Ghamidi’s interpretation post – some afterthoughts about hermeneutics

Don’t have much time these days to write at length. Still mulling over some really thought-provoking comments on my Ghamidi’s interpretation post.

Is it a plausible conclusion that this fairly recent originalist attempt of fixing the ‘original intent’ of the revealed word can be seen as another tragedy to reduce Quran to the level of computer language, which is perhaps the only monosemous language in the world.

Can it be justifiably shown that historical context of each and every Divine verse is preserved and the ‘original intended meaning’ can be deduced from it without a tinge of doubt?

Contention that understanding the textual coherence (nazm) is mandatory to bring out the intended message almost leads one to assume that coherence is somehow a result of an exhaustive and unified process of textual criticism which is not apt to undergo revisions in times to come. Isn’t it against a seemingly more plausible contention that Quran is strictly an on-going and perpetual inter-communicative project between God and humanity; one that is naturally open to plural socio-ethical and legal interpretations?

To assert, as one brother seemingly does, that nihilistic delusion is a natural corollary to the claim that some degree of equivocalness is an inherent part of language, is a strange kind of interpretive extremism; an argument, which is itself an indicator how words are (mis) understood. Indeed, statements like ‘Philosophy tends to depart from from reality‘ reflect how unconcerned are engrossed interpreters of the text about the modern discourse that surrounds its nature.

As much as I contemplate with all my prejudices and extremely limited knowledge, I fail to see how a text like Quran can be merely viewed as a document with a strictly singular intent frozen in the past. Hasn’t it been shown with enough strength by many philosophical developments of last century that texts carry the burden of historical interpretation with them and its kind of impossible, if not futile, to go behind one ‘historical understanding’ and view them once again.

Texts are authors and readers – and not just authors and their utterances.

In my humble view, the present discourse goes well beyond the historical debates of logic, language and grammar and there are many bridges that have been built by modern philosophy between Abu Bishr Mattas and Abu Said al-Sirafis of our times.

Filed under: Islam & Modernity, Philosophy, Quran , Ghamidi, Language, Philosophy, Quran

Ghamidi’s interpretation of Islam: Is it a fad that will fizzle out with time?

I have stopped believing strongly since long that Javed Ahmed Ghamidi’s exposition of Islam, more or less like Mutizilite Islam in medieval times and Progressive Islam in modernity, is a fad that will fizzle out automatically with time; however, I still doubt that sometimes. It is primarily a better understanding of traditional Islam, cornerstone of which is Ilm al-Ikhtilaf, which moved me to drop my prejudiced (most probably) contention. Persevered deliberation made me realise that Ghamidi’s Islam, which I often call Contemporary School and which may going to be widely recognised as Islahi’s School, is a movement that would prove to be good for intellectual rejuvenation of Islamic thought; a kind of renaissance, which according to Javed Ghamidi himself began with Shibli Naumani in Indian Subcontinent.

The most striking feature of Contemporary School, to its proponents and those who agree with it, is its effort to posit a simplified and wholesome interpretation of religion. An interpretation which is commonly accessible because unlike classical interpretive methodologies, it is rooted in a singular divine text which can primarily be deconstructed through its language and historical context rather than tradition; an interpretation which is philosophically dynamic as it advances the ethical argument by way of inherent nature of man rather than any textually ordained source; an interpretation which is jurisprudentially liberating because it delimits the ambit of religious obligation by redefining the second most important source of classical jurisprudence, reducing it to a mere handful of practices; most importantly, an interpretation which is intellectually refreshing as it tends to reposition the categories of classical Islam’s legal archetype.

Yet, despite its entirely remarkable outlook, the school of thought in question poses complex paradoxes that seem unresolvable unless the underlying methodology is repeatedly tuned, tweaked and transformed into a consistent whole. A large part of blame, for this contradictory presentation, should be apportioned to modernity itself which has blurred the demarcating lines between various disciplines of religious knowledge, creating an atmosphere which is difficult for sensible and comprehensible communication. It no more matters whether you are getting a religious opinion from a jurist, philosopher or a traditionist; rather most of the times, it is the persuasiveness and sheer strength of argument with which one challenges the ostensible status quo of traditional scholarship that matters. However, whether traditional or contemporary, intensity of the argument should not be allowed to enshroud the underlying incoherence and inconsistency of the method.

