses of reason and faith in turn give rise to no less thanthree distinct questions concerning what the relation between faithand reason is:

1. What role, if any, does the unaided human intellect play inacquiring religious knowledge?
2. What role, if any, does the intellect play in justifying specificbeliefs?
3. How should one reconcile conflicts between one’s religiousbelief and the finding of one’s best science or philosophicalsystem?

As one may expect, these questions were raised and debated in theIslamicate world.

1.1 Reason and religious knowledge

The first way that the faith-reason question may be understoodinvolves the extent, if any, to which the unaided human intellect candiscover the various claims of a religion, whether theological orethical. In answer to this question, Muslim philosophers andtheologians defended three major positions. One is that unaided humanreason is sufficient to reach true knowledge about what can (or needsto) be known about God and our moral duties. A second position is thatunaided reason can discover at least the basic claims of a religion,like God exists and is absolutely perfect, but this basic knowledgemust be augmented by truths that only a prophet can provide. The thirdposition is that human reason cannot reach the knowledge that religionprovides, and so a religious source is required for true knowledgeabout God and what God demands of us.

A purported representative of the first position is the physician andphilosopher Abū Bakr al-Rāzī (865–925; see entryonal-Rāzī). He is reported to have held that human reason is sufficient tounderstand all that is necessary for a devout life, and thus scriptureis at best superfluous and at worse deceptive and a source ofdissension (A. H. RāzīProofs of Prophecy: 2.1 and5.1, pp. 24–6 & 131–4). This is an extreme position.^[1] At the other extreme some Muslim scholars in general dismissed theuse of unaided reason in religious matters. There must be religiousauthority in the form of a prophet who teaches others what they shouldknow about God and who establishes rules that must be observed inindividual and social life. Such a position not only dismissedindependent reasoning about one’s religion, but also discouragedmetaphorical interpretations of sacred writ. Between these extremes,Muslim philosophers and theologians believed that while there is aplace for unaided reason in acquiring certain religious beliefs, aneed for scripture is also essential to that understanding, albeitthey disagreed about the nature and extent of that need. Let us beginwith the position of most of the Muslim philosophers.

Philosophers most generally defended the view that at leastindividuals of sufficient intellect could independently acquire aknowledge of all the fundamental claims of religion.They maintainedthat non-philosophers who constitute the majority of people, incontrast, must rely on religious sources. Those sources, however, thephilosophers continue, ultimately agree with what can be rationallyknown, albeit in a way that describes philosophically correct views inmetaphors and symbols so as to be accessible to the masses. One mayinclude al-Fārābī (d. 950), Ibn Sīnā (orAvicenna, d. 1037), Ibn Ṭufayl (d. 1185) and Ibn Rushd (orAverroes, d. 1198) among these philosophers.

Fārābī appears to be the originator of the general viewof the Muslim philosophers (FārābīPerfectState: 276–85 &al-Milla & b, ¶¶4–6). Humans divided into three classes based on theirintellectual capacities. One class is persuaded of divine truthssolely on the basis of demonstrative proofs. These proofs produce abelief that is certain and are discovered independent of scripture.The second class is persuaded on the basis of dialectical proofs.These proofs produce a belief that is highly probable, and soscripture is necessary to confirm the true beliefs and correct anyfalse ones. The final and the most numerous class consists of thosewho are easily persuaded by rhetorical proofs involving images thathold out threats of torment for non-belief and promises of pleasuresfor belief. Scripture is of most use for this class, for it provides asimplified version of the religious truths necessary for a devoutlife, but now put into a language that captures the imagination ofeven the most dull-witted. Thus, Fārābī’sposition has two elements:

1. the truths relevant to religion can be rationally known, andyet
2. religious authority is also needed, albeit not by all.

Fārābī’s view can be found in IbnṬufayl’s philosophical novelḤayy ibnYaqẓān (HIY, especially 161–5). The novelrelates the story of a child raised by a deer on a desert island, andwhat he was able to learn through unaided reason, and then hissubsequent encounter with a religious community. The story concludeswith the protagonist resigning himself to the fact that some people donot want to be intellectually challenged. Ibn Rushd also endorsesFārābī’s tripartite division of humanity in hislegal treatise,The Decisive Treatise (Ibn RushdDecisive: 1–12, esp. 8).

Some theologians gave a similar, but different, answer to thisquestion. They asked whether one who is mentally sound and has reachedthe age of discernment is accountable before God for their religiousbeliefs and practices, even if they have never heard the message ofIslam. Answering this question, the Muʿtazilite theologian,al-Qādī ʿAbd al-Jabbār (d. 1025) and AbūManṣūr al-Māturīdī (d. 944), the eponymousfounder of the Māturīdī school of theology, held thatindividuals at the age of discernment are responsible in believing,for example, that God exists, that God is just, that God sendsmessengers, that there is life after death and that one should lead amorally good life (ʿAbd al-Jabbār SUK: 62–8,122–4, 563–6 and Māturīdī KT: 3–7,156–62; also see Hourani 1971: 129–39). A common positionamong later Māturīdī and Ashʿarī theologiansslightly modified this view: In addition to the fundamental truthsabout God and his relation to the world just mentioned, human reasoncan verify that Muhammad was a genuine prophet. Having verifiedMuhammad’s prophecy, one now can go on to endorse all the claimsrevealed in the Qur’an, which is different than merely‘believing by faith’ (taqlīd) since theacceptance of the Quranic claims are grounded in an initial proof forthe veracity of the Qur’an as a revelatory source of knowledge(Nasafī TA: II 12–28; JuwaynīProofs,165–7; GhazālīModeration, treatises3–4; also see Frank 1989).

1.2 The role of reason in justifying specific beliefs

The first faith-reason issue concerned the role, if any, of unaidedreason in understanding general religious claims. The second issueconcerns the role of reason relative to a specific religion and hastwo parts: (1) the role of reason in having a justified belief inone’s specific religion, like Islam, and (2) the role of reasonin interpreting a specific religion’s sacred sources. As onemight expect, this second set of issues is closely tied to the first.Consequently, the various responses to the second issue frequentlymirror those to the first, albeit with additional nuances.

1.2.1 Reason and justified religious beliefs

Muslim philosophers and Muʿtazilite theologians, might broadly bedescribed as evidentialists. They held that reason, in the form ofrational first principles or proofs based upon them, is essential forjustified beliefs, even those found in religion, although in nuancedways. As for the philosophers, only those who have demonstrativeproofs of their beliefs are rationally and truly justified in thosebeliefs. As for non-philosophers, insofar as they accept a‘true’ religion—i.e., one that the philosopher wouldaccept on the basis of demonstration—and they do so based uponeither highly probably opinions or images from sacred texts thatsymbolically capture truths that philosophers demonstrate, members ofthese other two classes are likewise justified, to the extent thatthey can be, in their beliefs.

In addition to knowledge of certain general religious claims, someMuʿtazilite theologians extended this general knowledge tospecific credal beliefs (Frank 1978, esp. 124–9). Their strategywas to observe that having come to recognize that God exists and hascertain attributes, one should further speculate about what God wantsfrom us. This speculation leads to certain general ethical axioms;however, more importantly, it leads to the belief that such a wise andpowerful being would send a messenger, that is, a prophet, to make thedivine intentions known. Once one has reached this point, one would bemotivated to seek out self-proclaimed prophets and test them. Uponhaving tested a prophet and identifying them as a true prophet, thenanything based upon that prophetic message would also be rationallyjustified.

Muslim theologians who denied or limited the role of reason werepresented with a problem. Muslim philosophers and Muʿtazilitetheologians maintained, to varying degrees, something like thefollowing Evidentialist Premise:

(EP)

One is rationally justified in one’s belief (as opposed tobelieving out of fear, believing arbitrarily or even because it isabsurd) if and only if one has a reason for that belief that appealsto the human intellectual capacity to acquire the truth about thesubject of that belief.

The philosophers and certain theologians leveled a challenge againstthe Ashʿarites, Maturidites and more traditional theologians likeAḥmad Ibn Ḥanbal (d. 855). Since with few exceptions theselatter held that reason is limited in its capacity to acquire thosetruths or even is incapable, these thinkers either cannot berationally justified in their beliefs or at best they are onlypartially justified. Moreover, if one holds a belief without somerational justification, it appears as if one holds that beliefarbitrarily or even irrationally.

There were varying responses to this challenge. At the core of theseresponses, often, is simply a denial of (EP). The theologians’denial, however, is not obviously arbitrary or irrational, as theynote, since (EP) assumes that humans have the intellectual capacity toacquire the truth about either general or specific religious beliefs,and yet this issue is the very one at stake. In some cases, thesetheologians suggested alternative models of justification. Forexample, Imām al-Ḥaramayn al-Juwaynī (d. 1085) appearsto have had a coherentist theory of justification, at least withrespect to prophecy (JuwaynīProofs, 165–7; alsosee Siddiqui 2019: ch. 4). For Juwaynī, while reason alone isunable to acquire the tenets of Islam, that inability does not makethose tenets irrational, in the sense of being contrary to reason;rather, upon hearing the tenets, one determines that they are at leastcoherent in which case one is justified in believing them.

1.2.2 Reason and interpreting (taʾwīl) religious sources

The second aspect to the question of what role reason plays injustifying specific beliefs concerns hermeneutics, namely, what is therole of reason in interpreting one’s own sacred sources, likethe Qur’an and sayings of the prophet Muhammad? Within thecontext of Islam, the issue is whether a Muslim must take theQur’an and prophetic traditions at face-value or should usecertain interpretative tools, such as metaphorical readings andanalogical reasoning, when approaching scripture and propheticsayings. On one side, there are positions like that ofFārābī. True religious beliefs are the symbolicexpressions of the philosophical truths that philosophy and scienceprovide. Hence when there is a divergence between philosophicaltheories and religious teachings, one should keep in mind thatreligious texts are not literal expressions of the truth and perhapsmore like ‘noble lies’ (FārābīPerfectState: 276–85). On the other side of this issue, there isthe legal theorist Ibn Ḥanbal, who is usually associated withthe position that only the Qur’an and the sayings of Muhammadare sufficient and necessary for an intellectually completeunderstanding of God, the world and our place in it. Moreover, onemust simply accept the claims of these sources as literally true, eventhe most anthropomorphic ones about God and the divine attributes,such as those about the hands of God, God’s speech and that Godis seated or established on the Throne. Between these two positionsthere were a host of intermediate views.

For example, the Ashʿarīte theologian, AbūḤāmid al-Ghazālī (d. 1111), made room for ametaphorical interpretation (taʾwīl) of certainpassage from the Qur’an and the sayings of the prophets. Inparticular Ghazālī maintained that literal anthropomorphicdescriptions of God, particularly ones ascribing to God a body, had tobe rejected and interpreted metaphorically. Thus, inOn Moderationof Belief (I, 8), he divides Muslims into the general public andthe scholars. The general public should be disabused of anyanthropomorphic reading of God in the Qur’an, and if they askwhat such verses and sayings mean, they simply should be told it isnot theirs to investigate such matter. In contrast, Ghazālīcontinues, it is suitable for the scholar to pursue and to understandmetaphorically Qur’anic passages, such as “The Merciful isseated/established on (istawā ʿalā) theThrown” (20:5, trans. by authors), which suggest that God has abody or at least is localized in some specific place. ForGhazālī it is unthinkable that the Qur’an couldcontain contradictions, and yet he believes that he can rationallyprove that anything bodily must be subject to temporal becoming,whereas God cannot be subject to temporal becoming. Consequently, forGhazālī no bodily state can literally be ascribed of God onpain of contradiction and yet again the Qur’an is free of anycontradiction. In general, Ghazālī claims that any religiousclaims that “the intellect judges impossible” (māqaḍā al-ʿaql bi-istiḥālatihi) must beinterpreted metaphorically.

