DOI: 10.11136/jqh.1210.02.

02

The denial of supernatural sorcery in

classical and modern Sunni tafsīr of
sūrah al-Falaq (113:4): a reflection on
underlying constructions
Arnold Yasin Mol *
Abstract:
One of the main trends in Islamic modernism is the pursuit of
rational exegesis of the Qur’ān. As a response to this trend many
of these Sunni Islamic modernists have been accused of being
neo-Mu’tazilites because of their use of independent reason,
the historicizing of the Qur’ān, the emphasis on metaphorical
interpretation of verses with supernaturalistic contents, the
de-emphasizing of tradition, and the use of non-Islamic
sources and thought. The similarities between modernists and
classical rationalistic schools are seen in their exegeses on verse
113:4 wherein the dominant traditional interpretation of
supernatural sorcery is denied. This paper tries to show that
why many forms of Islamic modernism are labelled as modern
versions of Mu’tazilism.
Keywords: Islamic Modernism, tafsīr, Islamic theology,
occasionalism, (neo-)Mu’tazilism, Islam and science, Natural
law, natural philosophy, hadīth criticism

[Q113] “In the name of God, Most Gracious, Most Merciful [1]
Say: ‘I seek refuge in the Lord of the Daybreak, [2] from the evil
of what He has created, [3] and from the evil of darkness when it
gathers, [4] and from the evil of the blowers on knots (wa min sharri

*
Leiden University, Netherlands arnoldmol@deenresearchercenter.com. This paper
was written for the course “Advanced Qur’anic and Hadith studies” under Dr. Umar
Ryad. I thank him, Dr. Ghaly and Dr. Sneller for their guidance in developing the
background for this paper.

© 2012 Al-Bayān Journal.

Published by Department of al-Qur'an and al-Hadith, Academy of Islamic Studies,
University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur - Malaysia.

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 AL-BAYĀ� N - VOLUME 11 - NUMBER 1- (JUN 2013)

al-naffāthāti fi’l-'uqad), [5] and from the evil of an envier when he

envies’.”
The idea of sorcery, magic and witchcraft is present in most
religions as it was part of the classical worldview whereby many
workings of nature were unknown and understood as ruled by
supernatural forces. The ‘blowing on knots’ which the above
verse refers to is “a magical practice much in use in Semitic circles
[..] It was particularly popular in Jewish circles, despite its rigid
prohibition in the Pentateuch [..]. An allusion to this practice is
found in the Sumerian Maqlū (The Burnt Tablets), where we read:
“His knot is open, his witchcraft has been cancelled, and his spells
now fill the desert.” The blowing itself, the bad breath and the spit,
are considered an enemy’s curse.”1
In Islam the dominant viewpoint takes sorcery as something God
allowed to function in this world, thus reconciling God’s almightiness
and the classical worldview. The common people formulated many
types of protection against sorcery through amulets of Qur’ān verses
or Islamic symbols and prayers2, and classical scholars made the
existence of magic part of their interpretations of the Qur’ān, hadīth
and creeds. But from the 19th century on many modern Qur’ān
commentators as Mu’ammad ‘Abduh (1905 CE), Muhammad
Rashīd Ridā (1935 CE), and Syed Ahmed Khan (1898 CE), which
have influenced Qur’ān translators and commentators as Muhammad
Asad (1992 CE), Ghulam Ahmed Parwez (1985 CE), Muhammad
Ali (1950 CE), Sayd Qutb (1963 CE), and shaykh Muhammad al-
Ghazālī (1996 CE)3, have rejected the reality of supernatural sorcery
1
Gabriel Mandel Khan, ‘Magic’ in Encyclopeadia of the Qur'ān, volume 3 (2003),
p.248. 
2
For example the widespread use of amulets with Ayah al-Kursī (Q. 2:255) engraved in
them, and the North-African tradition of wearing necklaces with symbols as the ‘hand
of Fatima’.
3
Their works on the Qur'ān include: Muhammad 'Abduh and Rashīd Ridā, Tafsīr al-
Qur'ān al-Hakim al-Mustahir bi Tafsīr al-Manār (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-'Ilmiyyah,
2009), 12 volumes. Muhammad 'Abduh, Tafsīr juz 'Amma (Cairo: Maktaba wa
Matba'ah Muhammad 'Alī, 1967). Syed Ahmed Khan, Tafsīr ul-Qur'ān (India:
Aligarh, 1880-1904), 7 volumes. Muhammad Asad, The Message of the Qur'ān
(London: The Book Foundation, 2008). Ghulam Ahmed Parwez, Mafhoom ul-Qur'ān
(Lahore: Tolueislam publishing, 1980), 3 volumes. Maulana Muhammad Ali, The
Holy Qur'ān (USA: Ahmadiyyah Anjuman Isha'at Islam, 1991). Shaykh Muhammad

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The Denial of Supernatural Sorcery in Classical and Modern Sunni Tafsīr of Sūrah al-Falaq (113:4):
A Reflection on Underlying Constructions

and magic. We see this for example in their commentaries on the

above explained term al-Naffāthāti in sūrah al-Falaq (S.113:4) which
is understood by the majority of Sunni Qur’ān commentators and
translators as referring to witches performing supernatural sorcery
affecting reality through ‘blowing on knots’  with the intend to
truly bewitch people. The classical tradition claims that this sūrah
was revealed to cure the prophet from the effects of witchcraft
which had made him ill or confused for months. With this reason
of revelation (sabab al-Nuzūl) this surah together with S.114 al-
Nāss are known as the mu’awwadhatayn, “the two seekers of refuge”,
which by popular tradition is recited as amulets against curses and
the ‘evil eye’.4