Contemporary School asserts that the language of Quran, which is the single most important source text of Shariah, is not polysemantic in nature (a point about which I have already rambled once) and all differences of opinion due to apparent linguistic ambiguities will be resolved by referring to the context of revelation. The assertion, though attractive, is problematic on a number of accounts. It entails that a particular scholar or group’s insistence on absolute meanings of a verse is completely justified and all other explanations may not be seen as acceptable. It also disintegrates the problem of deconstructing the text by introducing an additional variable of context, differences of opinion regarding which will obviously be left unresolved. The magnitude of these contextual differences can be seen by comparing views of Islahi and Ghamidi on al-Ahzab 33: 59. Contemporary school insists that bringing out coherence (nazm) from the textual structure is the foremost principle and prerequisite of Quranic interpretation, which virtually reduces the possibility of true access of Quran to those individuals who have extraordinary command on language and have an exceptionally gifted mind that can appreciate high poetry in another language.

Indeed, we have enough evidence to substantiate that early generations of Muslims preferably interpreted the text through the simplest of meanings unless there is a specific directive from Prophet; otherwise, it seems hard to believe that some of the companions misinterpreted a seemingly straightforward trope, a caliph refused to comment on the meaning of ab’ba, and an exceptional master of language did not know the exact linguistic flavor of faatiris samaawat.

Coherence is a delight of mind and greatly improves one’s involvement in the divine text but it is not a prerequisite for understanding the message of God (not that Islahi contended so).

The ethical argument of Contemporary School is equally implausible, at least when it is applied to the details of religious interpretation. Philosophical skepticism of past two centuries have showed us decisively that ‘human nature’ is one of the most flimsy ground for establishing the moral argument. Even if one avoids the philosophical gibberish, it seems difficult to show arguably why swines and donkeys were made unlawful and camels were made lawful for human consumption; that too, when Ghamidi argues that Quran has prohibited only those comestibles which could not have been decided by human nature alone and Hadith (or Sunnah) cannot add to the Quran. Now, all of us know that camels and donkeys are not mentioned in Quran (in relation to food) and there are people in the world who have no qualms eating a plate full of sliced bacon.

It also seems strange how human nature alone, with its completely relative criteria of judgment, can be trusted to add into the ambit of religious prohibitions? Isn’t it true that Prophet himself used to ‘naturally’ dislike particular kinds of food and edible meat? If not an absurdity, it at least seems a dire contradiction that human nature can be understood as a primary ’source’ of religion on one hand and cannot be understood to define what is Shariah on the other. Is it also not ‘natural’ for men to grow hair on their faces? If it is, how it is not understood to be ordained by Shariah; if it is not, why should it be a recommended practice in religion at all.

By redefining what constitutes Sunnah, Contemporary School has actually redefined the established archetype of traditional Islamic law. The observation might seem exaggerated to some, as it has presumably happened partially in the past also; yet, the manifestation of any of the applied legal principles in the past has not been so consequential ever to delimit Prophetic legal authority to something like 27 practices. As already said, deducing Prophetic legal authority from established regional practices is not a unique idea, however limiting this authority solely to the transmitted practices – of majority – is a completely modernist phenomenon; one which is paradoxically simplistic and seemingly oblivious to methods of historical enquiry.

It is funny as it successfully circumvents the need of Prophetic traditions for proving extra-Quranic legal injunctions (of different shades from prohibited to obligatory) but seeks historical record to substantiate consensus of community.

As much as I mull over regarding the past, present and future of Javed Ahmed Ghamidi’s interpretation of religion, I see it quickly disentangling itself from the modernist tradition of Shiblis, Farahis, Azads, Iqbals and Islahis of the Subcontinent. It still remains doubtful whether history will remember it as a valid school of thought that steered Islam’s sojourn into modernity or another media-sect of Subcontinent, which struggled with itself to remain skeptical about all that reached us through tradition.