Ironically, the philosopher Ibn Rushd, who was a critic ofGhazālī, shared a similar view. In his legal work theDecisive Treatise (Ibn RushdDecisive: §III.B),he notes that Islamic religious sources either treat some givensubject of a demonstration or they do not. If the religion does notspeak to a given subject, the demonstrated conclusion should not be amatter of religious dispute and one is free to hold the position. Ifthe Islamic sources do treat a given subject of demonstration, thenthe two either agree or disagree. If they agree, then again thereshould be no religious dispute. If, however, there is a disagreementbetween the literal sense of the religious sources and the conclusionof a demonstration, then those intellectually capable can applymetaphorical interpretation to reconcile the conflict.

The issue is how to determine which Qur’anic passages andprophetic statements must be taken literally and which onesmetaphorically. Ibn Rushd’s view concerning theoretical matterstreated in religion, though not in practical and ethical issues, isthat there simply is no consensus (ijmāʿ). Muslimscholars, for Ibn Rushd, simply do not universally agree as to whichscriptures and traditions must be taken literally and which can betaken metaphorically. Hence, there is no religious basis forprecluding metaphorical interpretation of any text or prophetic sayingtreating theoretical issues whose apparent meaning conflicts with ademonstration. The only obligation on the religious scholar is that hemust not share metaphorical interpretations of sacred sources withthose who are incapable of grasping a demonstration. The greatestproponent of Islamic philosophical mysticism, Ibn ʿArabī (d.1240), also shared this inclusive view of scripture’s intendedmeaning. For him, every word, verse and chapter of the Qur’anhave an indefinite number of senses and interpretations, and Godintended all of them. Thus, in theMeccan Revelations, hewrites,

When a meaning repeats itself for someone who is reciting theQur’an, he has not recited it as it should be. This is proof ofhis ignorance. (cited in Chittick 2005: 18 = (Ibn al-ʿArabīal-Futūḥāt
al-Makkiyya (a), IV, 367.3)

1.3 Conflicts between religious teachings and science/philosophy

The third faith-reason issue involves responses to apparent conflictsbetween the teachings of one’s specific religion and thepurported demonstrated conclusions of one’s best science orphilosophical account. At the heart of this issue is the notion ofdemonstration (burhān). A demonstration proceeds frompurportedly absolutely certain, necessary and true first principlesfrom which one validly deduces some conclusion. Since the conclusionvalidly follows from purportedly absolutely certain, necessary andtrue premises, the conclusion is likewise absolutely certain,necessary and true (see Fārābī’s account ofcertainty = MR07: 63–6; also see Black 2006). Since, for thephilosophers, the conclusions of demonstration are certain andnecessarily true, any claim apparently contradicting a demonstratedconclusion cannot be literally true. Yet, within Islamic authoritativesources there are claims that are at odds with some of thephilosophers’ purported demonstrative conclusions. Few Muslimphilosophers were willing to say that the Qur’an and the sayingsof the prophets are simply false. Instead, many philosophers appealedto their epistemic hierarchy of human intellectual capacities seenabove. For them, both Islamic religious sources and demonstratedconclusion at heart express the same truth, although expresseddifferently depending upon the intended audience.

Even if some theologians recognized the difficulty with taking allreligious statements literally, there still was pushback against thephilosophers and particularly their unquestioning faith in‘demonstrative’ conclusions. Thus, several Muslimtheologians, like Ghazālī, ʿAbd al-KarīmShahrastānī (d. 1153) and Fakhr al-Dīnal-Rāzī (d. 1210), to name a few, took it upon themselves tofamiliarize themselves with the philosophers’ demonstrativemethod and show that even by the philosophers’ own standardsthey had not demonstrated their conclusions.

Ghazālī’sIncoherence of the Philosophers(Tahāfut al-falāsifa) provides an excellent exampleof this approach. There he vigorously criticizes thephilosophers’ attempts to demonstrate twentyphilosophical-theological theses, arguing that in all cases the proofsfall short of true demonstration. His strategy is to call intoquestion the supposedly self-evident, certain and necessary characterof the premises used in the philosophers’ proofs. He does so byarguing that either those premises fail to have these characteristicsand so are not first principles or, if a premise is not a firstprinciple, the philosophers have failed to demonstrate thepremise’s necessity. While Ghazālī believes that on atleast three counts the philosophers’ positions lead to unbelief,on several other issues he accepts the conclusion of the philosopherseven while denying their demonstrative character.

Ghazālī’s general concern in both theIncoherence and other works where he criticizes thephilosophers is their claim to having demonstrated truths of religionindependent of sacred sources. That is because this position,complains Ghazālī, has led some of those with lesserintellects to accept the philosophers’ arguments uncritically,and so think that they can dispense with religion and religioussources (GhazālīDeliverance, 60–70,83–6 andIncoherence, religious preface andintroduction 4). Ghazālī’s own position is that whilethere is a duty to provide a rational defense of the basic tenets ofone’s religion, this duty falls only on those intellectuallysuited and religiously trained and must be prohibited of those wholack this training (GhazālīModeration,introductions 1–3).

2. Proofs for the existence of God (Allāh)

Among the basic religious beliefs that some Muslim theologians andphilosophers thought that reason alone could establish is theexistence of God. To this end various, Muslim thinkers developeddifferent proofs as well as criticisms of each other’sarguments. Here we consider three such arguments and sets ofobjections: the argument from temporal coming-to-be, the argument fromthe nature of necessity and possibility/contingency and the argumentfrom knowledge by presence.

2.1 An argument from temporal coming-to-be (hudūth)

Muslim theologians, that is, proponents of kalām, and evencertain philosophers like as Abū Yūsuf al-Kindī (d. ca.866), had several arguments for the existence of God, all of which insome way appeal temporal coming-to-be (see, for example,Ashʿarī TAAT: 6–8; JuwaynīProofs,9–16; GhazālīModeration, 27–41;ShahrastānīSumma, 1–25) and which fall underthe umbrella expression, ‘kalām cosmologicalargument’. William Lane Craig has defended and brought to theattention of contemporary philosophers of religion the kalāmcosmological argument (see section in entry oncosmological arguments). In its simplest form, the argument runs like this:

1. Everything that begins to exist after not havingexisted has a cause for its existence.
2. The world began to exist after not havingexisted.
3. Therefore, the world has a cause for itsexistence, which is God.

Premise (1) is just a particular instance of the general principle that nothingcomes from nothing. Within the medieval Islamic world, the principleis associated with the notion of preponderation(tarjīḥ), which at least within the context of thekalām cosmological argument, states that for any action, motionor change some cause or reason exist for that action or change.

The more controversial premise is(2), for unlike the theologians, certain philosophers, likeFārābī, Ibn Sīnā and Ibn Rushd, maintainedthat the world has existed infinitely into the past. Consequently,these philosophers reject the world’s coming to exist after somepoint of not having existed. The theologians’ response waseither simply to claim that the intellect asserts that the existenceof an infinity is rationally impossible or to show that positing aninfinity leads to consequences known to be rationally impossible.Those who took the latter strategy drew upon the arguments of the lateNeoplatonic Christian philosopher, John Philoponus (d. 570; see entryonPhiloponus). Two examples should provide a sense of the general strategy.

First, according to the astronomy of the time, the world consists ofthe Earth, which was thought to be (approximately) at the center ofthe cosmos, and the various celestial bodies—the Moon, Sun, fivevisible planets and stars—that were believed to orbit the Earth.Now, assume that the world has existed infinitely into the past. Inthat case, the various celestial bodies that apparently orbit theEarth would have all made an infinite number of revolutions; however,the celestial bodies have different periods. For instance, the Moonorbits the earth approximately once a month, that is, twelve times ayear, while the apparent revolution of the Sun is only once a year.Consequently, while the Sun has made an infinite number of apparentrevolutions around the Earth, the Moon has made twelve times therotations of the Sun, that is, twelve times infinity, and so seeminglya greater number than that of the Sun. Since it is assumed that thereis nothing greater than infinity, reason recoils at the notion of anumber greater than that which nothing is greater. The theologians,then, conclude that the assumption of the world’s existinginfinitely into the past leads to absurdity and so must berejected.

Philosophers who accepted the eternity of the world rejected thisargument, claiming that the infinity in question is only a potentialinfinity and not an actual one, that is, one in which all the membersof an actually infinite set would presently exist. As such, theycontinued, there does not exist actual sets of revolutions that can becompared, which had led to the absurdity. The theologians’second kind of argument cuts off this form of escape. First, they notethat for the philosophers, species are eternal, that is, for example,there have always existed human into the infinite past and there willalways exists humans into the infinite future. They then continue thatthe leading philosophers, like Ibn Sīnā, believe that theyhave demonstrated that the human soul continues to exist after thedeath of the body.^[2] In that case, if the world together with the human species existedinfinitely into the past, then even if only one human a day were todie, there would presently and actually exist an infinite number ofhuman souls, and that number would increase infinitely as humans diedmoving into the infinite future. In short, the distinction betweenpotential and actual infinities does not save the philosophers fromthe purportedly absurd consequences. Thus, the assumption that theworld has existed infinitely into the past must be rejected.Consequently, the world must have begun to exist after not havingexisted, and so the second premise of the kalām cosmologicalargument is secured.

We set aside the philosophers’ defense(s) of the thesis that theworld always has existed infinitely into the past and merely note thatthis issue was one of the most vigorously debated one betweentheologians and philosophers in the Islamicate world.

2.2 An argument from necessity/possibility (wujūb/imkān)

Certainly, one of the most discussed arguments for the existence ofGod in the medieval Islamic world was Ibn Sīnā’sBurhān al-Siddīqīn, which can be translated as‘the demonstration of the truthful’ (Avicennaal-Najāt, 261–5 & 271–3 = MR07:211–16 & ITN1: 4.16–20; see also Morewedge 1979; Mayer2001; McGinnis 2010b: 163–8; Byrne 2019 and Zarepour 2022). IbnSīnā’s proof is unique in that it does not appeal tothe impossibility of infinite causal series, as most cosmologicalarguments, and even entertains the possibility of an actual infinityof causes existing simultaneously, although the argument ultimatelyshows that such a causal series is impossible. Additionally, it showsthat the world is causally dependent upon God for its existence atevery moment that it exists, even infinitely into the past.

The proof is embedded within Ibn Sīnā’s own modalmetaphysics (see entry onIbn Sīnā’s metaphysics). He began by laying out the logical space when considering existents,and conceptually distinguishes between a necessary existent throughitself (wājib al-wujūd bi-dhātihi) and apossible or contingent existent through itself (mumkinal-wujūd bi-dhātihi). The necessary existent throughitself would be an entity whose existence is self-explaining and soexists simply on account of what it is—it cannot not exist. Incontrast, a possible existent in itself exists on account of somethingother than itself (bi-ghayrihi)—it can not exist, andso there is something other that explains why it exists when it does.Again, these distinctions are merely the logically possible ways ofthinking of existents. We can safely take it that at least somethings, perhaps all things, are possible existents in themselves, forcertainly most things around us, considered in themselves, areindifferent to whether they exist or do not exist. The question iswhether the conceptual space of the necessary existent through itselfis empty or occupied.

To this question, Ibn Sīnā begins by considering what wouldeven count as such an existent. At least one feature of such anentity, Ibn Sīnā argues, is that it must be absolutelysimple. His argument assumes two modest mereological claims: one, awhole (jumla) exists through its parts and, two, parts areother than the whole. Now assume that the whole of the necessaryexistent through itself is not simple and so consists of parts. On thebasis of the first mereological assumption, if the whole of thenecessary existent through itself consisted of parts, then itsnecessary existence would bethrough those parts; however,from the second assumptions those parts areother than thewhole. Consequently, the whole of the necessary existent throughitself would be necessary through another. To be ‘throughanother’, however, is to be through what isnot itself.We have a contradiction: the whole of the necessary existentthrough itself existsthrough not itself. IbnSīnā concludes, the necessary existent through itself,should it exist, must be simple. Again, Ibn Sīnā is notclaiming that anything meets this description. He is merely describingwhat would count as a necessary existent through itself. It is stillan open question whether anything exists as absolutely simple andnecessary through itself.