No witchcraft in modernity?
The above cited modernists reject both the reality of supernatural
sorcery and the historical traditions which claim the bewitching of
the prophet, as these conflicts with their worldview and the purity
they demand of Mohammad’s prophethood. This rejection can be
provided by explicitly refuting the idea of supernatural sorcery, or
as in the case of Muhammad Ali, not even referring to the concept
of supernatural sorcery but applying the wide semantic fields of the
roots of the words in the verse to provide naturalistic meanings, a
methodology he has taken from Syed Ahmed Khan:
“’And from the evil of those who cast (evil suggestions)
in firm resolutions.’ Naffāthāt is the plural of
naffāth, which is an intensive nominative from
nafatha, meaning primarily he blew. But nafatha
fi qalbi-hi means he put a thing into his heart (LL),
and nafatha fi ru’i means he inspired or put it into
my mind (N). ‘Uqad is the plural of ‘uqdah, which
signifies a tie (LL), and judgment and consideration
al-Ghazālī, A Thematic Commentary of the Qur'ān (tafsīr al-Mawdu'ih) (translated by
Ashur A. Shamis, USA: IIIT, 2005). Sayd Qutb, In the Shade of the Qur'ān (fī zilāl al-
Qur'ān) (translated by Adil Salihi, Leichester: The Islamic Foundation, 1995-2009),
18 volumes. The years are the approximate years of death in CE, common era, or AH,
after Hijra.
4
Ibn ‘Umar al-Baydawī (658 AH), Anwār al-Tanzīl wa āsrār al-Ta’wīl (Beirut: Dār
Sadr, 2001), volume 1, p. 1180.

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 AL-BAYĀ� N - VOLUME 11 - NUMBER 1- (JUN 2013)

of one’s affairs (T), and management, regulating

and ordering of one’s affairs (LL). It also signifies a
promise of obedience or vow of allegiance (LA, LL).
Hence the naffathat fi al-’uqad are really those who
put evil suggestions into the resolution of men or into
the management of their affairs. Note that naffāthāt
are not necessarily women; the word equally applies
to jamā’at, or companies of men (Rz). This verse
deals with the second difficulty in the management
of an affair. The first difficulty is its being enveloped
in utter gloom (v. 3); the second is that darkness is
dispelled, but the resolution to accomplish the affair
is yet weak.”5
Sayd Qutb explains the effects of sorcery caused “by deceiving
people’s physical senses or by influencing their will-power and
projecting ideas onto their emotions and minds”. And rejects it
being supernatural as “[m]agic is the production of illusions, subject
to a magician’s designs, and it does not offer any kind of new facts
or alter the nature of things.”6 Muhammad Asad doesn’t take a
clear stance on the reality of supernatural sorcery, but his chosen
references shows he prefers naturalistic explanations as “Zamakhshari
categorically rejects all belief in the reality and effectiveness of such
practices, as well as of the concept of “magic” as such. Similar views
have been expressed - albeit in a much more elaborate manner, on
the basis of established psychological findings - by Muhammad
‘Abduh and Rashid Rida.”7 Shaykh Muhammad al-Ghazālī similarly
refers to “Ibn Hazm, the Andalusian scholar of the Zāhirite school
of Islamic fiqh refuse to believe in sorcery, as the idea is mixed with
a great deal of mythology and folklore and has to be taken with
much skepticism.”8 The above citations show that the rejection of
5
Muhammad Ali, ibid, p. 1259. LL stands for Lane's Lexicon, LA for the Arabic lexicon
Lisān al- 'Arab and RZ for Imam al-Rāzī's tafsīr Mafātīh al-Ghayb.
6
Sayd Qutb, ibid, volume 18, p. 296.
7
Muhammad Asad, ibid, p. 1125, note 3. In his commentary on verse 2:102 he says
that the Qur'ān is unclear “on the objective truth of occult phenomena as magic or
that it is based on self-deception”, but that it wants to warn to the spiritual danger of
these phenomena which can be viewed as supernatural “in the mind of the person”,
ibid, p. 367, note 84.
8
Shaykh Muhammad al-Ghazālī, ibid, p. 768.

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The Denial of Supernatural Sorcery in Classical and Modern Sunni Tafsīr of Sūrah al-Falaq (113:4):
A Reflection on Underlying Constructions

