The rise and spread of darwish Fraternities; the survival
and tradition of the Hanbalite doctrine; Abd ar-Razzaq; Ibn
Taymiya, his attacks on saint-worship and on the mutakallims;
ash-Sha‘rani and his times; the modern movements; Wahhabism and
the influence of al-Ghazzali; possibilities of the present.
Our sources now begin to grow more and more scanty, and we must hasten
over long intervals of time and pass with little connection from one
name to another. Preliminary investigations are also to a great extent
lacking, and it is possible that the centuries which we shall merely
touch may have witnessed developments only less important than those with
which we have already dealt. But that is not probable; for when, after
a long silence, the curtain rises again for us in the twelfth Muslim
century, we shall find at work only those elements and conditions whose
inception and growth we have now set forth.
One name in our rapid flight deserves mention, at least. It is that of
Umar ibn al-Farid, the greatest poet that Arabic mysticism has produced.
He was born at Cairo in 586, lived for a time at Mecca, and died at Cairo
in 632. He led no new movement or advance, but the East still cherishes
his memory and his poems.
[Sidenote: DARWISH FRATERNITIES]
We have already noticed (p. 177) the beginnings of darwish Fraternities
and the founding of monasteries or _khanqahs_. During the period over
which we have just passed, these received a great and enduring impetus.
The older ascetics and _walis_ gathered round them groups of personal
followers and their pupils carried on their names. But it was long,
apparently, before definite corporations were founded of fixed purpose
to perpetuate the memory of their masters. One of the earliest of these
seems to have been the fraternity of Qadirite darwishes, founded by Abd
al-Qadir al-Jilani, who died in 561 at Baghdad, where pilgrimage is still
made to his shrine. So, too, the Rifa‘ite Fraternity was founded at
Baghdad by Ahmad ar-Rifa‘a in 576. Another is that of the Shadhilites,
named after their founder, ash-Shadhili, who died in 656. Again another
is that of the Badawites, whose founder was Ahmad al-Badawi (d. 675);
his shrine at Tanta in Lower Egypt is still one of the most popular
places of pilgrimage. Again, the order of the Naqshbandite darwishes was
founded by Muhammad an-Naqshbandi, who died in 791. Among the Turks by
far the most popular religious order is that of the Mawlawites, founded
by the great Persian mystical poet, Jalal ad-Din ar-Rumi (d. 672), whose
_Mesnevi_ is read over all Islam. These and very many others, especially
of later date, are still in existence. Others, once founded, have again
become extinct. Thus, Ibn Sab‘in, though he was surrounded by disciples
who for a time after his death carried on the order of Sab‘inites, does
not seem now to have any to do him honor. The same holds of a certain
Adi al-Hakkari who founded a cloister near Mawsil and died about 558. It
is significant that al-Ghazzali, though he founded a cloister for Sufis
at Tus and taught and governed there himself, left no order behind him.
Apparently in his time the movement toward continuous corporations had
not yet begun. It is true that there are at present in existence darwish
Fraternities which claim to be descended from the celebrated ascetics
and _walis_, Ibrahim ibn Adham (d. 161), Sari as-Saqati (d. 257) and Abu
Yazid al-Bistami (d. 261), but it may be gravely doubted whether they can
show any sound pedigree. The legend of Shaykh Ilwan, who is said to have
founded the first order in 49, may be safely rejected. It is significant
that the _Awlad Ilwan_, sons of Ilwan, as his followers are called, form
a sect of the Rifa‘ites. Further, just as the Sufis have claimed for
themselves all the early pious Muslims, and especially the ten to whom
Muhammad made specific promise of Paradise (_al-ashara al-mubashshara_),
so these Fraternities are ascribed in their origin to, and put under the
guardianship of the first Khalifas, and, in Egypt at least, a direct
descendant of Abu Bakr holds authority over all their orders.
In these orders all are darwishes, but only those gifted by God with
miraculous powers are _walis_. Those of them who are begging friars are
_faqirs_. They stand under an elaborate hierarchy grading in dignity
and holiness from the _Qutb_, or Axis, who wanders, often invisible and
always unknown to the world, through the lands performing the duties of
his office, and who has a favorite station on the roof of the Ka‘ba,
through his _naqibs_ or assistants, down to the lowest _faqir_. But
the members of these orders are not exclusively _faqirs_. All classes
are enrolled as, in a sense, lay adherents. Certain trades affect
certain fraternities; in Egypt, for example, the fishermen are almost
all Qadirites and walk in procession on their festival day, carrying
colored nets as their banners. Much the same thing held, and holds, of
the monastic orders of Europe, but the Muslim does not wait till he is
dying to put on the weeds of Ahmad al-Badawi or ash-Shadhili. Finally,
reference may be made again to the last and most important of all these
orders, the militant Brotherhood of as-Sanusi.
[Sidenote: MYSTICS _v._ TRADITIONALISTS]
We have now returned to the period of al-Iji and at-Taftazani, when
philosophy definitely descended from the throne and became the servant
and defender of theology. From this time on, the two independent forces
at work are the unveiling of the mystic (_kashf_) and tradition (_naql_).
The only place for reason (_aql_) now is to prove the possibility of a
given doctrine. That done, its actual truth is proven by tradition. These
two then, _kashf_ and _naql_, hold the field, and the history of Muslim
theology from this point to the present day is the history of their
conflicts. The mystics are accused of heresy by the traditionalists.
The traditionalists are accused by the mystics of formalism, hypocrisy,
and, above all, of flat inability to argue logically. Both accusations
are certainly true. No fine fence on personality can conceal the fact
that Muslim mysticism is simple pantheism of the Plotinian type, the
individuals are emanations from the One. On the other hand, the formalism
of the traditionalists can hardly be exaggerated. They pass over almost
entirely into canon lawyers, meriting richly the fine sarcasm of
al-Ghazzali, who asked the _faqihs_ of his day what possible value for
the next world could lie in a study of the Qur’anic law of inheritance
or the like. Tradition (_hadith_), in the exact sense of the sayings and
doings of Muhammad, falls into the background, and _fiqh_, the systems
built upon it by the generations of lawyers, from the four masters down,
takes its place. Again, the accusation of illogical reasoning is also
thoroughly sound. The habit of unending subdivision deprived the minds
of the canonists of all breadth of scope, and their devotion to the
principle of acceptance on authority (_taqlid_) weakened their feeling
for argument. It is true, further, that the mystics, such as they were,
had heired all the philosophy left in Islam, and were thus become
the representatives of the intellectual life. They had so much of an
advantage over their more orthodox opponents. But the intellectual life
with them, as with the earlier philosophers, remained of a too subjective
character. The fatal study of the self, and the self only—that tramping
along the high _a priori_ road—and neglect of the objective study of
the outside world which ruined their forerunners, was their ruin as
well. Outbursts of intellectual energy and revolt we may meet with again
and again; there will be few signs of that science which seeks facts
patiently in the laboratory, the observatory, and the dissecting-room.
[Sidenote: ABD AR-RAZZAQ]
Curiously enough, there fall closely together at this time the death
dates of two men of the most opposite schools. The one was Ibn Taymiya,
the anthropomorphist free lance, who died in 728, and the other was
Abd ar-Razzaq, the pantheistic Sufi, who died in 730. Abd ar-Razzaq of
Samarqand and Kashan was a close student and follower of Ibn Arabi. He
commented on his books and defended his orthodoxy. In fact, so closely
had Ibn Arabi come to be identified with the Sufi position as a whole
that a defence of him was a favorite form in which to cast a defence
of Sufiism generally. But Abd ar-Razzaq did not follow his master
absolutely. On the freedom of the will especially he left him. For Ibn
Arabi, the doctrine of the oneness of all things had involved fatalism.
Whatever happens is determined by the nature of things, that is, by the
nature of God. So the individuals are bound by the whole. Abd ar-Razzaq
turned this round. His pantheism was of the same type as that of Ibn
Arabi; God, for him, was all. But there is freedom of the divine nature,
he went on. It must therefore exist in man also, for he is an emanation
from the divine. His every act, it is true, is predetermined, in time,
in form, and in place. But his act is brought about by certain causes,
themselves predetermined. These are what we would call natural laws in
things, natural abilities, aptitudes, etc., in the agent; finally, free
choice itself. And that free choice is in man because he is of and from
God. Further, it is evident that Abd ar-Razzaq’s anxiety is to preserve a
basis for morals. Among the predetermining causes he reckons the divine
commands, warnings, proofs in the Qur’an. The guidance of religion finds
thus its place and the prophets their work. But what of the existence
of evil and the necessity of restraint in a world that has emanated from
the divine? This problem he faces bravely. Our world must be the best of
all possible worlds; otherwise God would have made it better. Difference,
then, among men and things belongs to its essence and necessity. Next,
justice must consist in accepting these different things and adapting
them to their situations. To try to make all things and men alike would
be to leave some out of existence altogether. That would be a great
injustice. Here, again, religion enters. Its object is to rectify this
difference in qualities and gifts. Men are not responsible for these,
but they are responsible if they do not labor to correct them. In the
hereafter all will be reabsorbed into the divine being and taste such
bliss as the rank of each deserves. For those who need it there will be a
period of purgatorial chastisement, but that will not be eternal, _in sha
Allah_.