With these preliminaries in place, we turn to IbnSīnā’s proof proper. Clearly, something,x,exists, and so must be either a necessary or a possible existentthrough itself—these exhaust the possibilities. Ifx isa necessary existent through itself, the argument is complete. Ifx is a possible existent through itself, then IbnSīnā asks us to considerx along with all and onlythe other possible existents through themselves,y,z … n, which currently exist. Let the whole of all andonly things that are possible existents in themselves beW.SinceW currently exists, it itself must be either anecessary or possible existent in itself, given IbnSīnā’s modal ontology.W cannot exist asnecessary through itself, since it consists of the partsx,y,z …n, which are possibleexistents, and as seen what is a necessary existent through itselfcannot have parts but is absolutely simple. Consequently,Wis possible through itself but exists through another. This other,o, either is included withinW or is outside ofW. Ifo is withinW, then, becauseo exists, it is either a necessary or a possible existentthrough itself. It cannot be a necessary existent through itself,sinceonly possible existents were included inW,and so there would be a contradiction. Likewise,o cannot bea possible existent through itself, for it is througho thatW and so all the members ofW exist, which includeso. Thus,o would exist through itself, and so wouldbe a necessary existent through itself. Even if one allowed circularcausation, which Ibn Sīnā subsequently rebuts,oultimately, albeit indirectly, still would be necessary throughitself. We assumed, however, thato was a possible existentthrough itself, a contradiction. Sinceo cannot exist inW either as a necessary or as a possible existent throughitself on pain of contradiction, and yet those are the onlyconceptually possible ways something can exist,o must existoutside ofW. SinceW included all and only possibleexistents through themselves, the only thing outside ofW isthe Necessary Existent through itself, which Ibn Sīnāidentified with God.

2.3 An argument from knowledge by presences (ʿilm ḥuḍūrī)

The discussion of proofs for the existence of God by Ṣadral-Dīn Muhammad Shīrāzī, simply known asMullā Ṣadrā (d. 1636), is very much embedded withinhis own process ontology (seesection on the proof in the entry on Mulla Sadra). That ontology itself is an outgrowth of his mystic-inspiredphilosophical vision of religion, which gives precedence to the directexperience or presence of God. While he believes that there is adefinite proof for God, he is skeptical of the earlier traditionalarguments for God. In most general terms, his concern with earlierproofs is that they all proceed from the existence of something otherthan God and then infer to the existence of God, and yet God is thevery ground for the existence of everything else. If anything, God isproof of that other. More specifically, Mullā Ṣadrācriticizes the fact that all earlier proofs begin with certainconcepts or essences, like necessity and possibility, which aremental, and then illicitly infer from concepts of things to theirexistence, which is extra-mental. This claim is even true for thekalām cosmological argument, which begins with the concept of‘the world’, and then from the assumption that thatconcept refers and so exists infers the existence of God. ForMullā Ṣadrā one simply cannot move from mere conceptsto existence—one must begin with existence itself—and soall of these earlier arguments fail.

Mullā Ṣadrā’s own ‘proof’ for theexistence of God is less a proof for God’s existence than apointer that directs one to an experience that one already has andthen clarifies that experience. It would be analogous to one who hasexperienced frogs, toads and salamanders, but then claims that theyhave never experienced an amphibian. The proof that one hasexperienced amphibians is to lead them to recognize that theirexperience of frogs, toads and salamanders is an amphibian-experience.In this vein, Mullā Ṣadrā draws on the Qur’anicverse—“God (Allāh) is witness that there is no godbut He” (Qur’an 3.18). He suggests that we all haveexperienced God, even if we have not recognized that the experience isabout God. That is because existence never can be negated or denied.For even if there is non-existence, there is a sense thatthereis something, and while as simple as it might be, that somethingexists. There simply cannotnot be existence arguesMullā Ṣadrā, and indeed the experience or knowledge ofthis existence is present to everyone. Nothing, then, stands aboveexistence (not even non-existence), and yet God just is that existenceabove which nothing stands. For Mullā Ṣadrā existenceis not something static but dynamic, a single reality that varies inintensity and modulation (tashkīk). God is existence atits greatest intensity and perfection. To be sure, while theexperience or beliefthat there is this existence is basicfor everyone, it is not necessary for everyone to experience thisexistenceas God. To be sure, recognizing this existenceas God might take long practice and training as prescribed bySufi masters. Still, one’s experience of this existence as Godand consequent belief that it is God, which follows upon a knowledgeby presence, is for Mullā Ṣadrā, properly basic and inneed of no further proof.

3. God and the universe: creation and conservation/maintenance of the universe

A question closely related to the existence of God is that ofGod’s relation to other existents, that is, the universe. Thereare two distinct but related aspects to this question. The first iswhether God is the cause of the universe’s existence, for therehave been thinkers, like Aristotle, who believe both that God (or atleast a first unmoved mover) exists and is related to the cosmos,while denying that God is the cause of the universe’s veryexistence. The question here is whether God is a creator. The secondaspect to the question of God’s relation to the universe assumesthat God is a creator and further asks, “What is God’simmediate and present causal relation to the universe?” Somethinkers, like deists, maintain that God creates the universe and thenproverbially steps back and lets the world continue on its own like awell-made clock. Others, in contrast, hold that at every moment thatthe world exists, it is causally and ontologically dependent uponGod’s conserving power and should God remove his proverbialhand, the cosmos would slip into nothingness and oblivion. Muslimphilosophers and theologians alike had decided views on both of theseissues.

3.1 Creation

Muslim theologians and philosophers, with rare exceptions, agreed thatGod is a creator and that the cosmos’ existence is in some waycausally dependent or grounded upon God. (Ibn Rush, who followsAristotle and denies that God is strictly an efficient cause of theworld, is clearly an outlier.) What was at issue among these thinkers,and where there was virulent disagreement, was the nature of thiscausal dependence and grounding. There were three competing models toexplain God’s divine creative act. Many, but not all,philosophers viewed the world as emanating or flowing(fayaḍān) from the very being of God. Theologiansas a group favored a model of temporal coming-to-be, occurrence ororigination (iḥdāth), which frequently resulted insome form of occasionalism. Finally, the third model presents creationas a manifestation (maẓhir) of one single reality, aparadigm that Sufis or thinkers with a mystical orientation mainlyupheld. Closely aligned with the nature of God’s causal relationto the world is the issue of the age of the universe, and particularlywhether the cosmos has existed infinitely into the past. While thequestion of the world’s age is not the primary focus here, aparticular answer to it frequently is tied to a given model of thedivine creative act. Let us consider each of these models.

3.1.1 Creation as emanation (fayḍ)

Many of the Muslim philosophers, although again not all, adopted someversion of creation by ‘emanation’ (fayḍ orfayaḍān) to explain God’s causal relation tothe universe. In general, the emanation thesis makes two claims:

1. that the universe proceeds from God eternally and
2. that God’s causation is mediated so that lower things comefrom higher ones, not directly from God.

The details of this general thesis frequently differed among differentthinkers. Here we consider the details of Ibn Sīnā’sversion of emanation.

We have seen Ibn Sīnā’s proof for the existence of theNecessary Existent through itself, which in effect shows that at anyinstant that the universe, understood as the whole of allpossible/contingent things, exists, God must be conserving it inexistence. We have also seen his proof for divine simplicity (see§2.2). Ibn Sīnā believes that these two doctrines further implythat God’s creative act must be eternal, and so likewise theeffect of that creative act must also be eternal. In that case, thecosmos, if not eternal, is at least sempiternal(sarmadī) and perpetual (dahr) (Acar 2010).While Ibn Sīnā has a number of independent proofs by whichhe argues that the world has always existed (Avicenna MetaH: 9.1 &PhysH: 3.11), one need merely consider how he conceives theworld’s relation to God and the nature of God’s creatingto grasp why he held this position. His account is embedded within hisdiscussion of God’s knowledge of the world (Avicenna MetaH: 8.6[6–22] & 8.7).

One of the divine attributes is knowledge. In human intellects,knowledge occurs when we interact with an already existing world, andthe things in the world in some way act upon our intellects so thatour potential to understand is realized and our intellect in a sensereceives some concept that it previously did not have. For numerousreasons such an account of intellect cannot apply to the deity. First,God is free of potentiality, inasmuch as potentiality refers tosomething possible or contingent, and God as the Necessary Existent initself is outside of the whole of possible existents. Second, if Godwere to receive anything, there would be both that which is receivedand what receives, and so God would be composite, which is impossiblegiven Ibn Sīnā’s doctrine of divine simplicity. Facedwith these issues Ibn Sīnā introduces a different model ofdivine knowledge, which additionally explains God’s creativeact.

According to Ibn Sīnā’s model, what God knows directlyand primarily is the divine self. Because God is perfect, and indeedabove perfection, God must know himself perfectly. In that case, hemust know that he is the ultimate cause and grounds of all existence,but in order to know a cause perfectly, one must likewise know theeffect of that cause perfectly, which just is the cosmos in this case.Unlike with human knowledge, where our knowledge of a thing,x, is in some waycaused byx’sexistence, in divine knowledge God’s knowledge ofxcausesx to exist. In other words, there emanates fromGod’s self-knowledge the very existence of the cosmos, which IbnSīnā identifies with the order of the good. Since Godexisted infinitely into the past and will exist infinitely into thefuture and is always self-knowing, the emanation of the cosmos mustlikewise have existed infinitely into the past and will continueinfinitely into the future.

Not merely does Ibn Sīnā think that God must createeternally, he also thinks it is all but heresy(ilḥād) to claim that God started to create atsome first moment in the finite past (Avicenna PhysH: 3.11 [9]). Thatis because if God were not creating the cosmos eternally, there wouldbe some time when the divinity is not willing the creation of theworld and some time when it is willing the creation of the world.Consequently, there would be a change in the divine will, and so Godwould have changed. Whatever is subject to change, Ibn Sīnācontinues, must be composite in some way, for there is that whichperdures throughout the change and that which is either lost or comesto be. The idea of temporal creation is thus incompatible with divinesimplicity, and to adopt it is for Ibn Sīnā is to forgo thedoctrine of God’s oneness/uniqueness(tawḥīd), which is central to Islam.

There is one further point about Ibn Sīnā’s conceptionof God’s relation to creation that should be made, namely, theextent to which Ibn Sīnā’s deity creates as an act ofvolition. For Ibn Sīnā a willful agent (1) recognizes theaction it is doing, (2) is not forced to act and (3) is content orsatisfied (riḍan) with its action (Avicenna MetaH: 9.4[3]). Ibn Sīnā distinguishes an act of will from either anact of intention (qaṣd) or an act of nature(ṭabʿ). God’s act is not by way of nature,since such actions proceed from the agent independent of knowledge andconsent, and yet there is nothing about the Necessary Existing throughitself that it does not perfectly know and to which it does notperfectly consent. Ibn Sīnā likewise denies that God actsintentionally. That is because intentional actions involve theagent’s conceptualizing some good, then a separate act ofacquiring that good and finally the good that is acquired.Consequently, only an agent who is composite and not simple acts outof intention, but again Ibn Sīnā’s deity is absolutelysimple. These considerations likewise explain why for IbnSīnā, God’s creating does not, and indeed cannot,require choice among options, and yet it is a free act of the will. Itis a free, precisely because God knows he is creating, consents tothat creation and in no way is forced to create.

3.1.2 Creation as origination (ịdāth) after non-existence

The theologians were not impressed with the emanationist account ofGod’s creative act. Despite Ibn Sīnā’s move tore-interpret volitional action, emanation seemed to the theologians tobe little more than an act of nature, as if the sun were to know andto be glad that it shines, but also having no choice in the matter. Afree act of the will, they maintained, essentially involves choice,and so any action not involving choice is not free. The theologianswere likewise not impressed with arguments from simplicity thatconcluded that if God were to choose, God would not be simple. Forsome of them, like the early Ghazālī, were happy to deny thestrong conception of divine simplicity, which many philosophersfavored, since it seemed contrary to their belief that God has anumber of distinct divine attributes, like life, power, knowledge andwill (McGinnis 2022).