supernatural sorcery is not simply a modern position formed under

the influence of the modern scientific worldview. When looking at
classical Sunni sources we can see that this position is already present
in early Islamic thought that, although not being accepted by the
majority of later scholars, is still mentioned in many orthodox
works without any detailed refutation. Many early and later classical
scholars rejected the reality of sorcery and witchcraft, calling it forms
of deceptions, illusions and trickery as the Arabic word sihr means
“to make something false look real, deceit, falsification, delude’’.
The famous Arabic lexiconer Raghīb al-Isfāhanī (502 AH) says sihr
is “the deception and sham that has no reality (lā haqīq lahā) in
what it works on as the trickster (al-Musha’badu) uses the turning
(bi-Sarf) of the perception (al-absār) by the lightness of the hand”.9
The later Maturidī theologian al-Nasafī (701 AH) mentions that the
Mu’tazilah school rejected the reality of sorcery completely (inkār
tahqīq al-Sihr).10 The famous early Maturidī Hanafī jurist Abū Bakr
al-Jassās (370 AH) says sorcery and magic is just deception and
trickery and has no true existence in reality. If magic was true, he
asks, why don’t the magicians remove kings, steal their wealth and
rule the world? But no, he says, the only place we see magicians is
in the marketplaces, they are poor and this proves their magic isn’t
real as they would have improved their lives through magic.11 And as
Shaykh al-Ghazālī and Muhammad Asad mention above, it was also
rejected by classical scholars as the Zāhirite Ibn Hazm (456 AH)12
9
Edward Lane, Arabic-English lexicon (New Dehli: Asian Educational Services, 1991),
volume 4, pp. 40-42. al-Raghīb al-Isfāhanī (502 AH), al-Mufrādat fī gharīb al-Qur'ān
(Beirut: Dār al-Marifah, 2005), pp. 231-232.  Raghīb is deemed by many to be a
Mu'tazilite.
10
Ibn Mahmūd al-Nasafī, Tafsīr al-Nasafī aw Madārik al-Tanzīl wa Haqāiiq al-Tā'wīl
(Cairo: al-Maktab al-Tawfīqīt, n.dt), volume 2, p. 478. al-Nasafī makes it very clear
that he is oppossed to this opinion of the Mu'tazilah.
11
Muhammad Salīh Farfūr, The Beneficial Message & The Definitive Proof In The Study
Of Theology (al-Risālah al-Nafi'ah wal-Hujjat al-Qati'at fī 'ilm al-Tawhīd) (translated
by Wesam Charkawi, London: Azhar Academy, 2010), pp. 197-202. See also his
discussion on sihr: Abū Bakr Ahmad 'Alī al-Rāzī al-Jassās, Kitab Ahkām al-Qur'ān
(Beirut: Dâr al-Kitāb al-'Arabī, n.dt.), volume 1, pp. 41-58, chapter Bāb al-Sihr wa
Hukm al-Sāhir. For the discussion on al-Jassās being a Mu'tazilite or Māturīdī, see
Anvar M. Emon at xx below, pp. 45-46.
12
I haven’t taken the time to study Ibn Hazm and his theological constructs of God
and nature well enough to discuss him in this essay, but he lays much emphasis on

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 AL-BAYĀ� N - VOLUME 11 - NUMBER 1- (JUN 2013)

and the Mu’tazilite al-Zamakhsharī (538 AH). The latter gives this
explanation:
“al-Naffathat are women or persons or groups of
magicians who fix their desires in strings and blow
and spit on them by extreme blowing together with
saliva. And there is no real effect through this (lā
tā’thīr lidalika) unless when something harmful
thing is eaten.[..] But God, almighty and great, acts
with this on the path of testing to distinguish those
who are fixed on the truth of the gracious civilized
people from those of the ignorant barbaric masses.”13
Another example is the early Mu'tazilite judge Abū Bakr al-
'Asamm (220 AH) who explains the verse in a way which is very
similar to the modernist Muhammad Ali whereby the verse is not
seen as relating to witchcraft but only to bad influence:
“The female blowers [of inspirations] are those who incline
(yamilna) the opinions of men (āra’ al-Rijāl), they divert them
(ya’rifnahum) of their [original] intentions and make them turn
towards (yaruddunahum ilā) the opinions (of the blowers) in order
to change (ya’bur) the determination and opinions in one’s resolution
empiricism and hard rationalism: “The reality of the reason is that it makes distinction
between things that are comprehended by means of senses and intuitive understanding
and to have cognition of their qualities that constitute their nature like the necessary
cognition of createdness of the universe [..] And the truth is that the reason is the
only faculty that distinguishes between the qualities of existent things. It apprehends
the fact and conditions of matter, of the universe, of what is demonstrable of them
and what is impossible of them”, Ibn Hazm, Kitāb al-Fasl fī al-Milal wa al-Ahwa'
wa al-Nihal, volume 5, p.135, cited and translated by Ghulam Haider Aasi, Muslim
Understanding of Other Religions: A study of Ibn Hazm’s Kitāb al-Fasl fi al-Milal wa al-
Ahwā' wa al-Nihal, (New Dehli: Adam publishers & distributors, 2007), p. 69. Ibn
Hazm also rejected the idea of humans being possessed by jinn since the Qur'ān itself
only mentions that people can be influenced by them through ‘whispering inspirations’
(Q. 6:112), a stance also taken by the Mu'tazilah and the modernist Shaykh al-Ghazālī.
See Ignaz Goldziher, Schools of Koranic Commentators (translated by Wolfgang H.
Behn, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2006), pp. 92-93. And Shaykh Muhammad
al-Ghazālī his: The Sunna of the Prophet between the People of the Fiqh and the People of
the hadīth (al-Sunnah al-Nubuwiyyah bayna 'Ahl al-Fiqh wa 'Ahl al-hadīth) (translated
by Aisha Bewley, Istanbul: Dar al-Taqwa, 2009), pp. 88-97.
13
Ibn ‘Umar al-Zamaksharī, al-Kashāf ‘an Haqā’iq al-Tanzīl wa ‘uyūn al-’Aqāwīl fi
wujūh al-Tā’wīl (Beirut: Dār Sadr, 2010), volume 4, pp. 1834-1835.