Filed under: Hadith & Sunnah, Islam & Modernity, Philosophy, Quran, Scholars, Suspended Judgments , Exegesis, Ghamidi, Hadith, Language, Modernity, Philosophy, Quran, Sunnah, Tradition

Prophetic Experience of Revelation: Iqbal, Fazlur Rahman and Malik Bennabi

Can we become aware of God as we are aware of other objects?

As I contemplate more about the answer of this question, it occurs to me that the question is perhaps more important than the answer. Over the years, I have learnt to ask this question in innumerable ways and each time when it happens, this inquisitive process brings me another step closer to the cognition of Divinity.

Religious experience, as some of us take for granted, is a matter related to faith; one that cannot be justified on pure philosophical grounds and entailing arguments that cannot be contended with the tools of expression. The veracity of these arguments can only be judged within the domain of mysticism. There is a strong argument that this domain being irrational and obscure according to contemporary standards of knowledge is based upon categories which, while swaying on the fringes of vagueness, involve countless imponderables. Which effectively means that any narration of a mystic experience cannot be assessed accurately with conviction through conventional means of assessment.

There exists a counter argument to above, initiated primarily in our times by Perennialists and Sufi philosophers, which suggests that most of the knowledge for primitive civilizations came through pseudo-mystic experiences. To be more precise, primitive man acknowledged his experience of reality – which is ‘Natural’ for us – as a mystical experience and one that is unable to be deciphered rationally. The view tries to establish the validity of mystic experience like other experiences and asserts that mystic consciousness is mandatory in order to claim any knowledge of Absolute Reality.

Being totally oblivious to practical mysticism, I cannot claim to be intimate with the ‘Other Self’, yet I have come to believe that the philosophical contention of God being a metaphysical reality does not necessarily mean that God is physically meaningless. The Absolute Reality, as I have understood, can only be shaped meaningfully after conjoining the physical and metaphysical. This union of both the realms iterates within each one of us as we interact with the revelation. However, our inner self can only become aware of this union if it is completely at ease with the character of revealed knowledge; for we are not the direct recipients of this knowledge and neither being an audience to that historical happening.

Most of us cannot know God as we know other objects. We get knowledge of His self and attributes indirectly through humans who know Him better than us; humans who are the chosen ones and with whom God communicates through an incorporeal messenger, through inspirational dreams or directly from behind a screen.

Analyzing character of revelation vis-à-vis Prophet’s experience of it as a being in time is a comparatively modern phenomenon. To say the least, there are some contemporary slants to the problem which were not there previously. In addition, this experience of revelation is not merely an object of philosophical enquiry anymore but equally an object of scientific and psychological analysis; especially when the complete experience, which is extended on more than 21 years and has thousands of witnesses, has been downplayed by some of the modern critics, equating it with epileptic seizures and hallucinations.

Jalaluddin Suyuti mentions five different physical states of Prophet Muhammad during Wahy (mode of revelation) in his magnum opus about Quran and related sciences. It used to be an unidentifiable sound at times, trying to make the Prophet attentive for the revelation which usually followed. Most of the times, it was the Archangel Gabriel who either comes in the guise of a close companion reciting verses to be revealed or the message was directly inspired into Prophet’s heart. Revelation also used to come through dreams and Prophet used to remember everything afterwards like a real vision or experience. Suyyuti also mentions another way in which God may have communicated directly with the Prophet, as in the journey of Isra’a or as related in many Qudsi ahadith.

The narratives describing different states of the Prophet are not an object of present scrutiny; what concerns me now is how the modern discourse making sense of these narratives. Three modernist scholars, namely Muhammad Iqbal, Malik Bennabi and Fazlur Rahman, have discussed this matter in great detail. Here is a brief summary of their views:

Muhammad Iqbal: Highest State of Mystic Consciousness Transforms the Heart to Invite Revelation

Iqbal’s project is primarily philosophical. Throughout the first two chapters of Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam, Iqbal tries to reconcile the objectives of revealed religion and philosophy. According to him, the distinctions between both are in terms of greater details but both are one, as far as the original objective is concerned, i.e. acquiring knowledge. For Iqbal, mystic consciousness enables the self to interpret at a higher plane and is as valid as others methods of interpretation. He delineates the characteristics of the mystic experience and contends that there are intellectual and pragmatic tests to verify the knowledge gained through that experience. The example of Prophet Muhammad’s observation of a Jewish boy’s psychic abilities is a case study in carrying out such a test. Regarding claims of psychologists that Prophet was subjected to convulsive seizures, Iqbal takes stand that modern psychology has not yet devised the methods to differentiate between fruitless visions and divinely inspired messages.