Like his predecessors, Abd ar-Razzaq divides men into classes according
to their insight into divine things. The first is of men of the world,
who are ruled by the flesh (_nafs_) and who live careless of all
religion. The second is of men of reason (_aql_). They through the reason
contemplate God, but see only His external attributes. The third is of
men of the spirit (_ruh_) who, in ecstasy, see God face to face in His
very essence, which is the substrate of all creation.
In his cosmogony, Abd ar-Razzaq follows, of course, the neo-Platonic
model and shows great ingenuity in weaving into it the crude and
materialistic phrases and ideas of the Qur’an. Like all Muslim thinkers
he displays an anxiety to square with his philosophy the terms dear to
the multitude.
[Sidenote: IBN TAYMIYA]
To Ibn Taymiya all this was the very abomination of desolation itself.
He had no use for mystics, philosophers, Ash‘arite theologians, or, in
fact, for anyone except himself. A contemporary described him as a man
most able and learned in many sciences, but with a screw loose. However
it may have been about the last point, there can be no question that
he was the reviver for his time and the transmitter to our time of the
genuine Hanbalite tradition, and that his work rendered possible the
Wahhabites and the Brotherhood of as-Sanusi. He was the champion of the
religion of the multitude as opposed to that of the educated few with
which we have been dealing so long. This popular theology had been going
steadily upon its way and producing its regular riots and disputings. It
is related of a certain Ash‘arite doctor, Fakhr ad-Din ibn Asakir (d.
620), that, in Damascus, he never dared to pass by a certain way through
fear of Hanbalite violence. The same Fakhr ad-Din once gave, as in duty
bound, the normal salutation of the Peace to a Hanbalite theologian. The
Hanbalite did not return it, which was more than a breach of courtesy,
and indicated that he did not regard Fakhr ad-Din as a Muslim. When
people remonstrated with him, he turned it as a theological jest and
replied, “That man believes in ‘Speech in the Mind’ (_kalam nafsi,
hadith fi-n-nafs_), so I returned his salutation mentally.” The point
is a hit at the Ash‘arites, who contended that thought was a kind of
speech without letters or sounds, and that God’s quality of Speech could
therefore be without letters or sounds.
But even the simple orthodoxy of the populace had not remained unchanged.
It had received a vast accretion of the most multifarious superstitions.
The cult of saints, alive and dead, of holy sites, trees, garments, and
the observance of all manner of days and seasons had been developing
parallel to the advance of Sufiism among the educated. The _walis_ were
untiring in the recital of the _karamat_ which God had worked for them,
and the populace drank in the wonders greedily. The metaphysical and
theological side they left untouched. “This is a holy man,” they said,
“who can work miracles; we must fear and serve him.” And so they would do
without much thought whether his morality might not be antinomian and his
theology pantheistic. To abate this and other evils and bring back the
faith of the fathers was the task which Ibn Taymiya took up.
[Sidenote: A MUJTAHID]
He was born near Damascus in 661 and educated as a Hanbalite. His
family had been Hanbalite for generations, and he himself taught in
that school and was reckoned as the greatest Hanbalite of his time.
His position, too, was practically that of Ahmad ibn Hanbal, modified
by the necessities imposed by new controversaries. Thus he was an
anthropomorphist, but of what exact shade is obscure. He was accused of
teaching that God was above His throne, could be pointed at, and that He
descended from His seat as a man might, _i.e._, that He was in space. But
he certainly distinguished himself from the crasser materialists. He
refused to be classed as the adherent of any school or of any system save
that of Muhammad and the agreement of the fathers. He claimed for himself
the rights of a _mujtahid_ and went back to first sources and principles
in everything. His self-confidence was extreme, and he smote down with
proud words the Rightly Guided Khalifas, Umar and Ali, themselves. His
bases were Qur’an, tradition from the Prophet and from the Companions and
analogy. Agreement, in the broad sense of the agreement of the Muslim
people, he rejected. If he had accepted it he would have been forced
to accept innumerable superstitions, beliefs, and practices—especially
the whole doctrine of the _walis_ and their wonders—for their basis
was agreement. The agreement of the Companions he did accept, while
convicting them right and left of error as individuals.
His life was filled up with persecutions and misfortune. He was a popular
idol, and inquiries for his judgment on theological and canonical
questions kept pouring in upon him. If there was no inquiry, and he
felt that a situation called for an expression of opinion from him, he
did not hesitate to send it out with all formality. It is true that it
is the duty of every Muslim, so far as he can, to do away or at least
to denounce any illegality or unorthodox view or practice which he may
observe. This duty evidently weighed heavily on Ibn Taymiya, and there
was fear at one time at the Mamluk court lest he might go the way of
Ibn Tumart. In one of these utterances he defined the doctrine of God’s
qualities as Ibn Hazm had done, and joined thereto denunciations of
the Ash‘arite kalam and of the Qur’anic exegesis of the mutakallims as
a whole. They were nothing but the heirs and scholars of philosophers,
idolaters, Magians, etc.; and yet they dared to go beyond the Prophet
and his heirs and Companions. The consequence of this _fatwa_ or legal
opinion was that he was silenced for a time as a teacher. On another
occasion he gave out a _fatwa_ on divorce, pronouncing _tahlil_ illegal.
_Tahlil_ is a device by which an awkward section in the canon law is
evaded. If a man divorces his wife three times, or pronounces a threefold
divorce formula, he cannot remarry her until she has been married to
another man, has cohabited with him and been divorced by him. Muslim
ideas of sexual purity are essentially different from ours, and the
custom has grown up, when a man has thus divorced his wife in hasty
anger, of employing another to marry her on pledge of divorcing her
again next day. Sometimes the man so employed refuses to carry out his
contract; such refusal is a frequent _motif_ in oriental tales. To avoid
this, the husband not infrequently employs one of his slaves and then
presents him to his former wife the next day. A slave can legally marry a
free woman, but when he becomes her property the marriage is _ipso facto_
annulled, because a slave cannot be the husband of his mistress or a
slave woman the wife of her master. It is to Ibn Taymiya’s credit that he
was one of the few to lift up their voices against this abomination. His
independence is shown at its best.
[Sidenote: CONTROVERSY WITH SUFIS]
But it was with the Sufis that he had his worst conflicts, and at their
hands he suffered most. In many points his career is parallel to that of
Ahmad ibn Hanbal, the Sufi movement taking the place that was played by
Mu‘tazilism in the life of the earlier saint. One great difference, it
may be remarked, was that al-Ma’mun urged the persecution of Ibn Hanbal,
while an-Nasir, the great Mamluk Sultan (reg. 693, 698-708, 709-741),
supported Ibn Taymiya as far as he possibly could. The beginning of the
Sufi controversy was characteristic. Ibn Taymiya heard that a certain
an-Nasr al-Manbiji (d. 719?), a reputed follower of Ibn Arabi and of Ibn
Sab‘in, had reached a position of influence in Cairo. That was enough to
make Ibn Taymiya address an epistle to him, intended to turn him from his
heresies. It is needless to give in detail the position and content of
the epistle. He wrote as a strong monotheist of the old-fashioned type
and exposed and assailed unmercifully the doctrine of Unity (_ittihad_)
of the mystics. Al-Manbiji retorted with countercharges of heresy, and,
as he had behind him all the Sufis of Egypt—as great an army as the
Christian monks and ascetics or earlier Egypt and much like to them—Ibn
Taymiya had to pay for his eagerness for a fight with long and painful
imprisonment at Cairo, Alexandria and Damascus. Here it is evident that
he had lost touch with the drift of popular, and especially Egyptian,
feeling.
But his fearlessness was like that of Ibn Hanbal himself, and in 726
he gave out a _fatwa_ which ran still straighter in the teeth of the
beliefs of the people and which sent him to a prison which he never left
alive. It had long been a custom in Islam to make pious pilgrimage to
the graves of saints and prophets and there to do reverence to their
memory and to ask their aid. It was part of that cult of saints which
had so overspread and overcome the earlier simplicity of Islam. The most
outstanding case in point was, and is, the pilgrimage to the tomb of
Muhammad at al-Madina, which has come to be a more or less essential part
of the Hajj to the Ka‘ba itself. Against all this Ibn Taymiya lifted a
voice of emphatic protest. These shrines were in great part false, and
when they were genuine the visitation of them was an idolatrous imitation
of heathen practices. Equally idolatrous was all invoking of saints or
prophets, including Muhammad himself; to God alone should prayer be
directed. The clamor raised by this _fatwa_ was tremendous. This was
no doctrine of the schools which he had touched, but a bit of concrete
religiosity which appealed to everyone. His public life practically
ended, and the practices which he had denounced abide to this day. It is
a bitter satire on his position that when he died in 726 the populace
paid to his relics all these signs of superstitious reverence against
which he had protested. He became a saint, _malgré lui_. His work had
been to keep alive the Hanbalite doctrine and pass it on unchanged to
modern times. He did not destroy philosophy: it was dead of itself before
he came. Nor Sufiism: it is still very much alive. Nor _kalam_: it still
continues in the form to which it had crystallized by his time. But he
and his disciples made possible the Wahhabites and the monotheistic
revival of our day. The faith of Muhammad himself was not to perish
entirely from the earth.