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The Denial of Supernatural Sorcery in Classical and Modern Sunni Tafsīr of Sūrah al-Falaq (113:4):
A Reflection on Underlying Constructions

(bil- ‘Uqad). And this change towards dissolving [one’s opinion]

is through the blowing [of thoughts], and indeed the tyrannizing
behaviour (al-’āduh jartu) is that man dissolves [someone’s] resolution
by blowing [other thoughts] into it.”14
Al-Māturidī (333 AH) mentions that al-’Asamm believed
the bewitching of the Prophet is not possible (lā yajūz) and so he
rejected (fataraktuhu) the traditions that claim this.15 The reason
for rejecting these traditions by the Mu’tazilah is explained by the
famous Mu’tazilite ‘Abd al-Jabbār (1025 CE) who says these reports
are completely false (bātil) because according to the Qur’ān God has
protected the Prophet against mankind (ya’simuka min al-Nāss, Q.
5:67), that sorcerers never succeed (lā yuflihu al-Sāhir, Q. 20:69),
and that these reports lead to the slander of prophethood (yufadī ilā
al-Qadh fī al-Nabuwwah) which does damage (al-Darūr) to all the
prophets as this would mean these sorcerers would have the power to
control their souls, and this, according to ‘Abd al-Jabbār, is certainly
not possible.16 We see a similar position taken by al-Jassās and the
modernist Muhammad ‘Abduh.17 Rejecting hadīth traditions based
on these arguments is typical for the rationalistic schools (‘Ahl al-
Kalām or ‘Ahl al-Ra’y) when they felt their contents damages the
status of the Prophet and that of Islam as a truthful and rational
religion.18
14
Abū Bakr al-‘Asamm, tafsīr Abī Bakr al-‘Asamm (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-’ilmiyyah,
2007), p. 267. The same exegesis of this surah was also attributed to the later Mu'tazilite
Abū Muslim Isfahanī (332 AH), it is unclear to me at the moment if he adopted aal-
‘Asamm’s exegesis or that it was falsely attributed to al-‘Asamm.
15
Abū Mansūr al-Māturīdī, tā’wīlāt ‘ahl al-Sunna (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-‘ilmiyyah,
2005), volume 10, p. 653. According to traditions 5430, 5432, 5433 and 6082 in the
collection of Bukhārī, the Prophet was bewitched by the Jew Labīd ibn al-A'sam which
made him feel ill and forgetful until Gabriel or two angels explained the problem
and revealed this sūrah to protect him against the black magic. See also: al-Wāhidī al-
Naysābūrī (468 AH), 'Asbāb al-Nuzūl al-Qur'ān (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-'ilmiyyah,
2008), pp. 301-302.
16
al-Qādī Abī al-Hasan ‘Abd al-Jabbār bin Ahmad al-‘Asdābādī, Tafsīr al-Qādī ‘Abd al-
Jabbār al-Mu’tazilī (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-‘ilmiyyah, 2009), pp. 366-367.
17
Abū Bakr Ahmad ‘Alī al-Rāzī al-Jassās, ibid, volume 3, pp. 421-423. Muhammad
'Abduh, Tafsīr juz 'Amma, pp. 179-181.
18
Daniel W. Brown, Rethinking Tradition in Modern Islamic Thought (Cambridge: 1999,
Cambridge University Press) pp. 6-20. Aisha Y. Musa, Hadīth as Scripture: Discussions
on the Authority of Prophetic Traditions in Islam (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2007),

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 AL-BAYĀ� N - VOLUME 11 - NUMBER 1- (JUN 2013)

The nature of God and the nature of nature: theological

constructions and their consequences
As mentioned in the introduction, the Islamic tradition inherited
many different concepts of sorcery from different cultures.
Fākhruddīn al-Rāzī (606 AH) provides in his tafsīr eight categories
of sihr:
1. Ancient Chaldean magic related to astrology.
2. Physical magic.
3. Magic through spirits (Jinn).
4. Juggling and trickery through diversion.
5. Through devices and wired objects.
6. Using intoxicants and perfumes to confuse the
senses.
7. Through show and boasting gaining large crowds
who are more susceptible.
8. Through slander, backbiting and creating discord
between people.19
(1.) has been rejected by the Mu'tazilah but also by many
orthodox scholars as Ibn Jawziyyah (751 AH), (2.) and (3.) has
also been rejected by the Mu'tazilah and a minority of orthodox
scholars. The rest fit in a naturalistic world and are accepted by the
Mu' tazilah, rationalist scholars from other schools, and all orthodox
schools. Modernists as 'Abduh have provided psychological
explanations which can be understood as a new ninth (9.) category.
The difference between accepting and rejecting supernatural magic,
sorcery and witchcraft as real isn’t about ‘being rational’ as we
would see it through our modern eyes, the discussion on sorcery
within Qur'ān exegesis comes from the used theological constructs
which allow sorcery or not. With the above mentioned modern and
classical scholars, God is seen as creating the world with a natural
system which expresses His will in a consistent way, and which
can be discovered through logic and observation. Supernaturalism
is minimalized to the existence of angels and jinn, and must fall

pp. 9-21 and 33-39.

19
Fākhruddīn al-Rāzī, al-Tafsīr al-Kabīr aw Mafātīh al-Ghayb (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub
al-‘ilmiyyah, 2009), volume 3-4, pp. 184-202. Duncan B. MacDonald, ‘Sihr’ in
Encyclopeadia of Islam (Leiden: 1st edition reprint, Brill, 1993), volume 7, p. 414.