Iqbal’s explanation of Prophetic experience of revelation is problematic on two related accounts. Foremost being that establishing the veracity of mystic experience in psychic domain does not automatically proves that Absolute Reality can be envisioned in a similar manner. Secondly, how can a mystic who is capable of acquiring knowledge of ultimate Reality through such an experience can need Prophetic Revelation for guidance?

Fazlur Rahman: Externality of Revelation is a Misunderstanding of Orthodoxy

Feeling-Idea-Word complex is the cornerstone of Fazlur Rahman’s discussion of the problem in his remarkable work on Islam. While insisting that revelation is not something external to Prophet, he asserts that the very idea of its external character is a gross misunderstanding of orthodoxy. Fazlur Rahman does not explicitly negate the being of an angel; neither does he deny the verbal character of revelation, as commonly believed during the days of turmoil. According to him, there was some ‘channel’ for the movement of Moral Law from its Source to Prophet’s heart but he does not speculate about this channel and rejects all the views of it that are quasi-mechanical; quite similarly as he rejects the ‘locomotive’ nature of Prophet’s ascension to heavens.

According to Rahman’s explanation, Prophet’s self in his ‘Quranic Moments’ was extended so much that it is virtually incomprehensible to identify his self as something distinguishable from the Divine Moral Law. In this state of ’self ascension’ the Prophet’s expression of this Moral Law is Quran.

The single most important problem in Rahman’s construct is the impossibility of explaining tradition in its light. He obviously notes that himself and rejects a large magnitude of tradition (most of which is authentic according to conventional means of judging traditions) and considers it not more than a piece of historical fiction. There are other problems of course, for instance the dependency of textual characteristics of revelation on Prophet’s personal being in a particular historical setting. Rahman explores solutions to these problems by visibly formulating and tweaking his methodology.

Malik Bennabi: Revelation is External to the Prophet

As far as I am concerned, Bennabi’s exposition of the problem is the one that is most plausible among the three and deserves wider recognition. In Quranic Phenomenon, he neatly disentangles the problem into three parts, i.e. mode of revelation, Prophet’s personal conviction and the position of his self in the phenomenon of Wahy.

Bennabi strictly differentiates between intuition/inspiration and the phenomenon called Wahy which, according to his definition, should be taken to mean a spontaneous and absolute knowledge of a non-conceived or even inconceivable object. It is appropriate to quote him directly on this point:

…from the intellectual point of view, intuition does not induce any observable certainty on the part of the subject. It rather creates a semi certainty which corresponds to what one would call a postulate. It is a knowledge whose proof is a posteriori. It is this degree of uncertainty which psychologically distinguishes intuition from wahy. Now, Muhammad’s conviction was absolute, with the assurance in his eyes that the knowledge revealed to him was impersonal, incidental and external to his self. These characteristics were so evident to him that there could never remain any shadow of doubt in his mind as to the objectivity of the ‘revealing source’. This is a primary and absolutely necessary condition for the personal conviction of the subject. [...] Is it by intuition that Muhammad himself could interpret the gestures of the mother of Moses, who abandoned her child to the currents of Nile? Is it also by intuition that he would have distinguished two kinds of intuitions in his verbal acts? One kind would include the verses of the Quran – since as sonorous syllables, it is part of those verbal acts – which he ordered immediately for transcription and the other, the ahadith, which he simply confided to the memory of his companions? If it were not for this clear awareness of this duality, so separated on the part of the subject, a similar comparison would simply be absurd.