A potentially serious challenge to the theologians came in explaininga change in the divine will, namely, the change fromwilling-not-to-create to willing-to-create. The issue now is whatcaused that change in God, for if God is the Cause of causes, thennothing outside of God could explain that change of will, whereas ifcreating is essential to God, it is no longer clear how thetheologians’ position substantially differs from some version ofemanation. Ghazālī provided what becomes the standardAshʿarite theological response: From all eternity God freelywilled the creation of the world at the moment that it comes to be(GhazālīIncoherence, disc. 1, [13]). Thus, if oneimagines the whole of time as forming a timeline, where God creates atsome given moment,t then at every moment on that timeline,God wills the creation of the world att. Of course, Godcould have willed from all eternity to create at some moment otherthant or indeed not to create at all. Regardless of thecase, there would have been no change in the divine will.

There was push back against this account of the immutability ofGod’s eternal will from multiple directions, perhaps the mostpressing is that it only changes the focus of the original concern,namely that there still must be a cause of God’s willing somegiven moment to be the first moment of creation. More specifically,assume that God eternally willed to create our universe some fourteenbillion years ago. Of course, if God is truly omnipotent (and thisdivine attribute was non-negotiable for Ashʿarite theologians),then God eternally could have willed to create the world fifteen orsixteen billion years ago or even as early as ten-thousand years ago.Indeed, there are an infinite number of moments, all of which seemequally likely candidates for when God could have created our cosmos.Thus, either there is some cause for God’s choosing to create atthe moment he does or the choice is haphazard and random and so notthe act of an agent acting from knowledge. In short, either there is areason for God’s creating at the moment that he does—andso God’s action is caused—or there is no reason—andso God’s action is without reason, and so is irrational. Neitheroption seems appealing.

Ghazālī had a response, which again became the standard oneamong Ashʿarites (GhazālīIncoherence, disc. 1[45–6]). According to him, the essential function of the will issimply to choose among indiscernibles independent of any cause for theparticular choice made. Of course, there is a sense in which thechoice is ‘arbitrary’, but only in the sense that theaction is a result of the will and nothing else. The standard exampleof this point is that of a starving man presented with identicalpieces of food, who is also equally disposed to all of them, e.g., onepiece is not closer to the man nor is the man either left- orright-handed, etc. The man will certainly take one piece and eatdespite lacking any reason for taking that particular piece of food,and yet assuredly the act is one of a rational agent, for only animbecile under these circumstances would starve in indecision. Thisgeneral account of will holds not only for humans but also for God.Thus, maintained Ghazālī, from all eternity God wills tocreate (and so God’s will does not change), yet purely as an actof the will does God will to create at the particular moment that hedoes (for that, according to Ghazālī, is exactly what itmeans to be a rational volitional agent).

3.1.3 Creation as manifestation (maẓhir) of a single reality

A yet third way that the world’s dependence upon God wasenvisioned within the Islamicate world is that of MullāṢadrā, who drew inspiration from Ibn ʿArabī(Mullā ṢadrāPenetrations, 68–71; alsosee Rahman 1975: 59–63 and Kalin 2014: 104–19). MullāṢadrā’s account appeals to his theory oftashkīk al-wujūd (literally, ‘the ambiguityof existence’, but which contemporary scholar commonly label‘the modulation of existence’) as well as his novel notionof ‘substantial motion’ (al-ḥarakal-jawhariyya). (See thesection on monism and pluralism in the entry on Mulla Sadra.)

Both notions are complex and even to provide a general sense of howMullā Ṣadrā conceives God’s causal relation tocreation would be a move away from the philosophy of religion intogeneral metaphysics. Still, brief, even if inadequate, comments arewarranted. As for the modulation of existence, according to MullāṢadrā, God is existence at existence’s maximallyperfect, eternal and unchanging limit, and only God is perfect,infinite, eternal and unchanging. Creation is the manifestation ofexistence at degrees that fall short of the divine infinite existence.This is Mullā Ṣadrā’s doctrine of the‘modulation of existence’. MullāṢadrā’s doctrine of ‘substantial motion’complements this ontology. It is the idea that all changes, whetherchange of location, state or the like, are ultimately the result ofcontinuous change in the very substance and essences of things. Thisview is radical in that Mullā Ṣadrā is suggesting thatabsolutely nothing persist through change. There are no perduringmatter, forms, species and essences. Everything, apart from God, is ina constant state of evolution. Not random evolution, to be sure, butunceasing evolution directed toward God with creation forever becomingmore godlike.

Given the doctrines of the modulation of existence and substantialmotion, Mullā Ṣadrā offers a unique response to thequestion of the world’s age. Since the very substances andessences of things are in a state of constant change, nothing otherthan God is eternal, existing infinitely into the past and into thefuture. Instead, everything other than God, and this includes theuniverse as a whole, comes to exist after not having existed. Thus,among created things there simply can be no existent, such as theuniverse itself, that has persisted infinitely into the past.Consequently, with the theologians, Mullā Ṣadrā agreesthat creation must be viewed in terms of temporal coming to be, in thesense of coming to be after not having existed. Be that as it may, hisconception of substantial motion also allows, in the spirit of theemanationists, that infinitely into the past and infinitely into thefuture God is the wellspring of existence constantly creating withcreation constantly evolving. Thus, while God’s creative act canbe eternal, nothing in the creaturely order, like matter, forms oressences, remains the same as to have always perdured.

3.2 God’s conservation of the universe

Muslim theologians and most, but not all, Muslim philosophers agreedthat the world cannot conserve its own existence and so its existenceat every moment that it exists is in some way dependent upon God. Thereal issue for these thinkers is what role, if any, do creatures playin the ongoing processes that constitute the world? Specifically, door can creatures have causal powers or is God not merely the Cause ofcauses but the only Cause? Broadly, there were three responses to thisquestion: that of the philosophers, which appeals to their theories ofessential causation in the form of emanation and natural causationamong creatures; that of the Muʿtazilite theologians, which tendstoward divine occasionalism yet reserved some causal efficacy forrational agents; and that of the Ashʿarites and Maturiditetheologians, which is also occasionalist, but reserves all or at leastvirtually all causal efficacy for God alone. Here we focus primarilyon the philosophers’ theory of essential causation and thetheory of occasionalism that the theologians shared.

3.2.1 Essential causation and providence

Philosophers such as Kindī, Fārābī, IbnSīnā and Ibn Rushd all adopted some form of essential ornatural causation, some more influenced by the Neoplatonicemanationist framework, others less influenced by that framework(Kindī RKF: 214–37 = MR07: 1–16;FārābīPerfect State, ch. 8; Avicenna PhysH:bk. 1.5 (= MR07: 156–63) & 1.9–12 and Ibn RushdMetaphysics, 105–12 &Questions,11–14). (Ibn Rushd explicitly rejected emanation, whether fromGod or from creatures, while allowing that creatures have naturalcausal powers, i.e., that their natures were the source of actionsthat are strictly speaking their own; see Kogan 1985, esp. ch. 3 and5.) For present purposes, we focus on Ibn Sīnā’semanationist-influenced theory of causation, since it would becomeboth the preferred approach of supporters as well as the preferredtarget of detractors in the post-Avicennan period. IbnSīnā’s proof for the existence of the NecessaryExistent through itself is set up in terms of explaining the existenceof the whole of all possible/contingent things that exist at any givenmoment. Given its setup, that proof likewise shows that theworld—understood as all the possible things that have, presentlydo or will exist—is dependent upon God as that which conservesit in existence at every moment that the world exists. The causalmechanism explaining this dependency relation again is emanation,where, on Ibn Sīnā’s own unique theory of emanation,it is a possible existent that emanates from the Necessary Existent initself.

Here it is worth noting that for many philosophers, while ultimatelyeverything in the world traces its existence back to the divineemanation, God is not theimmediate cause of everything.Instead, God is only the immediate cause of a single effect,identified with the First Intellect. Ibn Sīnā is adamant onthis point: ‘From the One only one proceeds’ (AvicennaMetaH: 9.4 [5]; also see Amin 2020 and Dadikhuda 2020). Still, fromthat one effect a plethora of effects, i.e., other possible existents,cascade downward, all of which are mediately but ultimately dependenton God for their conservation and their continued existence at everymoment that they exist. In other words, the created order overflowsfrom the Necessary Existent in coherent grades of existents, namely, ahierarchy of immaterial creatures, like intellects or angels, followedby the material realm. In each case the higher-grade functions as theimmediate causal principle of the next lower grade.

This emanationist cosmology is rooted in the Neoplatonic principlethat “every activity in the world is in some sense doubleinsofar as it possesses both an inner and an outer aspect” (seeentry onneoplatonism). The inner aspect is the thing’s nature, which is the principleand cause of those activities that are essential to being a certainkind of thing. For example, the inner activity of a tree, which thetree’s nature determines, gives rise to its producing the shape,leaves, fruit etc. specific to that kind of tree. Another commonexample is fire’s burning cotton, for fire’s nature is toburn, while cotton is of a nature that when in contact with fire, thecotton is burnt. Our world, for the philosophers, then, is a networkof possible existents each having causal powers specific to theirkind, all of which are ultimately dependent upon God for theirexistence.

Finally, while Ibn Sīnā insists that God is not acting withthe intention of the world’s good, our world still is thebeneficiary of God’s providence. That is because in knowinghimself God knows the order of the good in the most perfectly possibleway, and God’s self-knowledge, as seen in the discussion of IbnSīnā’s account of creations (see§3.1.1), is his very act of emanation. Consequently, what emanates from him isan order that is the most perfectly possible commensurate with thechain of possible existents. This optimal ordering of existents, whosereality is grounded in the Necessary Existent, just is, for IbnSīnā, providence (ʿināya).

Here it is certainly worth noting that, for Ibn Sīnā, andothers like Fārābī and Ibn Rushd (FārābīPerfect State, §§6–7, Avicenna MetaH: 8.6[6]–8.7 and Ibn RushdMetaphysicsad Textus51), God does not know particulars in their particularity, e.g., thatyou are reading this sentence at this very moment; rather, God knowsparticulars only universally. Moreover, God does not act for our sakesuch that our good is the final end of God’s creative act, eventhought we are the benefactors of the divine goodness(Fārābīal-Siyāsa, 47–8 = MR07:91–2 [¶¶ 31–2]; Avicenna MetaH: 8.3 [1–3]&al-Najāt, 146–9 = MR07: 216–19 and IbnRushdMetaphysicsad Textus 52). Despite thesecaveats, Ibn Sīnā believes that God’s universalknowledge is sufficient to ensure that

not even the weight of a dust speck, whether in the heavens or on theEarth, escapes your Lord’s notice (Qur’an 10:61).(Avicennaal-Najāt, 247 = MR07: 217).

Thus by Ibn Sīnā’s lights divine providence is stillensured. Ibn Rushd makes a similar point about divine providence (IbnRushdMetaphysicsad Textus 52).

3.2.2 Occasionalism

Many Muslim theologians viewed the philosophers’ idea of natureswith causal powers as one that impugned God’s omnipotence andhis divine sovereignty over all that is. In addition, they found thephilosophers’ argumentation for essential or natural causationwanting. First, Muslim theologians were not impressed with either thetheory of emanation or the philosophers’ account of essential ornatural causation. In theIncoherence of the Philosophers,after faithfully presenting the philosophers’ discussion ofemanation, Ghazālī says,

What they have said is arbitrary and really just shadows in the dark.Were someone to utter this while dreaming, we would think they weredelirious! (GhazālīIncoherence, disc. 3 [48])

As for the philosophers’ theory of natures and naturalcausation, even before Ghazālī, Abū Bakral-Bāqillānī (d. 1013), a rough contemporary of IbnSīnā’s and whom Ghazālī subsequentlyfollows, challenged the philosophers’ account of natures(Bāqillānīal-Tamhīd, 34–47 andGhazālīIncoherence, disc. 17). These theologiansnote that the philosophers’ reason for insisting on natures withcausal powers and natural necessitation is purportedly drawn fromempirical observations: One regularly observes, for example,fire’s contact with cotton and the burning of the cotton or theimbibing of alcohol and the intoxication of the imbiber and amultitude of other such regularities. The philosophers maintain thatthese regularities require that the nature of fire, for example,causes the cotton to burn because the nature of cotton is to be soaffected and similarly for the rest of regularities in the naturalorder. Bāqillānī and Ghazālī push back onthis last assumption. We do not observe causal connections, they note,but merely constant conjunctions: one event followed by another. Whilenatural causation could explain these constant conjunctions,God’s habit (ʿāda) or custom of creating agiven event after another could equally explain them.