[Sidenote: ASH-SHA‘RANI]
It would now be possible to pass at once to the Wahhabite movement in
the latter part of the twelfth century of the Hijra. All the elements
for the explanation of it and of the modern situation are in our hands.
But there is one figure which stands out so clearly in an otherwise most
obscure picture and is so significant for the time, that some account
must be taken of it. It is that of ash-Sha‘rani, theologian, canonist,
and mystic. He was a Cairene and died in 973. The rule of Egypt had
passed half a century before to the Ottoman Turks, and they governed by
means of a Turkish Pasha. The condition of the people, as we find it
sketched by ash-Sha‘rani, was a most unhappy one. They were bent down,
and especially the peasantry, under a load of taxation. The Turks found
it advisable, too, to cultivate the friendship of the canon lawyers and
professional theologians in order to maintain their hold upon the people.
These canonists, in consequence, were rapidly becoming an official class
with official privileges. Further, the process, the beginnings of which
we have already seen, by which religious science was narrowed to _fiqh_,
had gone still further. Practically, the two classes of theologians left
were the canonists and the mystics. And the mystics had fallen far from
their pride of power under the Mamluks. They now were of the poor of the
land, a kind of Essenes over against the Pharisees of the schools.
Such, at least, is the picture of his time which ash-Sha‘rani gives.
How far it is exact must remain uncertain. For, of the many puzzling
personalities in Islam, ash-Sha‘rani is perhaps for us the most
unintelligible. He combined the most abject superstitions of a
superstitious age and country with lofty ethical indignation; social
humility of the most extreme with an intellectual pride and arrogance
rarely paralleled, a keen and original grasp of the canon law of the four
schools with an utter submission of the intellect to the inbreathings
of the divine from without; a power of discreet silence as to the
inconvenient with an open-mouthed vehemence in other things. He was
a devoted follower of Ibn Arabi and defended his memory against the
accusation of heresy. Yet his position is singularly different from that
of Ibn Arabi, and a doubt cannot but rise as to either his knowledge,
his intelligence, or his honesty. Practically where he differs from
the ordinary Muslim is in his extension of the doctrine of saints. As
to the Most Beautiful Names (_al-asma al-husna_), he follows Ibn Hazm.
So, too, as to God’s qualities, he follows the older school and would
prefer to leave them unconsidered. But he is, otherwise and in general, a
sound Ash‘arite, _e.g._, on the doctrine of predestination, and of man’s
part in his works (_iktisab_). There is in him no sign of the Plotinian
pantheism of Ibn Arabi. The doctrine of God’s difference (_mukhalafa_)
he taught, and that He created the world by His will and not by any
emanation of energy.
[Sidenote: THE UNSEEN WORLD]
But truth for him is not to be reached by speculation and argument:
its only basis is through the unveiling of the inner eye which brings
us to the immediate Vision of the Divine. Those who have reached that
Vision, guide and teach those who cannot or have not. Upon that Vision
all systems are built, and reason can only serve the visionary as a
defence against the gainsayer or against his own too wild thoughts.
Naturally, with such a starting-point as this the supernatural side of
things (_al-ghayb_) receives strong emphasis. The Jinn and the angels are
most intense realities. Ash-Sha‘rani met them in familiar converse. He
met, too, al-Khadir, the undying pilgrim saint who wanders through the
lands, succoring and guiding. The details of these interviews are given
with the greatest exactness. A Jinni in the form of a dog ran into his
house on such a day by such a door, with a piece of European paper in his
mouth—this is a touch of genius—on which certain theological questions
were written. The Jinni wished ash-Sha‘rani’s opinion as to them. Such
was the origin of one of his books, and another sprang from a similarly
exactly described talk with al-Khadir. Yet he was content also with
smaller mercies and reckons as a _karama_ that he was enabled to read
through a certain book for some time at the rate of two and a half times
daily. To all this it would be possible of course to say flatly that he
lied. But such a judgment applied to an oriental is somewhat crude, and
the knot of the mystic’s mind in any land is not to be so easily cut.
Further, the doctrine of the _walis_ is developed by him at length. They
possess a certain illumination (_ilham_), which is, however, different
from the inspiration (_wahy_) of the prophets. So, too, they never reach
the grade of the prophets, or a nearness to God where the requirements
of a revealed law fall away from them, _i.e._, they must always walk
according to the law of a prophet. They are all guided by God, whatever
their particular Rule (_tariqa_) may be, but the Rule of al-Junayd (p.
176) is the best because it is in most essential agreement with the Law
(_shari‘a_) of Islam. Their _karamat_ are true and are a consequence of
their devout labors, for these are in agreement with the Qur’an and the
Sunna. The order of nature will not be broken for anyone who has not
achieved more than is usual in religious knowledge and exercises. All
_walis_ stand under a regular hierarchy headed by the Qutb; yet above
him in holiness stand the Companions of the Prophet. This marks a very
moderate position. Many Sufis had contended that the _walis_ stood higher
than even the prophets, not to speak of their Companions.
It will be seen that his position is essentially a mediating one. He
wishes to show that the beliefs of the mystics and of the mutakallims
are really one although they are reached by different paths. In _fiqh_
he made a similar attempt. The Sufis had always looked down on those
theologians who were canonists pure and simple. A study of canon law was
a necessity, they thought; but as a propædeutic only. The canonists who
went no further never reached religion at all. Especially they held that
no Sufi should join himself to any of the four contending schools. Their
controversies were upon insignificant details which had nothing to do
with the life in God. But could it not be shown that their differences
were not actual—one view being true and the other false—but were capable
of being reduced to a unity? This was the problem that ash-Sha‘rani
attacked. These differing opinions, he held, are adapted to different
classes of men. Some men of greater gifts and endurance can follow the
hardest of these opinions, while the easier are to be recognized as
concessions (_rukhsa_) from God to the weakness of others. Each man may
follow freely the view which appeals to him; God has appointed it for him.
Ash-Sha‘rani was one of the last original thinkers in Islam: for a
thinker he was despite his dealings with the Jinn and al-Khadir. Egypt
keeps his memory. A mosque in Cairo bears his name, as does also a
division of the Badawite darwishes. In modern times his books have been
frequently reprinted, and his influence is one of the ferments in the new
Islam.
[Sidenote: THE WAHHABITES]
We must now pass over about two hundred years and come to the latter part
of the twelfth century of the Hijra, a period nearly coinciding with the
end of the eighteenth of our era. There these two movements come again to
light. Wahhabism, the historical origin of which we have already seen (p.
60), is a branch of the school of Ibn Taymiya. Manuscripts of the works
of Ibn Taymiya copied by the hand of Ibn Abd al-Wahhab exist in Europe.
So the Wahhabites refused to accept as binding the decisions of the four
orthodox sects of canon law. Agreement as a source they also reject. The
whole People of Muhammad can err and has erred. Only the agreement of
the Companions has binding force for them. It is, therefore, the duty
and right of every man to draw his own doctrine from the Qur’an and the
traditions; the systems of the schools should have no weight with him.
Again, they take the anthropomorphisms of the Qur’an in their literal
sense. God has a hand, God settles Himself on His throne; so it must be
held “without inquiring how and without comparison.” They profess to be
the only true Muslims, applying to themselves the term Muwahhids and
calling all others _Mushriks_, assigners of companions to God. Again,
like Ibn Taymiya, they reject the intercession of _walis_ with God. It
is allowable to ask of God for the sake of a saint but not to pray to
the saint. This applies also to Muhammad. Pilgrimage to the tombs of
saints, the presenting of offerings there, all acts of reverence, they
also forbid. No regard should be paid even to the tomb of the Prophet
at al-Madina. All such ceremonies are idolatrous. Whenever possible the
Wahhabites destroy and level the shrines of saints.
Over other details, such as the prohibition of the use of tobacco, we
need not spend time. Wahhabism as a political force is gone. It has,
however, left the Sanusi revolt as its direct descendant and what may be
the outcome of that Brotherhood we have no means of guessing. It has also
left a general revival and reformation throughout the Church of Islam,
much parallel, as has been remarked, to the counter-reformation which
followed the Protestant Reformation in Europe.
[Sidenote: INFLUENCE OF AL-GHAZZALI]
The second movement is the revival of the influence of al-Ghazzali. That
influence never became absolutely extinct and it seems to have remained
especially strong in al-Yaman. In that corner of the Muslim world
generations of Sufis lived comparatively undisturbed, and it was the
Sayyid Murtada, a native of Zabid in Tihama, who by his great commentary
on the _Ihya_ of al-Ghazzali practically founded the modern study of
that book. There have been two editions of this commentary in ten quarto
volumes and many of the _Ihya_ itself and of other works by al-Ghazzali.