Bennabi emphasizes the need to realize that Prophet Muhammad’s conviction stands as a direct evidence of the Quranic phenomenon and its supernatural character. According to Bennabi, Prophet Muhammad must have established two criteria to support his own conviction, i.e Phenomenological Criterion and the Rational Criterion. Explaining the first instance when Muhammad was dazzled by the light on the distant horizon as a ‘double sensation’, Bennabi asks:

Did he really hear and see this form? Or was this audio-visual sensation a mere subjective image [as Fazlur Rahman alludes to], surging through him as a result of a painful emotion that had driven him to the edge of the chasm? Was he the victim of over-excited senses?

Bennabi argues, while discussing the Phenomenological Criterion that these question must have occurred to a discursive mind like Muhammad’s, well before the critics of his time as well as ours. Being an engineer, he also asserts that the anomaly of Prophet’s visions is not physically unexplainable. His pointers towards the scientific arguments of luminous vibrations and a particular gamut of imperceptible frequencies below the visible band are the most interesting.

It is arguable and just a matter of personal opinion as to whose explanation among these three great thinkers is more accurate. There are finer nuances that need to be understood in order to compare their thoughts more objectively. The present effort is just an attempt to highlight an important discourse in modernist literature.

Filed under: Iqbaliat, Islam & Modernity, Philosophy, Quran, Scholars , Bennabi, FazlurRahman, Hadith, Iqbal, Modernity, Philosophy, Prophet, Quran, Tradition

Is Quran a simple and straightforward document?

To say that Quranic language is completely devoid of any lexical ambiguities may lead one to infer that at least one interpretation can be claimed as universal. This would be a rendering which in principle can be accepted as absolutely monolithic if correct analytical tools are agreed upon by all. The argument can be extended to contend that one can reach the ‘true’ purport of an ayah primarily through literary methods. Ruminating whether one can be sure to discover this original intent and limning methods to substantiate authenticity of any such discovery is not my present objective. I just want to assert in this entry that Quranic language is partially polysemous and its not a very straightforward document to interact with.

This characteristic embedded in the very design of Arabic language should not be confused with two seemingly contradictory facts emanating from the Quran itself. One, that Its a perspicuous Book with clear verses of established meaning and two, that It contains firm (Muhkamaat) and ambiguous (Mutashabihaat) verses. Shah Wali Ullah presents an exposition of both these claims in al-Fauz al-Kabir fi Usual al-Tafsir. He lucubrates that when Almightly says in Quran that its a clear book revealed in Arbic proper with unambiguous and clear verses,

the intention is to avoid going deep into the interpretation of allegorical verses, in drawing the picture of realities of God’s attributes, in determining the doubtful and in the narration of stories in minuteness.

On the other hand firm vesres are those from which the masters of speech (ahle lughat) can take only one meaning while ambiguous are those which admit duality in meanings. An example of this are words employed which are common to two meanings for instance lamas[tum], which means both the sexual intercourse and as well as touching with hand. Another case is when there happens to be a possibility of both the copulative conjunction and commencement of new sentence; for instance the verse Wa ma Yala’m Tawilahu Illalah wa al-Raasikhun fil Ilm. Intersetingly, the import of Shah Wali Ullah’s explanation implies that the verse of Mukam and Mutashabih ayahs is itself abstruse and ambiguous to some degree. There are of course various other reasons, for instance different figures of speeches causing obscurities in text. Works on the language of Quran are full of such discussion and would perhaps move me later to dedicate a complete post. The present concern, as I have mentioned above, is regarding various interpretations of seemingly firm and unequivocal portions of Quranic text.

It has reached through various reports that even Prophet’s companions sometimes understood various verses differently. Anas narrates that Umar, while addressing from pulpit, mentioned fakihaatin wa abba (fruits and fodder) and said that we understand fakiha but it is very difficult to say what is ab’ba. Ibn Abbas narrates that he did not know about the meaning of faatiris samawat till two bedouins came to him with a dispute, giving him an indirect clue what that phrase might have meant. Suyyuti includes long lists of words and phrases with their meanings narrated from Dhahak and Ibn Abbas. Knowledge of connotations associated with different words is also necessary to help eliminate the ‘wrong’ interpretation. An important question is regarding the basis to know whether a particular connotation understood by the interpreter was originally intended or not. A valid example is Ibn Abbas’ (who is one of the major source of classical exegetes) inclusion of music while explaining phrases like lahw al-Hadith and wa antum Saamiddoon.