In place of natural causation, many Muslim theologians held sometheory of occasionalism (Fakhry 1958 and Perler & Rudolph, 2000:13–124). For them, God is not simply the Cause of causes, he infact is the only cause. God not merely brought the world intoexistence at some moment in the past, but indeed at every instance, here-creates the world anew. In its extreme form, there is only theillusion of a continuity between moments or a creature’spersisting through time. Changes in the world, thus, are solely theresult of God’s re-creating the world slightly differently ateach subsequent moment. Consequently, nothing other than God can trulybe an agent of change or action.

Some might find the theologians’ theory of occasionalismmetaphysically exotic. For many theologians, it was simply animplication of God’s absolute omnipotence: God truly hasall power, and so no concession is made to creatures (seeWolfson 1976: VII.I). Even Ghazālī, who concedes that humanshave a modicum of power, hastens to add that when compared toGod’s omnipotence our power resembles impotence(GhazālīModeration, 99). Bāqillānīhimself (Bāqillānīal-Tamhīd,34–47) has a more philosophically rather than theologicallyengaged answer. He argues that occasionalism is metaphysicallypreferable to the theory of natural causation on the grounds of aPrinciple of Paucity: Given two theories each of which equally wellexplains the same phenomena, the simpler theory should be preferred.The philosophers must posit at least two ontologically distinct kindsof causes: divine causation and natural causation (which itselfburgeons into a passel of further ontologically distinct kinds ofcauses). In contrast, occasionalism, Bāqillānīobserves, needs posit only one kind of cause, God, and so should bepreferred.

4. Prophecy and Miracles

Assuming that God exists and stands in some ontological relation withcreation, does God, in some way, directly make his will andprovidential care known to us? For Muslim theologians and somephilosophers, humans receive guidance in how to construct awell-ordered society through the message of prophets. These messagesare a source of correct beliefs about God, how we should live, ourplace in the cosmos and our ultimate destiny in the hereafter. Giventhe centrality of prophecy (nubuwwa) to Islam, two distinctquestions faced Muslim philosophers and theologians alike. One isjustifying and even explaining prophecy as a source of true justifiedbeliefs. The other is identifying a true prophet and distinguishinghim from a charlatan, trickster or even sorcerer.

4.1 Prophecy

Concerning the first issue of justifying and explaining prophecy,proponents of prophecy were faced with a challenge. Since humans arerational, presumably they can acquire knowledge of reality and therules of conduct regarding their individual and social life on theirown. Thus, one may ask, “Why are prophets necessary foracquiring true beliefs and proper rules of conduct?” Indeed,Muslims did encounter opposition to their belief in prophecy, rangingfrom those who claimed it was redundant—at least as the,admittedly hostile, reports about Abū Bakr al-Rāzīrelate—to those who thought it was simply impossible—aposition that Muslim theologians ascribed to Ibn al-Rāwandī(b. ca. 815) and theBarāhima, arguably the Brahmans ofIndia (see Stroumsa 1999). Detractors of prophecy formulated theproblem regarding the need for prophecy as a dilemma (A. H.RāzīProofs of Prophecy: 24–6 &131–4; JuwaynīProofs, 165; Nasafī TA: vol.II, 1–3). If, on the one hand, that which a prophet teaches onthe basis of revelation agrees with that which reason can show, thereis no need for prophecy. If, on the other hand, that which a prophetteaches is inaccessible to reason, then it is not rational, and so tobe rejected. The argument continues that it seems impossible that Godshould act in vain, but if he were to send prophets, he would beacting in vain, since the presence of prophets is either redundant ortheir message is in a sense irrational.

Theologians and certain Muslim philosophers both wanted to justify andto explain prophecy in light of this challenge. Theologians preferredto show why, despite the above dilemma, prophecy is possible and notvain: If anything, it is a sign of God’s grace. Certainphilosophers aimed to show that in addition to prophecy’s beingpossible, there is a natural explanation for it grounded in naturalphilosophy. While both groups’ approaches are significantlydifferent, they share a common feature. Both recognized that humancognitive capacities differ and that not all humans are equal withregard to those capacities. Indeed, most humans need the symbolic andsimplified message of a prophet to reach genuine knowledge of the keyreligious, ethical and social elements necessary for a devoutlife.

Juwaynī followed by his student Ghazālī arerepresentatives of the theologians (Juwaynīal-Irshād, 302–7 = JuwaynīProofs,165–7 and GhazālīModeration, 188–95;also see Griffel 2004). For them, it is reasonable that differentindividuals with different intellectual capacities may know one andthe same truth in different ways. One way, however, need not makeanother way redundant, let alone impossible. Also, even if on theirown some humans can learn certain specific religious claims, reachingthem frequently is difficult and requires a lengthy and diligentinquiry, which not all either are willing to do or even capable ofdoing. Hence, these theologians conclude, it is appropriate, althoughnot obligatory, that God makes such truths available through prophetsin order that people who do not have the time nor capacity to pursuesuch an inquiry still can learn about God and things divine. In thisrespect, prophecy, far from being vain, is a sign of God’s graceand concession to human diversity and weakness.

The philosophers’ have multiple strategies when treatingprophecy. For example, Ibn Rushd maintains that while philosophy andscience provide the most completetheoretical account of theworld and God’s relation to it, prophecy and religion moregenerally provide apractical knowledge of what is good andright with respect to one’s actions (see Taylor 2018). Ibn Rushdmakes this point when identify which kinds of purported miracles aregenuine signs of a prophet. He likens a prophet to a physician. If twoindividuals were both to claim to be physicians, and one says,“Here is my proof”, and then walks on water, whereas theother heals the sick, it is the latter’s proof that is trulyrelevant and convincing that he is a physician. Similarly, if twoindividuals claim to be prophets, and so bearers of a message aboutwhat God wants of us in order to live well and devoutly, and one givesas proof some seemingly supernatural act, while the other provideslaws and knowledge that actually allow one to live well and devoutly,it is the latter who is the genuine prophet (Ibn RushdExpositions, 104–5). It is noteworthy that likeFārābī, Ibn Rushd distinguishes between philosophersand those incapable of grasping philosophical proof. As for propheticmessages, the latter group needs only know that prophecy conveys whatis necessary for living a religious life, while any theoreticalaccount of prophecy must be withheld from them. The fact is that it isunclear whether Ibn Rushd has or even thinks that there can be atheoretical account of prophecy, since in his works exclusively forphilosophers (muʾawwal) he is prone to be completelysilent or at most raises unanswered puzzles about prophecy.

A theoretical account of prophecy and the mechanism through which itpurportedly occurs are seen in the works of Fārābī andIbn Sīnā (FārābīPerfect State: ch.14 and Avicenna DA: 5.6 = MR07: 204–5; also see Walzer 1957 andMarmura 1964). Both philosophers would agree with Ibn Rushd that theprimary aspect of prophecy and revelation is grounded in the need forlaws and political institutions. That is because these laws andpolitical institutions delineate and support actions directed towardthe proper end of humans, namely, happiness or flourishing(saʿāda), which intimately involves a knowledge ofGod (Fārābīal-Tanbīh = MR07:104–20 Avicenna MetaH: 10.2). Unlike Ibn Rushd, theyadditionally want to provide a theoretical account of prophecy. Thistheoretical account attempts to show that far from being asupernatural act, as the theologians believe, prophecy is a naturalphenomenon and as such has a naturalistic explanation. This attempt ata naturalistic explanation of prophecy is grounded in both theiremanationist metaphysics and philosophy of mind (see entry onArabic and Islamic psychology and philosophy of mind). The details of their positions are complex, so the following issimply to provide a general sense of their strategy.

As seen, for Fārābī and Ibn Sīnā, thereemanates from God the order of the good in the form of a cascade ofgrades of dependent or possible existents, each of which can itself bea source of emanation and a principle of a lower grade. Humancognition is itself part of this overflowing: Human intellects receivethis emanation once they are suitably prepared and to the extent thatthey are capable, which in turn perfects the intellects so that theycome to have knowledge of our world and God. Next, as noted earlier,the philosophers recognize varying degrees among human cognitivecapacities. At the very apex of these varying degrees of capacity isthe intellect and imaginative power of prophets. The prophets’cognitive powers are wholly and perfectly disposed to receive thisemanation, and to the greatest extent possible for humans they graspthe divine order of the good as it emanates from God. Moreover, fromtheir intellects the cascade of emanation continues, now entering intotheir imagination such that they sensibly experience as symbols andimages what they perfectly know through receiving this ultimatelydivine emanation. It is these symbols and images that the prophets useto convey God’s proverbial plan to those who are otherwiseincapable of acquiring this knowledge. While the above presentationoverly emphasizes the ‘metaphysical’ aspect of theirtheory of prophecy, the fact is that the bulk of the theory isdiscussed and developed in natural philosophy, particularly in workscorresponding with Aristotle’sDe anima and discussionsin the novel reworking of the Arabic version of Aristotle’sParva Naturalia (for the Arabic verion of theParvaNaturalia see Hansberger 2010). In a real sense, the aim is tonaturalize prophecy. Thus, prophecy, for these philosophers, ispossible precisely because it is the natural, even necessary, outcomeof certain rare, but wholly natural, psychological processes.

4.2 Miracles

The second issue again is distinguishing the true prophet from acharlatan, trickster or even sorcerer. If it is reasonable that Godappoints prophets, the question that immediately arises is how torecognize them and to justify their claims to prophethood. In responseto this challenge many thinkers in the Islamicate world, theologiansand philosophers alike, identified performing miracles as a decisivesign of one’s rightful claim to being a prophet (ʿAbdal-Jabbār SUK: 568–9; JuwaynīProofs,167–8; Ibn FūrakMujarrad Maqālāt,176–80; and Bāqillānīal-Tamhīd,141–60).

The Arabic term for a prophet’s miracle ismuʿjiza, which means that which shows theimpotence of others. Specifically, a miracle is a challengeby the prophet to others to perform a similar act, which the othersare presumably incapable of doing. In general, then, a miracle is anyextraordinary event that confirms an individual’s claims toprophethood (JuwaynīProofs, 168–72). Muslimsrecognize two kinds of such extraordinary events. The first is anyevent that follows upon the prophet’s challenge and that ishighly unexpected albeit not strictly a violation of the naturalorder. For example, the occurrence of a plague, which ensues after theprophet predicts it. Also, the very inimitability of the Qur’an(iʿjāz) seems to fall within this category andoften is cited as the only, yet most convincing, proof ofMuhammad’s claim to prophethood.

And if you are in any doubt about what we (God) have sent down to ourservant, produce asūra of the like of [thisQur’an]. (Qur’an 2:23; also see 11:13, 10:38, 17:88 and52: 34)

Those who were so challenged apparently were impotent to rise to thechallenge. The second class of extraordinary events requires theactual suspension of natural laws. Examples include, the virgin birthand the raising of the dead back to life. (Peterson et al. 2013:208–9). To distinguish this class from the first, let us callthem ‘supernatural’ miracles or events, namely, somethingthat is both extra-ordinary and indeed outside of the natural order ofthings.

Although many, if not most, medieval Islamic scholars acknowledgedprophetic miracles, the issue of whether there truly were both kindsof miracles remained an important topic of discussion. The theologianschampioned the position that there are both kinds. The philosophers,while not denying that extraordinary acts confirm one’sprophethood, maintained that although miracles are exceptionally rare,they remain part of the natural order, and so they held a positionabout miracles much like the naturalized view of prophecy. Let us lookat the philosophers’ position and then turn to thetheologians’ response to it.