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The Denial of Supernatural Sorcery in Classical and Modern Sunni Tafsīr of Sūrah al-Falaq (113:4):
A Reflection on Underlying Constructions

under logically defined systems. Supernatural sorcery of (1-3.) is

rejected and all forms of practiced sorcery must fall under categories
(4-8, 9.). Any story in the Qur'ān talking about magic or sorcery
is interpreted as being practiced through the methods discussed
under (4-8, 9.), or alternative interpretations as by al-'Asamm and
Muhammad Ali that provide meanings completely unrelated to
supernatural sorcery or witchcraft and reduce it to “bad influence”.
These rational theological constructions were followed by scholars
of the Mu‘tazilah (dominant between the 7th till 12th century CE
in many parts of the Muslim world) and the Māturīdī (arose in the
10th century CE and was and is still partially adopted by the hanafī
school of Fiqh), who put reason and logic above or next to revelation,
and partially share the worldview of modern scientific naturalism
through their versions of Atomism and secondary causation which
provided mostly mechanical physical views of the world.
This pre-scientific Atomism reduced nature to bodies formed
of atoms which have properties that determine their quality and
workings (accidents), and as everything exists as finite atoms there
must be an infinite creator who sustains them through His will. And
in the Mu‘tazilah and Maturidī theological frameworks, God’s will is
consistent in act and purpose, thus providing a consistent mechanical
world without any deviation, excepting prophetic miracles.20 The
will of God sustains the laws of nature and the properties and
causality of atoms which creates continuity in nature, but without
20
Josef van Ess, The Flowering of Muslim Theology, (USA: Harvard, 2006), pp. 79-116.
Richard M. Frank, Beings and Their Attributes: The Teaching of the Basrian School of the
Mu’tazila in the Classical Period (New York: State University of New York Press, 1978),
pp. 58-148. Mustafa Ceric, Roots of Synthetic Theology in Islām (Malaysia: ISTAC,
1995), pp. 63-106. A new development is also that many modernists as the above
mentioned Muhammad'Abduh, Syed Ahmed Khan, Muhammad Asad, Muhammad
Ali and Ghulam Ahmed Parwez reject prophetic miracles as events that overruled
natural laws, and rejected the classical interpretation of jinns as supernatural beings
by providing alternative metaphorical or etymological explanations of the Qur'ānic
verses. Many of them also see angels not as beings but as non-personal forces as the
laws of nature, thus minimalizing supernaturalism to the existence of God and the
Hereafter. See their works mentioned above in note ii. This trend can be related to the
likely influence of or similar development as the Enlightenment anti-supernaturalism
movement in Western Protestant liberal theology. See for a discussion on this trend:
J.M.S. Baljon, Modern Muslim Koran Interpretation (1880-1960) (Leiden: Brill, 1968),
pp. 22-23, 27, 63-66.

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 AL-BAYĀ� N - VOLUME 11 - NUMBER 1- (JUN 2013)

denying God’s capability to override these when He wishes so (i.e.

conservatism, but in my eyes thus representing a minimal form of
occasionalism). For the majority of later mainstream orthodoxy of the
Ash‘arī school (arose in the 10th century CE) and the later Māturīdī
which had collapsed together with later Ash‘arīsm from theology
(‘ilm al-Kalām) into a unified dogmatic creed (‘aqīdah) of the ahl
al-Sunnah21 which still dominates the majority of Sunni thought,
sorcery isn’t irrational or against nature as God can grant people
power to do anything. They inherited the Atomism of the Mu‘tazilah
wherein God continuously sustains nature but they emphasized that
God acts without constraining Himself in any form of a consistent
system (thus a maximal form of occasionalism). There are no laws
determining God’s way of acting. Thus sorcery can be part of a rational
worldview wherein God can allow deviations; it isn’t unnatural as
everything that exists is part of nature as God wills it at the moment.
There is nothing supernatural or natural, there’s only God’s will.22
The Ash‘arī worldview was constructed on a rational theology
which emphasized God’s unrestrained power and immanence, and
at the same time affirmed and assimilated the classical worldview
wherein nature didn’t work through a fixed mechanical system. In a
way we can say that it reconciled intellectual philosophical theology
and the popular beliefs of the non-intellectual masses. The divide
between natural law (conservatism/minimal occasionalism) and no-
natural law (maximal occasionalism) theologies not only affect their
naturalistic worldview, but also their ethical worldview. Conservatism
adherents as the Mu‘tazilah and early Māturīdī as al-Jassās have an
objective view on ethics which Anvar M. Emon defines as ‘Hard
Natural Law’: 

21
As shown by the wide acceptance by the Ash'arī of the Māturīdī creed ('Aqīdah) of
al-Nasafī. See: Jeffry R. Halverson, Theology and Creed in Sunni Islam: The Muslim
Brotherhood, Ash’arīsm, and political Sunnism (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2010),
pp. 33-82.
22
Anvar M. Emon, Islamic Natural Law Theories (New York: Oxford University Press,
2010), pp. 25-37, 48-49. Imam al-Haramayn al-Juwayni (478 AH), The Guide to
the Conclusive Proofs of the Principles of Belief (Kitāb al-Irshad ilā qawati al-adilla fī
usūl al-i’tiqad) (translated by Paul E. Walker, Lebanon: Garnet, 2010), pp. 175-176.
Frank Griffel, Al-Ghazali’s Philosophical Theology (New York: Oxford University Press,
2009), pp. 172-174. Richard M. Frank, Classical Islamic Theology: The Ash’arītes (USA:
Ashgate, 2008), pp. X/39-53.