Whether his readers understand him fully or not, there can be no question
of the wide influence which he is now exercising. At Mecca, for example,
the orthodox theological teaching is practically Ghazzalian and the
controversy throughout all Arabia is whether Ibn Taymiya and al-Ghazzali
can be called Shaykhs of Islam. The Wahhabites hold that anyone who thus
honors al-Ghazzali is an unbeliever, and the Meccans retort the same of
the followers of Ibn Taymiya.
These two tendencies then—that back to the simple monotheism of Muhammad
and that to an agnostic mysticism—are the hopeful signs in modern
Islam. There are many other drifts in which there is no such hope.
Simple materialism under European, mostly French, influence is one. A
seeking of salvation in the study of canon law is another. Canon law is
still the field to which an enormous proportion of Muslim theologians
turn. Again, there are various forms of frankly pantheistic mysticism.
That is especially the case among Persians and Turks. For the body of
the people, religion is still overburdened, as in Ibn Taymiya’s days,
with a mass of superstition. Lives of _walis_ containing the wildest
and most blasphemous stories abound and are eagerly read. The books of
ash-Sha‘rani are especially rich in such hagiology. It is difficult for
us to realize that stories like the most extravagant in the _Thousand and
One Nights_ are the simplest possibilities to the masses of Islam. The
canon lawyers, still, in their discussions, take account of the existence
of Jinn, and no theologian would dare to doubt that Solomon sealed them
up in brass bottles. Of philosophy, in the free and large sense, there
is no trace. Ibn Rushd’s reply to al-Ghazzali’s “Destruction of the
Philosophers” has been printed, but only as a pendant to that work. In
it, too, Ibn Rushd carefully covers his great heresies. His tractates on
the study of kalam, spoken of above, have also been reprinted at Cairo
from the European edition. But these tractates are arranged to give no
clew to his real philosophy. The Arabic Aristotelianism has perished
utterly from the Muslim lands. Of the modern Indian Mu‘tazilism no
account need be taken here. It is derived from Europe and is ordinary
Christian Unitarianism, connecting with Muhammad instead of with Jesus.
[Sidenote: THE PROBLEM OF THE FUTURE]
From the above sketch some necessary conditions are clear, which must be
fulfilled if there is to be a chance for a future development in Islam.
Education must be widely extended. The proportion of trained minds must
be greatly increased and the barrier between them and the commonalty
removed. The economy of teaching has failed; it has destroyed the
doctrine which it sought to protect. Again, the slavery of the disciple
to the master must cease. It must always be possible for the student, in
defiance of _taqlid_, to go back to first principles or to the primary
facts and to disregard what the great Imams and Mujtahids have taught.
So much of health there was in the Zahirite system.
Third, these primary facts must include the facts of natural science.
The student, emancipated from the control of the schools, must turn from
the study of himself to an examination of the great world. And that
examination must not be cosmological but biological; it must not lose
itself in the infinities but find itself in concrete realities. It must
experiment and test rather than build lofty hypotheses.
But can the oriental mind thus deny itself? The English educational
experiment in Egypt may go far to answer that question.
APPENDICES
I. ILLUSTRATIVE DOCUMENTS TRANSLATED FROM THE ARABIC.
II. SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY.
III. CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE.
APPENDIX I
1. ASH-SHAHRASTANI ON THE CLASSIFICATION OF MUSLIM SECTS.
2. TWO TRADITIONS FROM MUHAMMAD ON THE ESSENTIALS OF ISLAM.
3. A SHORT CREED BY AL-ASH‘ARI.
4. A SHORT CREED BY AL-GHAZZALI.
5. A SHORT CREED BY AN-NASAFI (MATARIDITE).
6. A SCHOLASTIC EXPOSITION OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF THEOLOGY.
7. ANALYSIS OF A TREATISE IN CANON LAW.
Notes have been added where such appeared called for, but the
index, facilitating reference to the body of the book, renders
a full commentary unnecessary. The student should use the
index as a vocabulary of technical terms, referring for their
explanation to the passages where they occur.
I
ASH-SHAHRASTANI ON THE CLASSIFICATION OF MUSLIM SECTS
Then I applied myself to what of arrangement was easy of attainment and
to what of attainment was easy of arrangement, until I had crowded them
[the different opinions] into four fundamentals, which are the great
principles. The first fundamental concerns the Qualities (_sifat_)
with the Unity (_tawhid_); it embraces the question of the eternal
(_azali_) Qualities, affirmed by some and denied by others, and of
the exposition of the essential Qualities (_sifat adh-dhat_) and of
the active Qualities (_sifat al-fi‘l_) and of what is necessary in
God Most High and what is possible for Him and what is impossible; it
involves the controversies between the Ash‘arites and the Karramites and
the Anthropomorphists (_mujassims_) and the Mu‘tazilites. The second
fundamental concerns decree (_qadar_) and justice (_adl_); it embraces
the question of destiny (_qada_) and decree (_qadar_); of force (_jabr_)
and acquisition (_kasb_); of the willing of good and of evil and of
the decreed and the known, affirmed by some and denied by others; it
involves the controversies between the Qadarites and Najjarites and
Jabarites and Ash‘arites and Karramites. The third fundamental concerns
promise (_wa‘d_) and the decisions (_hukms_); it embraces the question
of faith (_iman_) and repentance (_tawba_) and threatening (_wa‘id_)
and postponing (_irja_) and pronouncing anyone an unbeliever (_takfir_)
and leading anyone astray (_tadlil_), affirmed by some and denied by
others; it involves the controversies between the Murji’ites and the
Wa‘idites and the Mu‘tazilites and the Ash‘arites and the Karramites. The
fourth fundamental concerns tradition (_sam_) and reason (_aql_) and the
prophetic mission (_risala_) and the imamate; it embraces the questions
of the determination of actions as good (_tahsin_) or vile (_taqbih_); of
the advantageous (_salah_) and most advantageous (_aslah_); of benignity
(_lutf_); of the prophets being guarded against sin (_isma_); of the
condition of the imamate, by statute (_nass_) according to some and by
agreement (_ijma_) according to others, and how it is transferred on
the view of those who say it is by statute, and how it is fixed on the
view of those who say it is by agreement; it involves the controversies
between the Shi‘ites and the Kharijites and the Mu‘tazilites and the
Karramites and the Ash‘arites.—_Translated from Cureton’s Arabic text, p.
4._
II
THE PROPHET IN A TRADITION
“Islam is built upon five things; testimony that there is no god but God
and that Muhammad is the Apostle of God. Prayer (_salat_), the Poor-rate
(_zakat_), Pilgrimage (_hajj_) and Fast (_sawm_) in Ramadan.”
A TRADITION OF THE PROPHET
Jibril came in the form of an Arab of the desert and sat down so that
his knees touched the knees of the Prophet and said, “O Apostle of God,
what is Islam?” He said, “That thou should bear witness that there is
no god save God and that I am the Apostle of God; that thou shouldest
perform the prayers (_salat_) and bring the poor-rate (_zakat_) and
fast in the month of Ramadan and pilgrimage to the House if the way is
possible for thee.” He said, “Thou hast spoken truly.” Then he said,
“What is Faith (_iman_)?” The Prophet said, “That thou should believe
in God and His angels and His books and His messengers and in the Last
Day, and that thou should believe in the decreeing (_qadar_) both of good
and of evil.” He said, “Thou hast spoken truly.” Then he said, “What
is right doing (_ihsan_)?” The Prophet said, “That thou should serve
God as though thou sawest Him; for though thou seest Him not, He sees
thee.” He said, “Thou hast spoken truly.” Then he said, “When shall be
the Last Day (_as-sa‘a_)?” The Prophet said, “The questioned knoweth not
more of that than the questioner.” Then he arose and went out. And the
Prophet said, “That was Jibril; he came to you to teach you your religion
(_din_).”—_Translated from Cureton’s text of ash-Shahrastani, p. 27._
III
A SHORT CREED BY AL-ASH‘ARI
Our doctrine which we teach and our religion (_diyana_) which we follow
consists in clinging fast to the Book of God and the Usage (_sunna_)
of His Prophet and to that which is handed down from the Companions,
their immediate followers (_tabi‘s_) and from the leaders (_imams_) in
tradition—with that we take refuge; and we teach that which Ahmad ibn
Hanbal—may God illumine his face, exalt his rank and make great his
reward—followed; and we shun that which is opposed to his doctrine. For
he is the excellent leader, the perfect chief, through whom God made
plain the truth, when error was made manifest, and showed the path and
smote down the innovations of the innovators, the deviations of the
deviators and the doubts of the doubters. So, the mercy of God be upon
him for an appointed leader and an instructed chief, and upon all the
leaders of the Muslims.
The sum of our doctrine is this, that we believe in God, His Angels, His
Books, His Apostles, in all that has come from God, and what trustworthy
men (_thiqat_) have reported from the Apostles of God; we oppose
nothing thereof. That God is One God, Single, One, Eternal; beside Him
no God exists; He has taken to Himself no wife (_sahiba_), nor child
(_walad_); and that Muhammad is His Servant (_abd_) and His Apostle.
That Paradise and Hell are Verity and that the Hour (_as-sa‘a_) will
come without doubt, and God will arouse those that are in the graves.