Ibn Sīnā’s position may be highlighted here (AvicennaDA: 198–200 & ITN2: 105; also see Davidson 1992: 121–2and Al-Akiti 2004). For Ibn Sīnā, performing miracles is oneof three properties that identify a prophet. We have already seen theother two, namely, (1) to divine future and/or absent events and (2)to relate religious truths in symbolic form that all can grasp. IbnSīnā explains miracles in much the same way that he explainsthese other two properties of the prophet. The intellect andimagination of prophets are of the highest degree possible for humans,and so the prophet fully grasps and understands the order of the goodthat has its ultimate sources in the divine emanation. Additionally,Ibn Sīnā recognizes the well-established fact thatone’s mind and emotions can produce psychosomatic responses evenin people of limited intellectual power; however, while for the mostparts these responses are limited to one’s own body, in the caseof the prophets their minds can affect other bodies, whether animateor inanimate. In so doing, they can cause winds to blow, or rains tofall and even earthquake as well as healing or bringing illness onothers. While for us to day the Avicennan account of miracles mightappear to border on the occult, within the scientific framework inwhich he was working, his position provided a legitimate naturalexplanation of what otherwise could only be called the miraculous. Tobe sure, not all philosophers accepted Ibn Sīnā’ssuggested naturalistic mechanism to explain the apparently miraculous.Still, few denied miracles outright. Thus, even Ibn Rushd apparentlyallowedthat there are miracles—as seen in themiraculous practical value of the laws and religious claims embodiedin Qur’an—while remaining virtually silent onhowsuch a miracle as the Qur’an could occur.

Ghazālī provides the theologians’ response to thephilosophers in hisIncoherence of the Philosophers(GhazālīIncoherence, disc. 17; also see Fakhry1958: 56–78; Marmura 1989; López-Farjeat 2016:131–140). To begin, the Qur’an contains accounts ofmiracles, some of which clearly appear to be of the supernatural kind,e.g., the virgin birth and resurrection from the dead. A literalreading of these miracle-stories requires violations of essential ornatural causation, that is, regular, non-divine causal series thatpurportedly necessitate their effects. Ghazālī complainsthat on the philosophers’ account, the Quranic stories ofsupernatural miracles cannot be taken literally.

Whoever renders the habitual courses [of nature] a necessary constant,makes all these [miracles] impossible. [The philosophers] have thusinterpreted what is said in the Qur’an about the revivificationof the dead metaphorically. (GhazālīIncoherence,163 [23])

While again Ghazālī allows for limited metaphorical readingsof the Qur’an, he does so only in those cases where he believesthat the literal sense leads to a genuine absurdity or evencontradiction. For example, Quranic passage that when taken literallyimply that God has a body, for Ghazālī, must be readmetaphorically, for to be embodied is to belimited and yetGod isunlimited. Miracles of the supernatural kind, that is,violations of natural causation and necessitation, in contrast, do notinvolve absurdities or outright contradictions. They are admittedlyrare, but seemingly possible. Moreover, as we have seen, thetheologians view natural causation as nothing more than presumption onthe part of the philosophers, preferring occasionalism instead. Thus,for Ghazālī, absent a proof for the impossibility ofsupernatural miracles, one should accept the Qur’anic stories asliteral accounts of real events. Still, Ghazālī does notultimately believe that these supernatural miracles should be theonly, even the primary, basis for one’s belief in the veracityof the Qur’an and Muhammad’s prophethood(Ghazālīal-Munqidh, 41–4[Deliverance, 83–7]). As for the true proof for theinspired nature of the Qur’an, Ghazālī, in a way thatforeshadows and even may have influenced Ibn Rushd’s views,points to the effect of a careful study of the Qur’an and thetraditions surrounding Muhammad, the effect of which is thepurification of hearts (taṣfiyat al-qulūb) Boththe miraculous and the practical confirm the divine sovereignty andgovernance of all events and testify to the prophetic and miraculousnature of the Qur’an.

5. The Problem of evil

One of the important problems for Abrahamic religions is to explainthe presence of evil given the assumption that an all-wise, all-just,all-powerful and all-loving God created and is continuously conservingthe world. Modern philosophical discussions of the so-called problemof evil frequently focus on whether the presence of evil providesevidence against the existence of such a God, and so against classicalmonotheism more generally. In contrast, for medieval Muslimphilosophers and theologians, the existence of God was never inquestion. Instead, ‘the problem’ of evil for thesethinkers is a cluster of related issues, not the least of which is“What is evil?” and “Is our world the best possibleworld?” Additionally, these thinkers wanted to reconcile thedivine attributes with the presence of evil or to determine which ofthe divine attributes, particularly between divine justice andGod’s omnipotence, trumps the others.

One strategy for explaining the presence of evil was to emphasizeGod’s transcendence and sovereignty over the universe.Considering human actions, we judge that some cases of causing otherspain are justified, e.g., in disciplining someone or administeringjustice, while others are not, e.g., gratuitous violence. Given thebelief that God created the universe and controls the course of eventsin the world, how can we explain the suffering that animals,especially humans, undergo? In this regard, some argued that theethical rules applicable among humans are not applicable to God.Supporters of this account, predeterminists (jabriyya),emphasize that the relation between God and the universe is onebetween property and owner. Just as a person can do what he wants withhis property, so also God has the right to treat his property inwhatever way he wants (ʿAbd al-Jabbār SUK: 483–5).Abū al-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Ismāʿīlal-Ashʿarī (d. 935/6), founder of the Ashʿaritetheological school, seems to have defended such a position at an earlystage in his career. He highlights God’s absolute control overthe course of events in the world (Ashʿarī EIF: 50–1).Thus, the suffering that affects animals and humans, does not need anyfurther justification, since the universe is God’s property andGod can treat creatures the way he pleases. He can punish an innocentperson and can hold people responsible to do that which they cannot do(Ashʿarī EIF: 111–13).

Instead of emphasizing God’s sovereignty over creation, anotherapproach, which is usually associated with Muʿtazilitetheologians, is to consider if there is any reason that justifies aninstance of suffering independent of whether the cause of thatsuffering is God or a human agent (see Hourani 1971 and Vasalou 2008).If one understands evil as unjustified suffering, then in such casesof suffering where there is a valid justification—like a certainderived benefit or as punishment—the suffering cannot beconsidered evil, at least not in the sense of unjustified suffering(ʿAbd al-Jabbār SUK: 485–6). Consequently, inconsidering whether some case of suffering is evil, one must take intoaccount, not only the conditions of the agent, that is, whether God ora creature caused it, but also whether there are justifying reasonsfor the suffering. Since God is good and just, there must be reasonsjustifying any instance of suffering that is traced back to the divineaction—excluding human free actions. Muʿtazilitetheologians identified some of these reason as compensation(ʿiwaḍ), admonition (ʿibr),punishment, some kind of benefit (maṣlaḥa) oreven grace (luṭf) (ʿAbd al-Jabbār SUK:487–9 and Ibn al-Malāhimīal-Fāʾiq,261–74). Thus, the Muʿtazilite theologians argued that theexistence of suffering in the world is compatible with the goodness,generosity and justice of God.

The standards by which Muʿtazilite theologians evaluate what isgood and just is the same for both God and humans. Their objectivestandard of goodness and justice had further implications about thepresence of evil in our world. One notable implication is that Godmust do what is best (aṣlaḥ). Initially certainMuʿtazilites maintained that God must do what is best only inreligious matters, namely, commands and prohibitions (Ibn Mattawayhal-Tadhkira, II, 332–3, 360). Ultimately, mostMuʿtazilite theologians came to agree that since God is generousand good, he does what is best in all his actions, whether religiousmatters or creating and ordering the universe (Ibnal-Malāhimīal-Fāʾiq, 119 and ʿAbdal-Jabbāral-Aṣlaḥ: XIV, 53). Consequently,even if the Muʿtazilite theologians do not emphasize thisimplication, for them this world is the best possible world.

The Neoplatonic-inspired philosophers, like Fārābī andIbn Sīnā, had yet another strategy to explain the presenceof evil, which Ibn Sīnā exemplifies well(Fārābīal-Taʿlīqāt, §39and Avicenna MetaH: 9.6, 339–47). Ibn Sīnā takes upthe problem of evil within the context of divine providence (see above§3.2.1). The question is how can the existence of evil in the universe beexplained, if the whole universe emanates from an absolutely good God?Following the Neoplatonist tradition, he associates goodness withexistence or being and evil with non-being or the imperfection ofbeing proper to a thing. Since evil is in a sense a non-thing, and thenon-existent does not have a cause, it is a category mistake to askwhat is the cause of evil absolutely speaking or to suggest that Godcauses. it.

Still, Ibn Sīnā recognizes that some apparent evils, mostnotably suffering, cannot simply be reduced to imperfections and theprivation of a proper existence. There are events, or conditions, thatactively can cause suffering. Ibn Sīnā argues that evil assuffering is applicable only to a small part of the whole universe,and yet is indispensable to that part, a ‘necessary evil’,if you will. This part of the universe consists of things that aresubject to generation and corruption. The sphere of generation andcorruption, according to Neoplatonic cosmology, is limited to theEarth, its inhabitants and the immediate atmosphere enveloping theEarth. Thus, in order for there to be absolutely no evil in the entirecosmos the sphere of generation and corruption either would haveneeded not to exist or to be deprived of the properties that makegenerable and corruptible things what they are. Divine providenceprecludes both options, Ibn Sīnā argues, for roughly thesame reason in both cases, namely, the universe overall would be lessgood than it actually is, even given the presence of some evil. Anexample drawn from Ibn Sīnā clarifies his point. Certainly,a poor man who loses his family and possessions to a fire, suffers anevil. Yet the fact that fire is essentially hot, so as to cook fleshand to burn wood, is in itself good. Likewise, that wood and flesh areessentially such as to be cooked by fire are in themselves good. Toeliminate fire’s power to burn and the powers by which wood andflesh are cooked is to eliminate those very things. Thus, to eliminatethe possibility of this kind of suffering would be to eliminate anentire class of existents, namely, those subject to generation andcorruption. Consequently, an entire class of objective good in theuniverse would be lost, and so make the world overall less good. ForIbn Sīnā, such a loss is simply incompatible with hisconception of divine providence, God is ultimately the source of anorder that is the most perfectly possible commensurate with the chainof all possible existents.

While both Ibn Sīnā’s and the Muʿtaziliteexplanations of the presence of evil imply that God has created thebest possible world, neither explicitly make this claim in theirworks. It was Ghazālī, who explicitly argued that the actualworld is the best of all possible worlds (see Ormsby 1984). “Inthe realm of the possible”, Ghazālī assures us,

there is nothing at all more wondrously beautiful than [this world]nor more complete nor more perfect (laysa fī-l-imkānabdaʿ aṣlan aḥsana minhu wa lā atamma wa lāakmala)

or as it was popularized in the rhyming couplet,

In the realm of all the possible, nothing than what is is morewonderful. (laysa fī-l-imkān abdaʿ mimmākān) (Ghazālī FDU: 45–6 andGhazālīForty Principles, 259)

The imperfection that we see in the world is a result of the limits ofour knowledge. The reason that this must be the best possible world isbecause if a better universe were possible and God did not create it,yet could have created it, he would have been miserly; however, God isomnibenevolent, and so this claim must be false. If God did not createthis purportedly better possible world because he could not do so,then God would be impotent in some respect; however, God isomnipotent, and so this claim must be false. In short, none of theseor similar options for explaining a less than optimal world areacceptable, for they all impugn God’s majesty. To be sure,Ghazālī is not claiming that there is no evil in the world;rather, for him, evil, as imperfection and suffering, is an essentialingredient of the perfection of the world. While we might not fullyrecognize how certain specific cases of evil contribute to theworld’s overall perfection, nonetheless, those veryimperfections can help one appreciate the contrasting good in theworld. Thus the actual universe, with the evil included in it, is thebest possible universe.

