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The Muʿtazilites And The Arabic

Rational Tradition

Farabi & Philosophy of The Mind

Conformality theory

everything has form & matter

the blueprint → form → that which holds the essence of the cat

present only for a moment → the perception of the cat

when you stop perceiving the cat → don’t lose the knowledge of it, just the
inhering

intellect interacting with intellection on the intellected

Intellectual work as a process → impossible to conceive multiple things at the

same time

subject (you) perceives an object

Farabi likes this one

Representational Theory

you knowing it is represented by the concept of the cat → you come to terms
with the catness/ cat → you have knowledge of it → ‘that is a cat’

Acquiring of Knowledge

Transmitted knowledge → inferior

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 by recorded accounts → flawed

it relies on the reliability of the records

Rational knowledge → superior

2nd order knowledge

if you claim to have knowledge of fire then you should ‘burn’ when you think of it

mystics

1st order knowledge

nothing separates object & subject

The moment you describe an object → loses a fundamental part of itself → a part of
it can’t be conveyed

Human intellect → bridge between the physical universe & higher

Revelations → when the truly great thinkers only touch upon the divine intellect

The capacity to perceive → as long as you are alive

becomes actual when it’s acquired

The Divine → intellect of The One

only reflects on itself

imitates God → God is nothing but pure intellect

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 Noetic → the knowledge of the form of the cat → the body doesn’t define the
essence

the form

not dependent on culture

occurs in the essence

the barking cat → the fault is in the matter not essence

accidents → all attributes that the essence doesn’t prescribe → e.g. fluffy,
pink, healthy, ill

they can never be bodies if they don’t have accidents

The World Is Temporarily Originated

4 principles

1. Accidents → present in bodies

2. The accidents are generated

3. Bodies in which accidents are present

can’t be free of them

don’t precede them

4. Necessarily generated → can’t be free or precede accidents → unavoidable then

Particularisation

Randomness → exponents assert that randomness in the world is inconceivable

Everything in this world is selected over a lesser alternative

not arbitrary

points to an action of a particularising agent

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 Nexus between inconceivability of randomness & the demonstrability of God

similar things coming into the existence at different times

what causes things coming into the existence → not intrinsic

things don’t come into existence on their own volition → otherwise all would
come to exist at the same time

physical objects come into existence by a particularised agent

the agent → external factor → doesn’t exist within the objects that come to exist

the agent → God

Kalam

Theology

Rational discourses

Disputation

Intelligent Speech

Early Islam

multi-religious milieu

minority faith → struggling to assert itself → politically & religiously

intellectual traditions

Syriac

Greek

Middle Persian

Coptic

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 Armenian

Arabic

Religious communities

Christian → Syria, Palestine, Egypt, N Africa

Zoroastrians → Iran, Iraq

Buddhists → Afghanistan, central Asia

Jewish → Parts of Iraq

influenced by Hellenistic philosophy

Origins of Kalam

Internal thesis

started as intra-Muslim disputation

confronted with new realities → Christian & Greek beliefs

autonomous of foreign influences

created before Muslims came into contact with Greek philosophy

addresses early religious concerns in early 700s & 800s AD

Topics addressed

free will

the question opened floodgates for philosophy in Islamic culture → began

with questioning scripture & judgement day → ‘if I can be punished then I
have free will’

nature of Qur’an

God’s nature

divine attributes

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 role of reason

2 distinct meanings in early Islam

Theological argumentation → talk with opponents

disjunctive argumentation → by asking questions & reducing opponent’s

position to meaningless alternatives

e.g. eating meat

/ \
Good Bad

/ \

Animals Plants also

are sentient sentient

argument → presented in a way that there’s only 2 options → 1 is a setup

the other is their view → leaves no option but to show fault in their own
argument

no matter which of 2 arguments is picked the argument is met with an

opposing view

works on the basis that human beings don’t act rationally

Systematic theological argumentation → seeks to..

defend

explicate

rationalise Muslim beliefs & religious commitments

Syncretic models of learning

no one kept a singular identity

inter/ cross religious debates

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 Evidence of Kalam-style theology in Middle East ca. 640s AD

Christianity in Middle East

Christological disputations → what is the nature of Jesus Christ

Christiological queries begin with disjunctive questions

you believe X → yes or no

Earliest Kalam debates in Arabic Quadariyya

Qadar → the power of acts or free will

are human actions predetermined

do we choose freely

does God punish us for actions that were predetermined

if we create our actions → how can God be all-powerful

Tolerated by ruling authorities

present in Iraq & Syria

Key doctrines

Humans responsible for their own actions

God doesn’t predetermine all human choices

Humans have some form of free will

human volition in sinful behaviour

Mu’tazila
Origins

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 Founded in Iraq → 700s AD

Etymology → ‘those who separate themselves’

Finding middle ground in opposition factions

Most sophisticated school of Kalam

adopted by Judaism & Christianity because of methodological universality

Development

Theology 800s → fairly developed

Vivacious scholastic community → Iraq, Syria, Iran

Debates with Jurists, Philosophers, Grammarians, Heretics

Theses

Atomism

Al-Nazzam → infinite divisibility of bodies

the participle that can’t be subdivided

Atom → juz’ or jawhar

accidents & atoms → exclusive constituents of the universe → i.e. besides God

Universe → made of discrete, contingent & admitting 2 primary categories of being

atoms

accidents

Atoms

discrete → can be distinguished from each other

contingent → existence of atoms related to divine causality

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 change in the world accounted by causality

3 positions on causality of accidents

1. caused by God

2. proceeded from their substrate

3. causal efficacy of human agents

Accidents inhere in body when it’s constituted

Thesis: Questions on Attribution

God & Attributes

God is one → there’s nothing like God

always knowing, powerful & living

Mu’tazilis → strict avoidance of anthropomorphism

refusal to admit attributes as distinct ontological entities

the problem of attribution → ‘God is a body but not like other bodies’

attribution → neither identical to the thing described nor not so → e.g. God’s
attributes belong to god but without any inherence like accidents

Mu’tazilis wary of lapsing into God of philosophers

Questions about God

is god knowing in the same way that human beings know

if God is knowing is there an object of His knowledge

God is knowing → He’s not unknowing

if objects change & undergo transformations → is God’s knowledge susceptible

to change or non-existence

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 God is knowing not in relation of things but of immaterial things → i.e. that
He is 1 and has no 2nd

another view → God is knowing → by virtue of a knowledge → which is He

himself

God is powerful → He’s not powerless

God is living → He’s not lifeless

The 5 Principles

1. Unity of God

2. Justice of God

3. Promise & Threat

4. State in between

5. Command to do right & prohibition of the reprehensible

Characteristic of Mu’tazili theology

Subject to commentaries & studies in medieval times

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