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The Denial of Supernatural Sorcery in Classical and Modern Sunni Tafsīr of Sūrah al-Falaq (113:4):
A Reflection on Underlying Constructions

“It is built upon theological first principles about God and

nature. Hard Natural Law jurists espoused as a theological first
principle that God only does good and is incapable of doing any
evil. Consequently, according to Hard Natural Law adherents, when
God created the world He intended to benefit humanity. God would
not have created the world to benefit God’s self since God requires
no such benefit. Nor would God create it in order to cause pain and
suffering for others regardless of their behavior, since that would
be unfair and unjust to those adversely affected. As God is only
just, they hold that creation must therefore pose a benefit to others.
From this proposition, they thereby held that we can discern these
benefits through the use of our reason and thereby develop norms of
behavior whose normative authority is based on the divine creative
will, which purposely created the benefits in the first place. Hard
naturalists fused the value arising from God’s justice and will with
the facts of a natural order to invest nature with both objectivity and
normative value.”23
Many of the later Māturīdī and the majority of the Ash‘arī who
professed maximal occasionalism are termed by him as following a
‘Soft Natural Law’:
“[They] preserve a theological commitment to God’s
omnipotence, since God can alter His grace as He
sees fit. For Soft Naturalist jurists, God need not
have provided any guidance through His creation of
nature. But since He did, out of His grace, humans
can rely upon it. But they do so not because of some
theological assumption about the limits of God’s
power. Instead, we can reason about the good and
the bad as a basis for the law only because of God’s
purposive, merciful, and gracious creation of our
ability to discern such things from His creation—
which God can alter at any time. While both Hard
and Soft Naturalists fused fact and value in nature,
the Soft Naturalists argued that its constancy is
subject to a divine purposiveness that can be changed
at God’s discretion. Nature, as it exists, is certainly
23
Anvar M. Emon, ibid, pp. 25-26.

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a source of the good. But it is not an unchangeable,

indubitable good.”24
There is a direct relation between seeing nature having a
consistent causational determined structure (laws of nature) and
it being a reliable source of ethics, goodness and welfare (ethical
natural law). The conservatists see a logical structured consistent
world that can be understood and discovered through reason, as
this must be a world that is a source of constant goodness. It is
an optimistic confident view of existence. As nature and reason are
reliable sources for ethics, they saw revelation as assisting, clarifying
and expanding objective ethics, and thus accepting universal access to
God’s will outside the Islamic sources (Theological objective ethics).
Occasionalists as the Ash‘arī also viewed nature as good, but not as
a consistent source of goodness, since its structure can be changed
at any moment (maximal occasionalism). Making it a pessimistic
skeptical view of existence. As nature and reason aren’t reliable sources
for ethics, they emphasized the importance of revelation and thus
also the exclusive access to God’s will through the Islamic sources
(theological voluntarism almost necessarily ends up in religious
exclusivism). As Mark C. Murphy puts it: “Standard [ethical] natural
law theory is, mutatis mutandis, mere conservatism. [..] Theological
voluntarism is, mutatis mutandis, mere occasionalism.”25 Frank
Griffel states it as: “Natural law, however, is not the same as the “law
of nature.” [..] Natural law is, however, legitimized by the existence
of laws of nature. Natural law is understood as precepts for ethical
behavior that are derived from the study of nature. [..] Humans are
able to detect and determine these judgments in an endeavor that is
similar to an investigation of the physical laws of nature or of logics
or mathematics. Natural law may be determined in two ways that
are not mutually exclusive: first, from determining innate notions in
our minds about what must be right and wrong, and second, from
an inquiry into nature or, generally, the world that is outside our
minds. The sources of natural law are thus (i) the notions about right
or wrong that humans find “naturally within their minds and/or (2)
the rules that govern nature. The understanding of what natural law
24
Anvar M. Emon, ibid, pp. 32-33.
25
Mark C. Murphy, God and Moral Law: On the Theistic Explanation of Morality (New
York: Oxford University Press, 2011), pp. 139-140.

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The Denial of Supernatural Sorcery in Classical and Modern Sunni Tafsīr of Sūrah al-Falaq (113:4):
A Reflection on Underlying Constructions

contains varies widely and often depends on a prior understanding

of what “nature” is. For those who understand nature as the original
and untouched state of affairs, natural law is the original order or Ur-
Order of human practice. Others understand nature as the realm of
rationality, and for them, natural law is simply rational law that can
be deduced from rational principles. Both these notions of natural
law rely on an understanding of “nature” as efficient causality.”26