What then do we mean by agreed upon universals of language? What we must know in order to determine the reference of an expression? Is it legitimate to disregard and discard agreed upon historical interpretations using tools of linguistic and literary criticism only? Isn’t it true that what we choose to eliminate also has valid basis in language though not always in historical context of revelation? What is the correct priority of sources of understanding Quran? What comes first in Quranic hermeneutics – knowledge of language, tribal dialects and jahilia poetry or Hadith, context of revelation and understanding of Companions and their students? Is it a valid assertion that understanding of Quran would always remain evolving and there would always be room for new interpretations?

The fact that answer to these questions are multifarious and sometimes extremely complicated implies that Quran by itself is not a very straightforward document. Or perhaps it is more accurate to say (in the words of Fazlur Rahman) that Quran is as ’straightforward’ and as organically coherent as life itself.

Filed under: Ilm al-Ikhtilaf, Quran

Al-Ittiqan fi Ulum al-Quran

I would not be doing the formal review and would rather like it to be a quickly readable introduction to the work.

Jalal al-Din Abd al-Rahman bin Abu Bakr al-Suyuti (1445 – 1505) was a Shafii jurist and achieved the repute of a hafiz and muhaddith. Gustav Flugel lists 561 works attributed to Jalaluddin al-Suyuti ranging from tomes of hundreds of pages to pamphlets and small treatises. Suyuti is exceptional in encompassing most of the preceding sources into his works. He penned no less than 8 works on different aspects of Quran and co-authored one of the widely taught exegesis with his teacher Jalaluddin al-Mahalli.

According to Hajji Khalifa, al-Itqan is actually an expansion of al-Takhbir fi Ulum al-Tafsir which was written by Suyuti as an introduction to Majma al-Bahrayn wa Matla’al-Badrayn – a voluminous commentary which is refered in many other works by the author but could not be traced so as to establish whether the author was able to complete it or not. In the process of revising and enlarging al-Takhbir, Suyuti made use of Balqini’s Mawaqi’al Ulum and Zarkashi’s al-Burhan fi Ulum al-Quran.

Al-Itqan is extremely elaborate in its width and gives a detailed exposition of 80 different fields concerning the reading, writing and understanding of Quran. This includes not only the disciplines derived from holy Quran but also the principles which facilitate this derivation. While introducing all these disciplines in the introductory chapter, Suyuti writes:

These 80 categories are chosen so as to include various branches of knowledge that are interrelated and if each of these branches were dealt with seperately, there would have been more than 300 disciplines. There are seperate books on many of these areas of study and I have read most of them. The books which are written on similar lines as my book are very few but these do not come close to the width of subjects that I have expounded upon here.

Besides covering usual disciplines like a count of Huruf and Kalima’at, history of compilation and organisation, reasons and places of revelation, Nasikh & Mansukh (abrogation), Tajwid (rules of recitation), lughat (lexical analysis), names of reciters & memorisers, principles of exegesis and grades of exegetes, the book contains some really unique dimensions of approaching the Quran. I am inclined to list few of these unusual ways of exploration. These are:

• Parts of Quran which were exposed through the tongue of Companions.
• Chapters of Quran which were revealed with an accompanied group of angels.
• Parts of Quran which were also revealed to previous Messengers.
• Non Arabic words in Quran and differences of opinion regarding the contention itself.
• Branches of knowledge which were derived from Quran.
• Quranic oaths.
• Dialogues in Quran.
• Ambiguities in Quran.
• Etiquettes of writing Quran.

This book is not meant to be read from cover to cover in few sessions. Its more of a researcher’s companion – one of the oldest and most elaborate reference of studying or accessing holy Quran. Its greatness does not lie in its profoundness and depth but the extremity of breadth and the surpassing comprehensiveness with which the author establishes the richness of the greatest book on earth.