6. Religious/theological language

Theological language has a special status that presents a challengefor thinkers particularly within the Abrahamic traditions since God isconsidered to be completely different from creation, while ourlanguage applies mainly, if not solely, to creatures. Thus, to expresswhat and how God is proves a difficult challenge. The follow sectionconsiders earlier Islamic approaches to understanding theologicallanguage and how to read the Qur’an’s claims about God.The next section (§6.2) considers how later Muslim philosophers and the various schools ofMuslim theologians developed these approaches with an eye to theirdiscussions of the divine attributes.

6.1 Early approaches to theological language

The earliest developments in Islamic theological language emphasizedGod’s absolute unity/simplicity (tawḥīd) andperhaps most importantly, since God is unlike creatures(mukhālafa li-l-ḥawādith), his transcendence(tanzīh). The proponents of divine transcendence, theeponymous Jahmiyya, named after the movement’s founder Jahm ibnṢafwān (696–745), denied that God has any attributes(see Schöck 2016: 55–77). Consequently, critics referred tothese theologians as apophaticists(Muʿaṭṭila, literally, ‘those whovoid’) to indicate that this position voids religious texts oftheir literal meaning since God transcends anything that we can say orunderstand about him. In response to this emphasis on divinetranscendence, there emerged those who stressed a hyper-literalreading of Qur’anic verses—such as Qur’an 48: 10& 38, 71; 2: 115 and 11: 37 with their references to God’shands, face and eyes respectively—and the prophetic traditions.Based on a literal reading, they made God similar to creatures andascribed to him a physical body, and so were labeled anthropomorphists(mushabbiha, literally, ‘simulators’) andcorporealists (mujassima) (see Van Ess 2000). A reaction tothese two earlier positions was that of the traditionalist(salafī) who claimed to follow the example of theearliest generation (salaf) of Muslims, i.e., the companionsof the Prophet and the followers of the companions. They attempted toprovide a middle path between the apophatic and anthropomorphicunderstandings of God. They wanted neither to void the Qur’an ofits literal meaning by emphasizing divine transcendence nor to makeGod similar to bodily creatures by taking the Qur’an out of itsbroader theological context. In general, they maintained that whileone knowsthat God has the various anthropomorphic charactersthat the Qur’an attributes to him, one should not delve intohow (kayf) God has those attributes, i.e., theirmode of existence. All the major approaches developed later in themedieval Islamic world, such as those of the Muʿtazilites,Ashʿarites, Maturidites and philosophers, can be traced back toand are modifications of these three approaches (Winter 2008:33–141; Rudolph 1996 [2015]: 23–121; and Watt 1973:242–50, 279–318; 1992: 46–55, 64–97).

Underlying the apophatic, anthropomorphic and traditionalist positionsabout divine attributes is a common assumption, namely, when one talksabout God and about creation, one must use univocal language. In otherwords, it was assumed that if language is to be literal andinformative, properties predicated of God and of creatures must haveexactly the same sense. Thus, if, as the Qur’an purports, Godhas hands, eyes and speaks, having hands, eyes and speaking must haveone the same meaning when predicated of God and of creatures. ForMuslim Apophatic theologians, since we cannot take attributespredicated of God univocally in the way they are predicated ofcreation, we must take them as negations about God. Conversely,granting the assumption of univocal predication, Muslimanthropomorphists maintained it is legitimate to draw the implicationsthat God has bodily parts similar to those of creatures from theQur’anic statements about God. Muslim Traditionalists, with thesame assumption, affirmed the literal meaning of religious texts thatpredicate of God creaturely properties, but they understood them asgoverned by the principle that God is unlike creation, and so thoseproperties that are found in creation and predicated of God may beacknowledged without additionally drawing their ordinaryimplications.

6.2 Theological language and the divine attributes

Issues associated with how God or the divine self (dhāt)is related to his properties or attributes (ṣifāt)drove further developments among medieval Islamic scholars. One commonclassification of the divine attributes was into (1) essentialproperties or attributes (ṣifāt bi-dhāt) and(2) properties of action (ṣifāt bi-fiʿl).Essential properties in turn are divided into negative(salbī) properties and ‘properties ofmaʿnī’, that is, properties with a positive(thubūtī) meaning, and so add some further sense towhat it is to be God. Negative properties indicate God’stranscendence and include unity, eternity (qidam), permanence(baqāʾ), self-subsistence (qiyām binafsihi), dissimilarity to the creation (mukhālafali-l-ḥawādith) and one may also include simplicity,although it is not usually included in the list. This list consists of‘formal properties’ in the sense that they do not indicateany perfectionper se but an absence of limitations on God,e.g., non-temporal, immutable and non-dependent (Burrell 1986:46–50). In general, all of these negative properties express adissimilarity to creation, since each one of them indicates how God isnot like creation in a certain respect. The positiveproperties (properties ofmaʿānī) includepower (qudra), will (irāda), knowledge(ʿilm), life (ḥayāt), speech(kalām), hearing (samʿ) and sight(baṣar). Properties of action include creation and theconservation of the universe, commanding, determining what happens(qadar) in the universe, etc. Positive properties andproperties of action imply some similarity to creation. One may add asanother sub-category of properties found in the Qur’an thosethat necessarily imply similarity with creaturely existence, likehaving a face, eyes, being seated, etc. In general later Muslimtheologians and philosophers understood this last set of propertiesmetaphorically. How to understand the sense and status of the divineessential properties with a positive meaning, however, remained animportant problem for medieval Muslim scholars. The three mostprominent and developed views were those of the Muʿtazilitetheologians, the Ashʿarite and Maturidite theologians and thephilosophers. Let us consider each school in turn.

6.2.1 The Muʿtazilites and theological language

Muʿtazilite theologians strongly emphasized both God’sdissimilarity to creation and his absolute oneness or simplicity. Theyask one to consider the properties or perfections found in humans andalso attributed to God, like, knowledge, power and will. As theseproperties exist in humans there is a distinction between the thingthat possesses the perfections and the perfections themselves. Is thesame true of God? The answer for the Muʿtazilites is a resounding‘no!’ That is because if the divine attributes aredistinct from the divine self, then there would be a multiplicity ofdivine, eternal entities, namely, the eternal and divine subject ofattribution and the eternal and divine attributes. Consequently, theyconclude, divine oneness and unity is lost and indeed one sinks into aform of polytheism far from the monotheism of Islam, a position thatthe Muʿtazilites found wholly untenable. For Muʿtazilites,the relation between God’s self and his attributes must beeither one of negation (salb), namely, to deny that God is inany way limited in the way creatures are, or one of identity, namely,the divine attributes are not distinct from the divine self that bearsthose attributes.

In the case of interpreting divine attributes as negations,Muʿtazilites modified a version of the earlier Muslimapophaticists. For instance, to say that “God is knowing”,means that God is not ignorant”, or to say that “God ispowerful” means that “God is not weak or notpowerless”. The rest of the divine attributes are interpretedalong the same lines (Ashʿarī MI: 155–77, 183–5& 486 and ʿAbd al-Jabbār SUK: 182–213). Suchattributions are helpful in understanding and speaking about God injust they way that eliminating possible choices from a multiple-choicequestion is helpful. One with such negative knowledge is certainly ina better position than one who does not possesses it or is merelyguessing or who wrongly believes that they know what is true.Moreover, informative, negative ascriptions do not require assigningto God a plurality of distinct positive properties, which in fact aremore fitting of creatures. Thus, in the case of negative ascriptions,both God’s transcendence and simplicity are safeguarded.

As for identifying God’s self and attributes, Muʿtazilitesbegan by acknowledging that human language cannot avoid distinguishinga subject and the properties predicated of that subject, and indeedthe Qur’an addresses humans in human language. This feature is alimit of human language and our cognitive capacities but not of God.In the case of God, there is an identity of the subject andperfections predicated of the divine subject, even though humanthinking and speaking cannot avoid distinguishing these as separate(Ashʿarī MI: 155–85 and ʿAbd al-Jabbār SUK:182–213). Unfortunately, identifying the divine properties ofperfection with God Himself is not as simple as it might first appear.If divine properties are identical to God, then they must be identicalto each other, and yet, for example, despite adages to the contrary,knowledge seems to be truly distinct from power. Additionally, if Godis identical to his properties, God would be a property, which hardlyseems like an object worthy of worship (GhazālīIncoherence, discs. 5–6; cf. Plantinga 1980:26–61 and McGinnis 2022).

One Muʿtazilite response to this objection was that of AbūḤāshim al-Jubbāʾī (d. 933). In order toexplain, both why and how identifying positive properties with Goddoes not lead to these absurdities, he argued that such properties arelike states (aḥwāl) of an entity—e.g.,sitting—which can differ depending upon how one considers them.Thus, if a state is taken on its own, it does not really exist outthere—there is no ‘sitting’ that exists out theresimply as sitting. Still, the fact that a state as some independentproperty does not exist out there does not mean that it is anabsolutely non-existent; rather, it exists by virtue of the existenceof the entity in that state. Thus, to say that “God isknowing” is to indicate a certain state of God and to say that“God is powerful” is to indicate another state of God, yetin neither case, does the state indicate what God himself is(ʿAbd al-Jabbār SUK: 128–9; also see Schmidtke 2016a:162–4).

6.2.2 Ashʿarites/Maturidites and theological language

Ashʿarite and Maturidite theologians accused the Muʿtazilitetheologians of all the problems following upon identifying the divineself and its attributes implies, such as the loss of distinction amongthe divine attributes and that ultimately God would be identical witha property. In opposition to the Muʿtazilites, the Ashʿariteand Maturidite theologians affirmed the distinction between thepositive divine attributes, like knowledge, power and will, and God asthe bearer of those attributes. Thus, the problem facing them was toexplain how a multiplicity of divine things, and so a violation ofdivine oneness, does not ensue if God’s self and his distinctproperties of perfection are all divine and eternal.

They adopted two main strategies to address this problem. One earlystrategy was to argue that properties predicated of God with somepositive connotation—properties that are not simplynegations—are neither different from nor identical to the divineself. One challenge to such a view is that it seems to violate the Lawof Excluded Middle, for a divine attribute must either be identical tothe divine self or not identical to it, in which case it would bedifferent from the divine self. Two early Ashʿarite theologians,Bāqillānī and Juwaynī, apparently tried to adoptthe Muʿtazilite theory of states to address this concern.Considered in themselves, the divine attributes are not identical toGod, while considered relative to God’s possession of thoseattributes they are identical to God (Shahrastānīal-Milal, I 82 &Summa, 52–60; F. D.RāzīOpinions, 61–4 andTaftāzānīCreed, 51–5).

Another way that Ashʿarites and Maturidites attempted to observedivine transcendence while upholding the meaningfulness of theologicallanguage was to emphasize that when an attribute is predicated of God,“God is not like others that have that attribute”. Forexample, al-Māturīdī, in hisKitābal-Tawḥīd, begins by criticizing the anthropomorphicposition by indicating certain shortcomings of conceiving God in amanner similar to creation (Māturīdī KT: 43–7;also see Rudolph 1996 [2015: 282–4]). He then explains how Godis unlike creation. When properties predicated of creation arepredicated of God, they are used in such a way that all the creaturelyimplications are stripped off; they are, as it were, a ‘winnowedconcept’ (cf. Alston 1985). He also acknowledges that in orderto know God, we must use the language that is used to talk aboutcreatures. Accordingly, we predicate perfections of God, but take intoaccount the principle that God is unlike creatures. For example, onemay say “God knows but His knowledge is unlike, knowledgebelonging to creatures”. This way of predicating attributes ofGod also found supporters among Muʿtazilite theologians, likeʿAbd al-Jabbar, who offers and defends the same strategy andformula. The strategy, however, has its challenges, for if oneinterprets ‘unlike’ in the strict sense, theologicallanguage seems to lose its informative function, while if it is nottaken in a strict sense, it is not clear that divine transcendence issecured.