That God has settled Himself (_istawa_) upon His throne, as He has
said, (Qur. 20, 4); “the Rahman has settled Himself upon His throne.”
That God has a countenance, as He has said, (Qur. 55, 27); “and the
countenance of thy Lord will abide, full of majesty and glory;” and two
hands, as He has said, (Qur. 5, 69); “much more! both His hands are
spread out,” and (Qur. 38, 75); “that which I have created with both My
hands;” and two eyes, without asking how (_bila kayfa_), as He has said,
(Qur. 54, 14); “which swims forth under Our eyes.” That whoever thinks
that God’s name is other than He, is in error. That God has Knowledge
(_ilm_), as He has said, (Qur. 35, 12); “Not one woman becomes pregnant
and brings forth, except by His knowledge.” We maintain that God has
Power (_qudra_), as He has said, (Qur. 41, 14); “and have they not seen
that God who created them is stronger than they?” We maintain that God
has Hearing (_sam_) and Seeing (_basar_) and do not deny it, as do the
Mu‘tazilites, Jahmites and Kharijites. We teach that God’s Word (_kalam_)
is uncreated, and that He has never created anything except by saying
to it, “Be!” and it forthwith became, as He has said, (Qur. 16, 42);
“Our speech to anything when We willed it was, ‘Be’ and it was.” Nothing
exists upon earth, be it good or bad, but that which God wills; but
all things are by God’s Will (_mashya_). No one is able to do anything
before God does it, neither is anyone independent of God, nor can he
withdraw himself from God’s Knowledge. There is no Creator but God. The
works (_amals_) of creatures are created and predestined by God, as He
said, (Qur. 37, 94); “and God has created you and what ye do.” Man is
able to create nothing; but they are created, as He has said, (Qur. 35,
31); “Is there any Creator except God?” and (Qur. 16, 17) “and is He
who created like him who created not?” and (Qur. 52, 35); “were they
created out of nothing, or are they the creators?” and such passages are
many in the Qur’an. And God maintains the believers in obedience to Him,
is gracious unto them, cares for them, reforms them, and guides them
aright; but the unbelievers He leads astray, guides them not aright,
vouchsafes them not Faith (_iman_), by His Grace, as the People of
error and pride maintain. For should He be gracious unto them and help
them aright, then would they be pious, and should He guide them aright,
then would they allow themselves to be guided aright, as He has said,
(Qur. 7, 177); “whom God guideth aright, he allows himself to be guided
aright, and whom He leads astray, they are the losers.” God is able to
help the unbelieving aright and to be gracious unto them, so that they
shall become believing, but He wills that they shall be unbelieving as
is known. For He has made them impervious to all help and sealed their
hearts. Good and Evil happen according to the Destiny (_qada_) and Decree
(_qadar_) of God for good and evil, for the sweet and the bitter. We
know that the misfortune that befalls us is not in order that we may go
astray, and that the good fortune which befalls us is not in order that
we may go aright. We have no control over that which is good or hurtful
to us, except so far as God wills. We flee from our anxieties to God and
commit at all times our distress and poverty to Him. We teach that the
Qur’an is God’s Word, and that it is uncreated, and that whosoever says
that it is created is an unbeliever (_kafir_). We believe that God at
the Day of Resurrection (_yawm al-qiyama_) will be visible to the eyes,
as the moon is seen upon the night of the full moon; the believers will
see Him, according to traditions which have come down from the Prophet.
We teach that while the believers will see Him, the unbelievers will be
separated from Him by a wall of division, as God has said, (Qur. 83, 15);
“Surely not! They will be separated from their Lord, upon that Day.”
We teach that Moses besought God that he might see Him in this world;
then God revealed Himself to the mountain and turned it into dust and
taught Moses thereby that he could not see Him in this world (Qur. 7,
139). We are of the opinion that we may not accuse anyone of unbelief
(_kufr_), who prays towards Mecca, on account of sin committed by him,
such as unchastity, theft, wine drinking, as the Kharijites believe,
who judge that these thereby become unbelievers. We teach that whoever
commits a great sin (_kabira_), or anything like it, holding it to be
allowed, is an unbeliever, since he does not believe in its prohibition.
We teach that Islam is a wider idea than Faith (_iman_), so that not
every Islam is Faith. We believe that God turns the hearts upside down,
and holds them between two of His fingers, that He lays the heavens upon
a finger and the earth upon a finger, according to the tradition from
the Prophet. We believe that God will not leave in Hell any of those
who confess His Unity (_muwahhid_) and hold fast to the Faith, and that
there is no Hell for him whom the Prophet has by his witness appointed
to Paradise. We hope for Paradise for sinners and fear on their account,
that they will be punished in Hell. We teach that God will release a few
out of Hell, on account of Muhammad’s intercession (_shafa‘a_) after they
have been scorched there. We believe in the punishment of the grave. We
believe that the Tank (_hawd_) and the Balance are Verities: that the
Bridge _as-Sirat_ is a Verity; that the Arousing (_ba‘th_) after death
is a Verity; that God will set up His creatures in a place (_mawqif_)
and will hold a reckoning with the Believers.[1] We believe that Faith
(_iman_) consists in word (_qawl_) and in work (_amal_) and that it
increases and diminishes. We trust in the sound Traditions handed down
from the Apostle of God, which trustworthy people (_thiqat_), just man
from just man, up to the Apostle, have transmitted. We hold by the love
of the early Believers (_salaf_), whom God chose to be Companions to the
Prophet, and we praise them with the praise with which God praised them,
and we carry on their succession. We assert that the Imam succeeding
the Apostle of God was Abu Bakr; that God through him made the Religion
(_din_) mighty, and caused him to conquer the Apostates (_murtadds_).
The Muslims made him their Imam, just as Muhammad had made him Imam at
prayers. Then followed [as legal Imam] Umar ibn al-Khattab; then Uthman
ibn Affan; his murderers killed him out of wickedness and enmity; then
Ali ibn Abi Talib. These are the Imams after the Apostle, and their
Khalifate is that of the Prophetic office [_i.e._, they are, though not
prophets, successors of the Prophet]. We bear witness of Paradise for
the Ten (_al-asharatu-l-mubashshara_), to whom the Apostle bore witness
of it, and we carry on the succession of the other Companions of the
Prophet and hold ourselves far from that which was in dispute between
them. We hold that the four Imams were in the true way, were rightly
guided and excellent, so that no one equals them in excellence. We hold
as true the traditions which the People of Tradition (_naql_) have
established, concerning the descent of God to the lowest heaven (_sama
ad-dunya_), and that the Lord will say, “Is there a supplicant? Is there
a seeker for forgiveness?” and the rest of that which they have handed
down and established, contrary to that which the mistaken and misled
opine. We ground ourselves in our opposition on the Qur’an, the _Sunna_
of the Prophet, the agreement of the Muslims and what is in accordance
therewith, but put forth no novelty (_bid‘a_) not sanctioned by God, and
opine of God nothing that we have not been taught. We teach that God will
come on the Day of Resurrection, as He has said, (Qur. 89, 23); “When
the earth shall be turned to dust, and the Lord shall appear and the
angels, rank on rank,” and that God is near to His servants, in what way
(_kayfa_) He wills, as He has said, (Qur. 50, 15); “and We are nearer to
him than the artery in his neck;” and (Qur. 53, 8); “Then He approached
and came near and was two bows’ length distant or even nearer.” To our
Religion (_din_) belongs further, that we on Fridays and on festival
days pray behind every person, pious and profane—so are the conditions
for congregational prayers, as it is handed down from Abd Allah ibn Umar
that he prayed behind al-Hajjaj. To our Religion belongs the wiping
(_mash_) of the inner boots (_khuffs_) upon a journey and at home, in
contradiction to the deniers of this.[2] We uphold the prayer for peace
for the Imams of the Muslims, submission to their office, and maintain
the error of those who hold it right to rise against them whenever there
may be apparent in them a falling away from right. We are against armed
rebellion against them and civil war.
We believe in the appearance of anti-Christ (_ad-Dajjal_) according to
the tradition handed down from the Prophet; in the punishment of the
grave, and in Munkar and Nakir and in their questions to the buried in
their graves. We hold the tradition of the journey to heaven (_mi‘raj_,
Qur. 17) of Muhammad as true, and declare many of the visions in sleep to
be true, and we say that there is an explanation for them. We uphold the
alms for the dead of the Muslims and prayer for them, and believe that
God will help them therewith. We hold as true that there are enchanters
in the world, and that enchantment is and exists. We hold as a religious
duty the prayer which is held over the dead of those who have prayed
toward Mecca, whether they have been believers or godless; we uphold
also their right of testation. We acknowledge that Paradise and Hell are
created, and that whoever dies or is killed, dies or is killed at his
appointed time (_ajal_); that the articles of sustenance (_rizq_) from
God, with which He sustains His creatures, are permitted (_halal_) and
forbidden (_haram_);[3] that Satan makes evil suggestions to men, and
puts them in doubt, and causes them to be possessed, contrary to that
which the Mu‘tazilites and the Jahmites maintain, as God said, (Qur.