Scaling Naturalism and Goodness

Islamic studies has traditionally referred to these camps as the
rationalists versus the traditionalists, the conservatists versus the
occasionalists, the Mu‘tazilah versus the Ash‘arī, but I believe we can
achieve better insights by using a scale of theistic minimal to maximal
occasionalism and objective ethics to theological voluntarism on
which individual scholars can be placed as not all scholars from the
Mu‘tazilah, Māturīdī and Ash‘arī schools fall into specific camps.
For example, a classical scholar as Abū Hamīd al-Ghazalī (1111
CE) is classified as an Ash‘arīte, but he viewed God’s immanent will
(God’s habit, ‘ādat Allah) in nature almost as fixed and reliable as
conservatists.27 The same can be said concerning his stance between
objective ethics and theological voluntarism. Instead of seeing him as
simply deviating from Ash‘arī views, we can understand him better
by placing him on this scale as an individual, adopting different
positions during different phases in his life, within an evolving
tradition with fluid epistemologies and sociological contexts and
needs.
When studying the works of the above cited modernists, who
mostly don’t take a clear stance on which theological construct they
follow but do come from the creedal-merged Maturidī and Ash‘arī
schools, it is clear they fall on the side of minimal occasionalism
(conservatism) but on different levels. For example Shaykh
Muhammad al-Ghazālī when commenting on Qur‘ān verses 42:28-

26
Frank Griffel, The Harmony of Natural Law and Shari’a in Islamist Theology in Shari’a:
Islamic law in the contemporary context edited by Abbas Amanat and Frank Griffel
(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007), p. 40.
27
Frank Griffel, al-Ghazāli Philosophical Theology, p. 231-233. Richard M. Frank, al-
Ghazālī and the Ash’arite school (London: Duke university press, 1994), pp. 36-39.

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32 says: “These are references to natural laws”, and he constantly

emphasizes the importance of rationality and God’s goodness, while
still acknowledging the reality of prophetic miracles. There are laws
of nature which create consistency and make creation intelligentable,
but God is not restrained by them.28 Ghulam Ahmed Parwez on the
other hand can be classified as an extreme minimal occasionalist as
he says: “In the universe which He has created, His Will assumes
the shape of immutable laws to which all physical beings are subject.
These laws—the Laws of Nature—are called “Kalimat Ullah” in
the terminology of Quran, and, as already stated, are immutable.
“There is no changing the Kalimat of Allah” (10:64). It is the
unchangeability and immutability of these laws on which the entire
edifice of science and the predictions we make in the realm of
physical world are founded. [..] [T]he world has been created by
God Who is both all-powerful and all-wise. it, therefore, exhibits
order and harmony, purpose and benignity. it is the home of
values.” For Parwez, it is not possible that any event runs counter to
natural laws as God’s will is immutable, thus all supposed miracles
or supernatural realities mentioned in the Qur‘ān are interpreted
metaphorically, whereby to him supernatural evil in the form of
Satan as a being does not even exist.29

28
Shaykh Muhammad al-Ghazālī, ibid, pp. 534, 102-103.
29
Ghulam Ahmed Parwez, Islam: A Challenge to Religion (Lahore: Tolu-e-Islam Trust,
1996), pp. 170-171, 136-144, 328-334.

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The Denial of Supernatural Sorcery in Classical and Modern Sunni Tafsīr of Sūrah al-Falaq (113:4):
A Reflection on Underlying Constructions

When placing these modernists on the scale, they fall in or

close to the same area as the Mu‘tazilah, which partially explains
why they have been identified as neo-Mu‘tazilah, even though these
modernists differ on many issues with the Mu‘tazilah and do not
uphold the specifics of the five principles (‘Usūl al-Khamsa) which
defined classical Mu‘tazilah adherence. It is in my view not only
the similarity in specific methodologies, dogma’s or interpretations
that creates the accusation of neo-Mu‘tazilism, as most elements
of orthodox Islamic jurisprudence (‘Usūl al-Fiqh) and theology
(‘ilm al-Kalām) go back to the Mu‘tazilah, but the similarities in
positions on the scale which are the foundations from which similar
methodologies, dogma’s and interpretations spring from.30
It is beyond the scope of this paper to make detailed specifications
for the scale and assessments of all mentioned Islamic scholars and
schools, but this diagram gives an idea of my proposed criteria.31 On
30
Mariam al-Attar, Islamic Ethics: Divine command Theory in Arabo-Islamic thought
(New York: Routledge, 2010), pp. 45-47, 142. On the accusations of neo-Mu'tazilism,
see for example Richard C. Martin and Mark R. Woodward with Dwi S. Atmaja,
Defenders of Reason in Islam: Mu’tazilism from Medieval School to Modern Symbol
(Oxford: Oneworld, 2003), pp. 128-136. See also Hussein Abdul-Raof, Theological
Approaches to Qur’anic Exegesis: A practical comparative-contrastive analysis (New York:
Routledge, 2012), pp. 32-36, 57-61.
31
A worked out concept of this scale will be the specific focus of my next publications.
The idea of such a scale is partially inspired by William E. Shepard’s Islam and Ideology:

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the horizontal line we go from minimal occasionalism (natural laws)

to maximal occasionalism (no natural laws), and on the vertical
line we go from objective ethics (natural goodness) to theological
voluntarism (no natural goodness). Another important factor is
that the closer one is to accepting natural laws and goodness, the
less emphasis and need is laid on revelatory sources and the higher
criteria one sets for accepting and grading revelatory sources. For
religion to be natural and rational, sources that are as reliable as
nature itself are needed, and for many scholars only the Qur‘ān and
a few traditions conformed to this criteria. As mentioned above, the
Mu‘tazilah laid less emphasis on the hadīth and discarded them when
the contents contradicted their position on the scale. Shaykh al-
Ghazālī (2) was famous for his criticism on several hadīth traditions
as in his eyes they did not conform to reason, and Parwez (1) was
a Qur‘ānist (accepting the Qur‘ān as the sole religious scripture)
who used hadīth only as a minimal historical source and rejected
them as revelation and being authoritative in matters of religion and
law.32 The more one emphasizes the concreteness of this nature and
the world, the less God is immanently present. This is also counts
for the opposite position. The more one rejects natural goodness
and laws, the more emphasis is laid on revelatory sources to fill the
epistemological vacuum in the pursuit of constructing the religion
of Islam. And as the Qur‘ān can only provide general religious
outlines, the more one accepts hadīth traditions and the lower the
criteria used for them. And when one rejects natural laws the more
one accepts supernaturalism and God’s immanence. All of these are
connected and influence one another:
natural goodness & natural laws <-> revelatory sources & supernaturalism