Filed under: Books & Reviews, Quran

Creation of Quran – Mutazilite Perspective

In the end of 846 AD, a motley fool named Ibaadah entered the court of Wathiq and said “May Allah increase the reward of Amir ul Mumineen in hereafter in regards to his favors on Quran when it (the Quran) is still alive”. “What do you mean”, Wathiq asked in obvious confusion, “Do you think Quran is perishable somehow”. The jester explained wearing a solemn look on his face, “O’ Amir of the faithful, every creation is bound to perish and I am afraid how Muslims will observe Taraweeh prayers in Ramadhan after the sudden death of Quran”. Wathiq laughed and kicked him out of the court with some peculiar vocal insults that was the characteristic lingo at that time.

That was the drop scene of the drama that began in the time of Mamun and ended at the time of Wathiq with Mutasam maintaining status quo in between. Reading through the letters of Mamun to Ishaq who was his governor in Baghdad, helped me grasp and analyze the matter more profoundly. The political dimension is the one that keeps coming up in the history books as Ibn Abi Dawood influenced Mamum considerably to use coercive methods against the noble scholars of that time, Ahmed Bin Hanbal being on top of the list. However the theological dimension does not hit the surface so often. An unbiased reader of history might agree if I assert that Mutazilites were not so insincere in their intellectual approach towards the whole matter of creation of Quran.

The theological debates between Mutazilite school with Christian missionaries made them look towards the matter in a different way. They sincerely believed that the idea of Quran not being created would make them closer to canons of Christian belief. It would in a way make the Quran eternal which ultimately means that there are numerous eternals rather then a single one. That seems close to Christian dogma of trinity which is a union of three eternals. A peculiar methodology of dialog by John of Damascus is mentioned in Kitab al-Tiraas which he used to propose to Christian missionaries in their debates with Muslims. The hypothetical dialog as visualised by the author of the book can be concised as follows:

Arab Muslim: What is your belief regarding Jesus Christ?
Christian Missionary: He is the word of God. What does your Quran states about him?
Arab Muslim: [hesitates for a moment and after thinking a lot recites a part of this verse]… “Christ Jesus the son of Mary was a messenger of Allah, and His Word, which He bestowed on Mary, and a spirit proceeding from Him…” [al-Quran 4: 171]
Christian Missionary: What is the word of Allah, and what is ’spirit’ and are these created or not created?

The rest of the exchange is pretty obvious as If the Muslim replies that it is not created, he would himself give a weapon into the hands of missionary of multiple eternal entities. If on the other hand he resorts to the choice of created word of God, debate might continue and missionary can always switch to circular arguments that the all three can’t be created simultaneously.

Such inter-faith theological debates were the common practice among adherents of Mutazilite methodology. They strongly believed that whoever holds the opinion that Quran was not created actually gives the weapon of multiple eternals in the hands of Christians and thus makes their argument stronger. Jahiz while explaining the shrewdness and nefariousness of missionary approach simplifies the whole argument as were seen by fresh Christian converts as well as Muslim skeptics of that era:

The complete word of God is eternal and as Jesus is the word of God, he is also eternal and this ideology seems to be affirmed by Quran.

However this apprehension of Mutazilites moved them to take coercive actions against the scholars who disagreed with them by insisting calmly that word of God should be taken as such and no external ideologies should be mixed into it. Analysis of these discourses is not the subject of this article and should be left to some other time.

Damiri writes in kitab al-haywan that Wathiq discontinued shoving his ideas into the minds of others before his death. A stranger once indulged in a debate with Ibn Abi Dawood regarding creation of Quran in the court of Wathiq few days before his death. He boldly said to Ibn Abi Dawood, “How do you claim to force an ideology which was not forced by the Prophet and neither by the righteous caliphs succeeding him? If the Salaf were familiar with this ideology and chose to keep quiet, you should also do the same. If on the other hand you believe that they did not know it at first place, how can you claim to know the issues of faith better then them”.

It is said that Wathiq jumped up from his seat as if this was a new revelation to him and conciliated his opinion with the opinion of the Salaf. I have a hard time believing in such an undramatic ending but that’s how the sages narrate it.

Filed under: Debates & Disputes, Ilm al-Ikhtilaf, Quran, Traditional Islam