2, 276); “Those who take usury will [at the Resurrection] stand there
like one whom Satan causes to be possessed by madness,” and (Qur. 114,
4 ff.); “I take my refuge in God, from the evil suggestion, from the
stealthy one who makes suggestions in the hearts of men, by means of men
and Jinn.” We affirm that God may distinguish the pious by signs which
He manifests through them. Our teaching concerning the little children
of the polytheists (_mushriks_) is this, that God will kindle a fire in
the other world for them, and will say, “Run in there;”—as the tradition
says.[4] We believe that God knows what men do and what they will to do,
what happens and how that which does not happen, if it should happen,
would happen. We believe in the obedience of the Imams and in their
counsel of the Muslims. We consider right the separation from every
inciter to innovation (_bid‘a_) and the turning aside from the People of
wandering desires (_ahl al-ahwa_).—_Translated from the Arabic text in
Spitta’s Zur Geschichte al-As‘ari’s, pp. 133 ff._
IV
A SHORT CREED BY AL-GHAZZALI
An exposition of the Creed of the People of the Sunna on the two Words of
Witnessing (_kalimata-sh-shabada_) which form one of the Foundations of
Islam.
[Intended to be committed to memory by children. It forms the
first section of the second book of his _Ihya_, vol. ii, pp.
17-42 of edit. of Cairo with commentary of the Sayyid Murtada.]
We say—and in God is our trust—Praise belongeth unto God, the Beginner,
the Bringer back, the Doer of what He willeth, the Lord of the Glorious
Throne and of Mighty Grasp, the Guider of His chosen creatures to the
right path and to the true way, the Granter of benefits to them after
the witness to the Unity (_tawhid_) by guarding their articles of belief
from obscurities of doubt and opposition, He that bringeth them to follow
His Apostle, the Chosen one (_al-Mustafa_), and to imitate the traces
of his Companions, the most honored, through His aid and right guidance
revealed to them in His essence and His works by His beautiful qualities
which none perceives, save he who inclines his ear. He is the witness who
maketh known to them that He in His essence is One without any partner
(_sharik_). Single without any similar, Eternal without any opposite,
Separate without any like. He is One, Prior (_qadim_) with nothing before
Him, from eternity (_azali_) without any beginning, abiding in existence
with none after Him, to eternity (_abadi_) without any end, subsisting
without ending, abiding without termination. He hath not ceased and
He will not cease to be described with glorious epithets; finishing
and ending, through the cutting off of the ages and the terminating of
allotted times, have no rule over Him, but He is the First and Last, the
External and the Internal, and He knoweth everything.
We witness that He is not a body possessing form, nor a substance
possessing bounds and limits: He does not resemble bodies, either in
limitation or in accepting division. He is not a substance and substances
do not exist in Him; and He is not an accident and accidents do not exist
in Him, nay He does not resemble an entity, and no entity resembles Him;
nothing is like Him and He is not like anything; measure does not bound
Him and boundaries do not contain Him; the directions do not surround
Him and neither the earth nor the heavens are on different sides of Him.
Lo, He is seated firmly upon His Throne (_arsh_), after the manner which
He has said, and in the sense in which He willed a being seated firmly
(_istiwa_), which is far removed from contact and fixity of location and
being established and being enveloped and being removed. The Throne does
not carry Him, but the Throne and those that carry it are carried by the
grace of His power and mastered by His grasp. He is above the Throne and
the Heavens and above everything unto the limit of the Pleiades, with an
aboveness which does not bring Him nearer to the Throne and the Heavens,
just as it does not make Him further from the earth and the Pleiades.
Nay, He is exalted by degrees from the Throne and the Heavens, just as
He is exalted by degrees from the earth and the Pleiades; and He, in
spite of that, is near to every entity and is “nearer to a creature than
the artery of his neck” (Qur. 50, 15), and He witnesseth everything,
since His nearness does not resemble the nearness of bodies, just as
His essence does not resemble the essence of bodies. He does not exist
in anything, just as nothing exists in Him: He has exalted Himself far
therefrom that a place should contain Him, just as He has sanctified
Himself far therefrom that time should limit Him. Nay, He was before He
had created Time and Place and He is now above that which He was above,
and distinct from His creatures through His qualities. There is not in
His essence His equal, nor in His equal His essence. He is far removed
from change of state or of place. Events have no place in Him, and
mishaps do not befall him. Nay, He does not cease, through His glorious
epithets, to be far removed from changing, and through His perfect
qualities to be independent of perfecting increase. The existence of His
essence is known by reason; His essence is seen with the eyes, a benefit
from Him and a grace to the pious, in the Abiding Abode and a completion
in beatitude from Him, through gazing upon His gracious face.
We witness that He is living, powerful, commanding, conquering;
inadequacy and weakness befall Him not; slumber seizes Him not, nor
sleep. Passing away does not happen to Him, nor death. He is Lord of the
Worlds, the Visible and the Invisible, that of Force and that of Might;
He possesses Rule and Conquest and Creation and Command; the heavens
are rolled in His right hand and the created things are overcome in His
grasp; He is separate in creating and inventing; He is one in bringing
into existence and innovating; He created the creation and their works
and decreed their sustenance and their terms of life; not a decreed thing
escapes His grasp and the mutations of things are not distant from His
power; the things which He hath decreed cannot be reckoned and the things
which He knoweth have no end.
We witness that He knoweth all the things that can be known,
comprehending that which happeneth from the bounds of the earths unto the
topmost heavens; no grain in the earth or the heavens is distant from His
knowledge. Yea, He knows the creeping of the black ant upon the rugged
rock in a dark night, and He perceives the movement of the mote in the
midst of the air; He knows the secret and the concealed and has knowledge
of the suggestions of the minds and the movements of the thoughts and the
concealed things of the inmost parts, by a knowledge which is prior from
eternity; He has not ceased to be describable by it, from the ages of the
ages, not by a knowledge which renews itself and arises in His essence by
arrival and removal.
We witness that He is a Willer of the things that are, a Director of
the things that happen; there does not come about in the world, seen
or unseen, little or much, small or great, good or evil, advantage or
disadvantage, faith or unbelief, knowledge or ignorance, success or loss,
increase or diminution, obedience or rebellion, except by His will.
What He wills is, and what He wills not is not. Not a glance of one who
looks, or a slip of one who thinks is outside of His will: He is the
Creator, the Bringer back, the Doer of that which He wills. There is no
opponent of His command and no repeater of His destiny and no refuge for
a creature from disobeying Him, except by His help and His mercy, and
no strength to a creature to obey Him except by His will. Even though
mankind and the Jinn and the Angels and the Shaytans were to unite to
remove a single grain in the world or to bring it to rest without His
will, they would be too weak for that. His will subsists in His essence
as one of His qualities; He hath not ceased to be described through it as
a Willer, in His infinity, of the existence of things at their appointed
times which He hath decreed. So they come into existence at their
appointed times even as He has willed in His infinity without precedence
or sequence. They happen according to the agreement of His knowledge and
His will, without exchange or change in planning of things, nor with
arranging of thoughts or awaiting of time, and therefore one thing does
not distract Him from another.
And we witness that He is a Hearer and a Seer. He hears and sees, and
no audible thing is distant from His hearing, and no visible thing is
far from His seeing, however fine it may be. Distance does not curtain
off His hearing and darkness does not dull His seeing; He sees without
eyeball or eyelid, and hears without earholes or ears, just as He
knows without a brain and seizes without a limb and creates without an
instrument, since His qualities do not resemble the qualities of created
things, just as His essence does not resemble the essences of created
things.
And we witness that He speaks, commanding, forbidding, praising,
threatening, with a speech from all eternity, prior, subsisting in His
essence not resembling the speech of created things. It is not a sound
which originates through the slipping out of air, or striking of bodies;
nor is it a letter which is separated off by closing down a lip or moving
a tongue. And the Qur’an and the Tawrat [the Law of Moses] and the
Injil [the Gospel] and the Zabbur [the Psalms] are His book revealed to
His Apostles. And the Qur’an is repeated by tongues, written in copies,
preserved in hearts: yet it, in spite of that, is prior, subsisting
in the essence of God, not subject to division and separation through
being transferred to hearts and leaves. And Musa heard the speech of God
without a sound and without a letter, just as the pious see the essence
of God, in the other world, without a substance or an attribute.
And since He has those qualities, He is Living, Knowing, Powerful, a
Willer, a Hearer, a Seer, a Speaker, through Life, Power, Knowledge,
Will, Hearing, Seeing, Speech, not by a thing separated from His essence.
We witness that there is no entity besides Him, except what is originated
from His action and proceeds from His justice, after the most beautiful
and perfect and complete and just of ways. He is wise in His actions,
just in His determinations; there is no analogy between His justice and
the justice of creatures, since tyranny is conceivable in the case of a
creature, when he deals with the property of some other than himself, but
tyranny is not conceivable in the case of God. For He never encounters
any property in another besides Himself, so that His dealing with it
might be tyranny. Everything besides Him, consisting of men and Jinn and
Angels and Shaytans and the heavens and the earth and animals and plants
and inanimate things and substance and attribute and things perceived
and things felt, is an originated thing, which He created by His power,
before any other had created it, after it had not existed, and which He
invented after that it had not been a thing, since He in eternity was an
entity by Himself, and there was not along with Him any other than He.