Towards a Typology, International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 19, No. 3 (Aug.,
1987), pp. 307-33, wherein he does the same for modernity and what he labeled
Islamic totalism. I hope also to provide a comparative view between our scales in a
future publication.
32
See for Shaykh Muhammad al-Ghazālī his: The Sunna of the Prophet between the People
of the Fiqh and the People of the hadīth (al-Sunnah al-Nubuwiyyah bayna 'Ahl al-Fiqh
wa 'Ahl al-hadīth), ibid. And for Parwez his: The Actual Status of Hadith (Muqaam-
e-Hadith), translated by Aboo B. Rana, http://www.tolueislam.org/Parwez/mh/mh.htm,
accessed on 07-05-2013. See also: Ali Usman Qasmi, Questioning the Authority of the
Past: The Ahl al-Qur’an movements in the Punjab (Karachi: Oxford University Press,
2011), pp. 216-286. And on both: Daniel W. Brown, ibid, pp. 54-139, 127, 129.

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The Denial of Supernatural Sorcery in Classical and Modern Sunni Tafsīr of Sūrah al-Falaq (113:4):
A Reflection on Underlying Constructions

By emphasizing natural laws and natural goodness the modernists

are, just as the classical rational scholars partially were, confronted
with traditions and dominant interpretations of the Shari‘ah and
Islam as formulated in classical Sunni Fiqh which uses an opposite
worldview. Some ignore or aren’t aware of this confrontation, others
try to reconcile, and others demand partial or complete reform of
the Shari‘ah and Islam. When we return to our original discussion
on the similarity of the classical and modern rationalists in their
rejection of supernatural sorcery, we see that both emphasize God as
sustaining the rationality and reality of natural goodness and natural
laws which makes the idea of supernatural magic and sorcery seem
irrational and an erratic form of evil that run counter to God’s own
goodness and wisdom as manifested within nature. Together with
the higher criteria laid upon revelatory sources, the traditions that
claim the prophet Muhammad was bewitched are seen as a threat
to the reliability of his prophethood, and thus to the Qur‘ān which
they see as conforming to their high standards of rationalism. The
story of the bewitching of Muhammad is denied by them based on
three issues: their conservatism denies the possibility of supernatural
sorcery, their emphasis on natural goodness demands revelatory
sources to conform to rational criteria, and the emphasis on
natural goodness also reduces the need for many revelatory sources.
Meaning that the hadīth traditions on the bewitching of the Prophet
are denied on their contents, the threat they pose for the rational
criteria of prophethood, and simply because traditions aren’t as vital
for their construction of a rational religion as the Qur‘ān is.

Conclusion
The natural law theologies of rational scholars and schools as the
Mu‘tazilah , early Māturīdī, and many of today’s modernists focus on
God’s justice, benevolence and wisdom who created a world wherein
evil can be conquered and where nature is meant to serve mankind’s
welfare. To make this all possible, creation must follow a consistent
causational system that can be discovered through human reason. It
seems that many of them see supernatural sorcery as an erratic and
irrational evil which has no place in such a type of creation. The
direct interdependent relationship between conservatism, natural

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goodness and high criteria for revelatory sources create natural law
theologies with a similar foundation. Classical rational scholars
focused on natural goodness, modernists on conservatism, and
thus both end up with natural law theologies. As today’s modern
conservatism is a dominant worldview constantly expanded and
confirmed through the success of modern science and education,
the return of Islamic natural law theologies isn’t an innovation or a
return to old heresies, but an honest search to construct a worldview
wherein a benevolent God has put mankind in a rational consistent
and humanity-serving world. These pursuits of constructing a
rational religion of Islam aren’t about pleasing or reconciling with
popular beliefs of the general Muslim masses or dominant positions
in Sunni thought, which also explains why in the past these
theologies rarely became a majority point of view as they confronted
the masses and tradition with a consistent and optimistic worldview
wherein God is less immanently present and needed. Today, natural
law theologies are returning in the works of many modernists in
conscious and unconscious fashions, whereby they ignore, reconcile,
or reform the concept of Shari‘ah and Islam in classical Sunni Fiqh,
as the differences in worldview have consequences in what way
people demand or see the degree of, as Shepard would call it, Islamic
totalism in the world. In natural law theologies, creation is seen as
a revelation next to the Qur‘ān which both can be interpreted as a
source of goodness and guidance and provides more certainty than
the historical tradition. This allows more flexibility in interpretation
and the use of non-revelatory sources, and thus embraces both the
demands of modern science and the needs of modern globalistic
society. The systematic rationality of creation and revelation is seen
as true justice and benevolence of a God who doesn’t play dice with
mankind.

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