6.2.3 Philosophers and theological language

To varying degrees most, if not all, philosophers accepted some formof a negative theology when discussing the divine attributes(Kindī PWK: “On First Philosophy”, §§XIX–XX; FārābīPerfect State, ch. 1; andAvicenna MetaH: 8.4). For them, many, if not all, of the attributesascribed to God are in fact merely descriptions of ways that God isunlimited or infinite in some respect or other. Thephilosophers’ general strategy is the same as theMuʿtazilites (see§6.2.1), where the basic idea, again, is that negative ascriptions, whileinformative, do not involve God’s necessarily possessing aplurality of positive attributes, which would jeopardize both divinesimplicity and God’s transcendence.

Certain philosophers, like Ibn Sīnā and Ibn Rushd, likewiserepeated the Muʿtazilite position that the divine self isidentical with its essential attributes, like life, knowledge andpower (Avicennaal-Najāt, 264 = MR07: 214 & MetaH:1.7 & 8.4 and Ibn RushdTahafut, 299–301 [1954:177–9]). Ibn Rushd notes that in a limited sense thisidentification of some entity with its essential attributes is trueeven of creatures. He provides the example of the definition of‘man’ as a ‘rational animal’. Both rationalityand animality are parts of the definition of ‘man’, butthey are not distinct parts constituting the flesh-and-blood man inthe world in the way that color and shape are. This analogy is not tosuggest that one can have a definition of God, which Ibn Rushd flatlydenies, but only to indicate that the way humans conceive an entityneeds not perfectly reflect how that entity exists in the world.Indeed, Ibn Rushd goes further and provides a principled Aristotelianreason why no creature could ever form a definition of God or fullygrasp the divinity (Ibn RushdTahafut, 345–6 [1954:207]). He notes that according to Aristotelian principles to graspwhat a thing is essentially, so as to be able to have a definition,requires that in some sense the intellect becomes the very thinggrasped. Thus, since a finite human intellect can never grasp theinfinite—indeed, to whatever extent it does grasp it, the veryact of grasping it limits it so that it is finite in the humanintellect—it can never form a definition of God nor fully graspGod’s essential existence. Thus, by necessity the humanintellect conceives a plurality of attributes in its conception of Godwhere in fact none exists. Admittedly, this discussion comes from oneof Ibn Rushd’s popular works and not from one intended solelyfor the philosophers, and so whether it presents his considered viewon the subject remains unclear. As for Ibn Sīnā, he is moreforthcoming, arguing that all the various (positive) essentialattributes said of God really are nothing more than alternativedescriptions of a single reality, namely, necessary existence throughitself (wājib al-wujūd bi-dhātihi), which isidentical with and unique to God.

7. Ethics in Islam

In addition to the role of reason in justifying specific ethicaljudgments like what is morally right and wrong (al-ḥusnwa-l-qubḥ)—a discussion that mirrors those aboutreason and faith in Islam more generally (§1.2)—Muslim thinkers also were concerned with the ontological status of normativeproperties, like goodness and badness (see Emon 2010). With respect tothis issue, one asks whether ethical facts exist independently of Godor do they originate from and have their morally binding force as aresult of a divine command. On the one hand, if the demands of morallygood and bad actions are independent of God, then is God subject tothose demands or not? If so, then does God observe them as a matter ofnecessity, in which case God’s power seems limited, or does heobserve them as a matter of will or choice, in which case were he notto observe them would he be morally bad, since again these demandsdetermine morally good and bad actions? On the other hand, if ethicaldicta have their source and force in God’s commanding them,could God have commanded contrary to what he did and so invert rightand wrong? For example, could God have commanded us to lie, in whichcase lying would have been obligatory and even morally good?

7.1 The Muʿtazilites on the morally right and wrong (al-ḥusn wa-l-qubḥ)

Muʿtazilite theologians defended the view that reason can acquirea knowledge of what is morally right and wrong, precisely becausestandards of right and wrong are purportedly objective and notarbitrary, and so are independent of God’s merely commandingthem. Their views are laid out within the context of moralresponsibility (see Hourani 1971 & 1985 and Vasalou 2008). ForMuʿtazilite theologians, while perhaps reason cannot discover allof those actions for which one is religiously responsible in order tobe a devout Muslim (such as praying five times daily or avoidingpork), one could come to know the more general ethical humanresponsibilities (such as avoiding lying and honoring one’sbenefactor). This is because according to the Muʿtazilites, theproperties that make an action good or bad, and for which one ismorally responsible, are objective qualities relative to the action,to the consequence(s) of the action or to the agent of the action.These moral properties are objective precisely because weobserve—whether through self-reflection or inference from theoutward behavior of others—the benefit or the harm that anaction causes. Thus, in a consequentialist vein, theseMuʿtazilites relate the morally good with what is genuinelybeneficial and the morally bad with what is harmful. Religion thenconfirms what reason knows about the moral status of an action and itsconsequence(s).

Since for these thinkers the ethical status of an action does notdepend on a divine command, the question arises whether God is boundto behave ethically. ʿAbd al-Jabbār argued that ethicaldemands are binding and applicable not only to human agents but alsoto God and his action as well (ʿAbd al-Jabbāral-Taʿdīl: 52–70). Thus, he argues that ifone denies that God is bound to do and to command the morally good,the commands and prohibitions given in scripture would be not onlyarbitrary but possibly even mutable and unreliable. For example, ifone allowed that God could lie, then God or the prophets could belying about what is required for salvation or what leads to damnation,in which case all the religious teaching would be under suspicion, aposition which that ʿAbd al-Jabbār simply foundunacceptable.

7.2 Responses to the Muʿtazilites

Most medieval Muslim thinkers, whether philosophers, theologians orSufis, recognized some need for religion in order to possess acomplete understanding of things ethical. Although they generallygranted that humans have some intuitive recognition of virtues andwhat is morally good and bad, they emphasized that various humanconditions limit our ability always to judge correctly about theethical status of particular actions. One such limit is our inherentcognitive limits. Thus, the Sufi master Ibn ʿArabī complainsthat because the moral goodness or badness of actions may depend oncertain conditions that human reason cannot comprehended, divinerevelation is needed to inform us of the ethical status of our actions(Ibn al-ʿArabīal-Futūḥātal-Makkiyya (b), I 459–60 & VII 326). For instance,what we ‘observe’ or judge to be a benefit may, all thingsconsidered, actually be harmful and similarly for our judgments aboutwhat is harmful. Only from a ‘God’s eye perspective’can one be assured that in fact all things have been considered. Inaddition to our inherent cognitive limits, personal and socialconditions affect the reliability of our ethical judgments. Forexample, the Sunni jurist, Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī (d. ca.869), noted that while reason has some share in making sound moraljudgments, selfishness and the human desire for material benefits andpleasures hinders our ability always to reason correctly andobjectively about what is ethically right and wrong (TirmidhīKitāb Ithbāt al-ʿilal, 67–78).Fārābī and Ibn Sīnā identify yet anotherhuman condition that requires religion to aid reason in determiningright ethical rules. They maintained that ethical and politicaljudgments are nota priori necessary truths, but well-knownand commonly accepted specific rules(tafṣīlāt) acquired from attending to variouspractices over long periods of time. Thus, without knowing thissocio-cultural history that religion preserves, one cannot know whatis efficacious for living a good and virtuous life here on earth(FārābīPerfect State, 77–8 and AvicennaMetaH: 10.2–4; also see Erlwein 2019).

Ashʿarite and Maturidite theologians in general vehementlycriticized the Muʿtazilite position that reason alone candiscover even general ethical demands incumbent upon humans and Godalike. Their criticisms highlight the unacceptable theologicalimplications of the Muʿtazilite position and the inherent limitsof human reason. The most common criticism comes from the theologicalimplication that God is compelled or obligated to do the good. Recallthat the general Muʿtazilite position, as ʿAbdal-Jabbār articulated it, holds that good and bad are inherentproperties of actions regardless of their agents, and so since God isgood, God is morally compelled to do good. One obvious implication ofthis view is that if God cannot do bad actions, then God’s poweris limited, and so God is not wholly omnipotent. From a theologicalpoint of view, Ashʿarite theologians found this implicationunacceptable. Consequently, they denied that good and bad are inherentproperties of actions and instead demanded that all ethical standardsare dependent on what God himself commands.

As for criticisms against the Muʿtazilite position from thenature of human reason, Ashʿarite and Maturidites theologiansavailed themselves of all the argument we have already seen about thelimits of our cognitive capacities and the constraints of our humancondition. Thus, for example, Māturīdī presses thepoint that while humans may have some inkling of general ethicalprinciples and what is morally good and bad, these judgments arealways shaky given the frailty of our cognitive capacities.Consequently, religion is always needed to set our moral judgments onfirm ground (Māturīdī KT: 346–51).

Ashʿarite and Maturidite scholars also added further arguments tothe arsenal of criticisms against the Muʿtazilite ethical theory.For instance, inThe Guide to Conclusive Proofs, Juwaynīputs forth an account of the good and bad, which in certain waysanticipates the moral theory of David Hume seven hundred years later(JuwaynīProofs, 141–6). The Muʿtaziliteposition rests on two key elements: (1) that some actions are eitherinherently and rationally good or bad and (2) the implicit assumptionthat a rational agent must act in a rational way. Juwaynī simplydenies that moral actions are inherently rational and thatconsequently there is anything irrational when one does a good or badaction. To be sure, actions can be obligatory and praiseworthy orprohibited and blameworthy, but not rational. Instead, continuesJuwaynī, when through self-reflection or inference one recognizesthat certain actions are seemingly beneficial and others harmful, onemerely instinctually recognizes that those actions produce pleasure orpain. It is the human’s (and all animals’) naturalinstinct to seek pleasure and to avoid pain that motivates the action,not some inherent rational property of the object that reasongrasps.

Ghazālī likewise rejected the Muʿtazilites’position, which he claimed rested upon an ambiguity in the meanings ofthe terms ‘good’, ‘bad’ and‘obligatory’ (wājib). For Ghazālī,when one says an action is ‘good’ or ‘bad’,those value judgments must be understood in terms of the intention orpurpose relative to the agent or the one affected by the action. Sounderstood, an action is good if it achieves the intended purpose andbad if it does not. While reason can direct and set one’sintentions, so can imagination and estimation (wahm) as wellas our passions and appetites. These latter faculty, however,frequently fail to get at what is ultimately beneficial and harmfulfor us, and so they fail to get at what an agent would intend allthings considered. Divine law provides precisely the‘all-things-considered’ view.

As for human reason’s determining what is morally incumbent uponGod, Ghazālī continues that since good and bad are relatedto the intentions of the agent, it is impossible for reason alone todetermine whether God’s actions are good or bad since we simplydo not know God’s intentions independent of revelation. Fakhral-Dīn al-Rāzī developed a similar defense (F. D.Rāzīal-Maṭālib, 289–304; also seeShihadeh 2006 and 2021). Now instead of understanding good and badrelative to an agent’s intentions, Razi explains them inconsequentialist terms: Actions are good when, relative to the agentor one affected by the action, they are beneficial or pleasurable andbad when they are harmful or painful. Since God is in no need ofbenefit and in no way can be pained, there is a sense in which hisactions are simply beyond good and evil.

In light of their denial that there is any objective, God-independentstandard of right and wrong to which God is beholden, Ashʿariteswere accused of undermining God’s justice and making thegoodness or badness of actions arbitrary. That is because if therewere no limits to what God can morally command, then what God willedin the past to be good or bad, he could in the future will and socommand to be contrariwise. Indeed, God may inflict pain on aninnocent for no reason whatsoever, and yet that action would be goodprecisely because God commanded it. The Ashʿarites were notinsensitive to this complaint. While both al-Juwaynī andGhazālī insist on God’s absolute omnipotence and soGod’s possibility to act arbitrarily, they also note that anaction is only actually arbitrary if it is actually carried out, notif its occurrence is merely possible. Thus, a preferred Ashʿariteresponse to the arbitrariness complaint was that the possibility ofthe occurrence is not the occurrence of the possibility; God confirmsvia revelation that he gives reward for good actions and he may punishonly those who do not fulfill what is decreed by revelation(JuwaynīProofs, 157–64, 209–11 andGhazālīModeration, 172–88).

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