So He originated the creation thereafter, by way of manifestation of His
power, and verification of that which had preceded of His Will, and of
that which existed in eternity of His Word; not because He had any lack
of it or need of it. And He is gracious in creating and in making for the
first times and in imposing of duty—not of necessity—and He is generous
in benefiting; and well-doing and gracious helping belong to Him, since
He is able to bring upon His creatures different kinds of punishment
and to test them with different varieties of pains and ailments. And if
He did that, it would be justice on His part, and would not be a vile
action or tyranny in Him. He rewardeth His believing creatures for their
acts of obedience by a decision which is of generosity and of promise
and not of right and of obligation, since no particular action toward
anyone is incumbent upon Him, and tyranny is inconceivable in Him, and
no one possesses a right against Him. And His right to acts of obedience
is binding upon the creatures because He has made it binding through the
tongues of His prophets, not by reason alone. But He sent apostles and
manifested their truth by plain miracles, and they brought His commands
and forbiddings and promisings and threatenings. So, belief in them as to
what they have brought is incumbent upon the creation.
THE SECOND WORD OF WITNESSING is witnessing that the apostolate belongs
to the apostle, and that God sent the unlettered Qurayshite prophet,
Muhammad, with his apostolate to the totality of Arabs and foreigners
and Jinn and men. And He abrogated by his law the other laws, except so
much of them as He confirmed; and made him excellent over the rest of the
prophets and made him the Lord of Mankind and declared incomplete the
Faith that consists in witnessing the Unity, which is saying, “There is
no god except God,” so long as there is not joined to that a witnessing
to the Apostle, which is saying, “Muhammad is the Apostle of God.” And
He made obligatory upon the creation belief in him, as to all which he
narrated concerning the things of this world and the next. And that He
would not accept the faith of a creature, so long as he did not believe
in that which the Prophet narrated concerning things after death.
The first of that is the question of Munkar and Nakir; these are two
awful and terrible beings who will cause the creature to sit up in his
grave, complete, both soul and body; and they will ask him, “Who is thy
Lord, and what is thy religion (_din_), and who is thy Prophet?” They
are the two testers in the grave and their questioning is the first
testing after death. And that he should believe in the punishment of the
grave—that it is a Verity and that its judgment upon the body and the
soul is just, according to what God wills. And that he should believe
in the Balance—it with the two scales and the tongue, the magnitude
of which is like unto the stages of the heavens and the earth. In it,
deeds are weighed by the power of God Most High; and its weights in
that day will be of the weight of motes and mustard seeds, to show the
exactitude of its justice. The leaves of the good deeds will be placed
in a beautiful form in the scale of light; and then the Balance will
be weighed down by them according to the measure of their degree with
God, by the grace of God. And the leaves of evil deeds will be cast in
a vile form into the scale of darkness, and the Balance will be light
with them, through the justice of God. And that he should believe that
the Bridge (_as-sirat_) is a Verity; it is a bridge stretched over the
back of Hell (_jahannam_), sharper than a sword and finer than a hair.
The feet of the unbelievers slip upon it, by the decree of God, and fall
with them into the Fire. But the feet of believers stand firm upon it,
by the grace of God, and so they pass into the Abiding Abode. And that
he should believe in the Tank (_hawd_), to which the people shall go
down, the Tank of Muhammad from which the believers shall drink before
entering the Garden and after passing the Bridge. Whoever drinks of it
a single draught will never thirst again thereafter. Its breadth is a
journey of a month; its water is whiter than milk and sweeter than honey;
around it are ewers in numbers like the stars of heaven; into it flow two
canals from _al-Kawthar_ (Qur. 108). And that he should believe in the
Reckoning and in the distinctions between men in it, him with whom it
will go hard in the Reckoning and him to whom compassion will be shown
therein, and him who enters the Garden without any reckoning,—these are
the honored (_muqarrab_). God Most High will ask whomsoever He will of
the prophets, concerning the carrying of His message, and whomsoever He
will of the unbelievers, concerning the rejection of the messengers; and
He will ask the innovators (_mubtadi‘s_) concerning the Sunna; and the
Muslims concerning works. And that he should believe that the attestors
of God’s Unity (_muwahhids_) will be brought forth from the Fire,
after vengeance has been taken on them, so that there will not remain
in Hell an attestor of God’s Unity. And that he should believe in the
intercession (_shafa‘a_) of the prophets, next of the learned (_ulama_),
next of the martyrs, next of the rest of the believers—each according
to his dignity and rank with God Most High. And he who remains of the
believers, and has no intercessor, shall be brought forth of the grace
of God, whose are Might and Majesty. So there shall not abide eternally
in the Fire a single believer, but whoever has in his heart the weight
of a single grain of faith shall be brought forth therefrom. And that he
should confess the excellence of the Companions—May God be well pleased
with them!—and their rank; and that the most excellent of mankind,
after the Prophet, is Abu Bakr, next Umar, next Uthman, next Ali—May
God be well pleased with them! And that he should think well of all the
Companions and should praise them like as he praises God, whose are Might
and Majesty, and His Apostles. All this is of that which has been handed
down in traditions from the Prophet and in narratives from the followers.
He who confesses all this, relying upon it, is of the People of the Truth
and the Company of the Sunna, and hath separated himself from the band of
error and the sect of innovation (_bid‘a_). So we ask from God perfection
of certainty and firm standing in the Faith (_din_) for us and for all
Muslims through His compassion.—lo! He is the Most Compassionate!—and
may the blessing of God be upon our Lord Muhammad and upon every chosen
creature.
V
ARTICLES OF BELIEF OF NAJM AD-DIN ABU HAFS AN-NASAFI
[A Mataridite who d. A.H. 537. This creed is still used as a
text-book in schools. It is translated from Cureton’s edition
(London, 1843) with the assistance of at-Taftazani’s commentary
(Constantinople, A.H. 1310). The asterisks mark the points on
which al-Mataridi differed from al-Ash‘ari.]
In the name of God, the merciful Compassionator.
The Shaykh, the Imam, Najm ad-Din Abu Hafs Umar ibn Muhammad ibn Ahmad
an-Nasafi—may God have mercy upon him!—said;—The People of Verity,
contradicting the Sceptics [_Sufistiqiya_, i.e., Sophists] say that the
real natures of things are validly established and that the science of
them is certain.
Further, that the sources of knowledge for mankind are three: the sound
Senses, true Narration (_khabar_), and Reason (_aql_). As for the
Senses, they are five: Hearing, Sight, Smell, Taste and Touch, and by
each sense you are informed concerning that for which it is appointed.
True Narration, again, is of two kinds. The one is Narration handed down
along a large number of lines of tradition (_mutawatir_); that is, it
is established by the tongues of a number of people of whom we cannot
imagine that they would agree in a lie. It compels a knowledge which
is of necessity (_daruri_), such as the knowledge of departed kings in
past times and of distant countries. And the second is Narration by the
Apostle (_rasul_) aided by miracle [_i.e._, Muhammad], and it compels
deduced knowledge (_istidlali_), and the knowledge established by it
resembles in certainty and fixity the knowledge established by necessity.
Then as for Reason, it is a cause of knowledge also; and whatever is
established by intuition (_badaha_) is of necessity, as the knowledge
that everything is greater than its parts; and whatever is established
by inference is acquired knowledge (_iktisabi_), as the existence of
fire from the appearance of smoke. And the Inner Light (_ilham_) with
the People of Verity is not one of the causes of knowledge as to the
soundness of anything.[5]
Further, the world in the totality of its parts is a thing originated
(_muhdath_), in that it consists of Substances (_ayns_) and Attributes
(_arads_). The Substances are what exist in themselves, and a substance
is either a compound, that is a body (_jism_), or not compounded like an
essence (_jawhar_), namely a division that is not further divided. And
the attributes are what do not exist in themselves but have a dependent
existence in bodies or essences, such as colors, tastes, conditions
(_kawns_), odors.
The Originator (_Muhdith_) of the world is God Most High, the One,
the Eternal, the Decreeing, the Knowing, the Hearing, the Seeing, the
Willing. He is not an attribute, nor a body, nor an essence, nor a thing
formed, nor a thing bounded, nor a thing numbered, nor a thing divided,
nor a thing compounded, nor a thing limited; and He is not described by
quiddity (_mahiya_), nor by modality (_kayfiya_), and He does not exist
in place or time, and there is nothing that resembles Him and nothing
that is outwith His knowledge and power.
He has qualities (_sifat_) from all eternity (_azali_) existing in
His essence. They are not He nor are they any other than He. They are
Knowledge and Power and Life and Strength and Hearing and Seeing and
Doing and Creating and Sustaining and Speech (_kalam_).
And He, whose Majesty is majestic, speaks with a Word (_kalam_). This
Word is a quality from all eternity, not belonging to the genus of
letters and sounds, a quality that is incompatible with coming to silence
and that has no weakness.
God Most High speaks with this Word, commanding and prohibiting and
narrating. And the Qur’an is the uncreated Word of God, repeated by our
tongues, heard by our ears, written in our copies, preserved in our
hearts, yet not simply a transient state (_hal_) in these [_i.e._, the
tongues, ears, etc.]. And Creating (_takwin_) is a quality of God Most
High from all eternity, and it is the Creating of the world and of every
one of its parts at the time of its becoming existent, and this quality
of Creating is not the thing created, according to our opinion.* And
Willing is a quality of God Most High from all eternity, existing in His
essence.
And that there is a Vision (_ru’ya_) of God Most High is allowed by
reason and certified by tradition (_naql_). A proof on authority has come
down with the affirmation that believers have a Vision of God Most High
in Paradise and that He is seen, not in a place or in a direction or by
facing or the joining of glances or the placing of a distance between him
who sees and God Most High.
And God Most High is the Creator of all actions of His creatures, whether
of unbelief or belief, of obedience or of rebellion; all of them are by
the will of God and His sentence and His conclusion and His decreeing.
And to His creatures belong actions of choice (_ikhtiyar_),* for
which they are rewarded or punished, and the good in these is by the
good pleasure of God (_rida_) and the vile in them is not by His good
pleasure.*
And the ability to do the action (_istita‘a_) goes along with the action
and is the essence of the power (_qudra_) by which the action takes
place, and this word “ability” means the soundness of the causes and
instruments and limbs. And the validity of the imposition of the task
(_taklif_) is based upon this ability,* and the creature has not a task
imposed upon him that is not in his power.
And the pain which is found in one who is beaten as a consequence of
being beaten by any man, and the state of being broken in glass as a
consequence of its being broken by any man, and such things, all that is
created by God Most High, and the creature has no part in its creation
and a slain man is dead because his appointed time (_ajal_) has come;
and death exists in a slain man and is created by God Most High, and the
appointed time is one.[6]
And that which is forbidden (_haram_) is still Sustenance (_rizq_), and
each one receives his own Sustenance whether it consists of permitted or
of forbidden things; and let no one imagine that a man shall not eat his
Sustenance or that another than he shall eat his Sustenance.
And God leadeth astray whom He wills and guideth aright whom He wills,
and it is not incumbent upon God Most High to do that which may be best
(_aslah_) for the creature.
The punishment of the grave for unbelievers and for some rebellious ones
of the believers, and the bliss of the obedient in the grave, and the
questioning by Munkar and Nakir are established by proofs of authority.
And the Quickening of the Dead (_ba‘th_) is a Verity, and the Weighing is
a Verity, and the Book is a Verity and the Tank (_hawd_) is a Verity, and
the Bridge, _as-Sirat_, is a Verity, and the Garden is a Verity, and the
Fire is a Verity, and they are both created, existing, continuing; they
shall not pass away and their people shall not pass away.
A great sin (_kabira_) does not exclude the creature who believes from
the Belief (_iman_) and does not make him an unbeliever. And God does
not forgive him who joins another with Himself, but He forgives anything
beneath that to whom He wills, of sins small (_saghira_) or great.
And there may be punishment for a small and pardon for a great one, if it
be not of the nature of considering lawful what is forbidden, for that is
unbelief (_kufr_). And the intercession (_shafa‘a_) of the Apostles and
of the excellent on behalf of those who commit great sins is established.
And those believers who commit great sins do not remain eternally in the
Fire although they die without repentance.
Belief (_iman_) is assent (_tasdiq_) to that which comes from God and
confession (_iqrar_) of it. Then, as for Works (_amal_), they are acts
of obedience and gradually increase of themselves, but Belief does not
increase and does not diminish. And Belief and al-Islam are one.* And
whenever assent and confession are found in a creature, it is right that
he should say, “I am a believer in truth.” And it is not fitting that he
should say, “I am a believer if God will.”*
The happy one sometimes becomes miserable and the miserable one sometimes
becomes happy,* and the changing is in happiness and misery, and not in
making happy and making miserable: for those are both qualities of God
Most High, and there is no changing in Him nor in His qualities.
And in the sending of Apostles (_rasuls_) is an advantage and God
has sent Apostles of flesh unto flesh with good tidings, warning and
explaining to men the things of the world and of faith, of which they
have need. And He has aided them with miracles (_mu‘jizat_) which break
the order of nature. The first of the Prophets (_nabis_) was Adam and the
last is Muhammad, Upon both of them be Peace! A statement of their number
has been handed down in several traditions, but the more fitting course
is that there should be no limiting to a number in naming them; God Most
High has said, “Of them are those concerning whom We have recited to
thee, and of them are those concerning whom We have not recited to thee.”
And there is no security in a statement of number against there being
entered among them some that are not of them, or of there being excluded
from them some that are of them. They all give intelligence concerning
God Most High, are veracious and sincere, and the most excellent of the
Prophets is Muhammad—Upon him be Peace!
The Angels are servants of God and work according to His commands. They
are not described as masculine or feminine.
And God has books which He has revealed to His Prophets, and in them are
His commands and His promises.
The Night Journey (_mi‘raj_) of the Apostle of God—Upon whom be Blessing
and Peace! while awake, in the body, to Heaven, then to what place God
Most High willed of the Exalted Regions, is a Verity.
The Wonders (_karamat_) of the Saints (_walis_) are a Verity. And a
Wonder on the part of a Saint appears by way of a contradiction of the
ordinary course of nature, such as passing over a great distance in a
short time, and the appearing of meat and drink and clothing at a time of
need, and walking upon the water and in the air, and the speech of stones
and of beasts, and the warding off of an evil that is approaching, and
the guarding of him who is anxious from enemies, and other things of the
same kind. And such a thing is to be reckoned as an evidentiary miracle
(_mu‘jiza_) on behalf of the Apostle followed by the Saint on whose part
the wonder appears. For it is evident by it that he is a Saint and he
could never be a Saint unless he were right in his religion and worship
and in abiding by the message committed to his Apostle.
The most excellent of mankind after the Prophets are Abu Bakr, the Very
Veracious (_as-Siddiq_), then Umar, the Divider (_al-Faruq_), then
Uthman, he of the Two Lights (_Dhu-n-Nurayn_), then Ali—The good-will of
God be upon them! Their Khalifates were in this order, and the Khalifate
extended to thirty years; then, thereafter, came kings and princes.
The Muslims cannot do without a leader (_Imam_) who shall occupy
himself with the enforcing of their decisions, and in maintaining their
boundaries and guarding their frontiers, and equipping their armies,
and receiving their alms, and putting down robberies and thieving and
highwaymen, and maintaining the Friday services and the Festivals, and
removing quarrels that fall between creatures, and receiving evidence
bearing on legal claims, and marrying minors, male and female, and those
who have no guardians, and dividing booty. And it is necessary that the
leader should be visible, not hidden and expected to appear (_muntazar_),
and that he should be of the tribe of Quraysh and not of any other. And
he is not assigned exclusively to the sons of Hashim nor to the children
of Ali. And it is not a condition that he should be protected by God from
sin (_isma_), nor that he should be the most excellent of the people
of his time, but it is a condition that he should have administrative
ability, should be a good governor and be able to carry out decrees and
to guard the restrictive ordinances (_hadds_) of Islam and to protect the
wronged against him who wrongs him. And he is not to be deposed from the
leadership on account of immorality or tyranny.
Prayer is allowable behind anyone whether pure or a sinner. And we give
the salutation of Peace to the pure and to the sinner.
And we abstain from the mention of the Companions (_sahibs_) of the
Prophet except with good.
And we bear witness that Paradise is for the ten to whom the
Prophet—God bless him and give him Peace!—gave good tidings of Paradise
(_al-asharatu-l-mubashshara_).
And we approve the wiping (_mash_) of the inner-shoes (_khuffs_) both at
home and when on a journey.
And we do not regard _nabidh_ as forbidden.
And the Saint does not reach the level of the Prophets. And the creature
does not come to a point where commands and prohibitions and the details
of the statutes in their outward sense (_zahir_) fall away from him; and
the turning aside from these to the views which the People of the Inner
Meaning (_batin_) assert is a deviation (_ilhad_) through unbelief.
And feeling safe from God is unbelief. And despairing of God is unbelief.
And rejection of the statutes and contempt for the law is unbelief. And
believing a diviner (_kahin_) in what he tells of the Unseen (_ghayb_) is
unbelief. And what does not exist (_ma‘dum_) is known of God Most High
just as what exists (_mawjud_) is known of Him and it [_i.e._, what does
not exist] is neither a thing (_shay_) nor an object of vision (_mar’an_).
And in prayer of the living for the dead, and in alms offered for them
there is an advantage to them. And God Most High answers prayers and
supplies needs.
And what the Prophet has reported of the conditions of the last day
(_as-sa‘a_), of the appearance of _ad-Dajjal_ and of the beast of the
earth [cf. Revelations xiii, 11 ff.] and of _Yajuj_ and _Majuj_ and the
descent of Isa from heaven and the rising of the sun in the west, that is
verity.
And the Mujtahids sometimes err and sometimes hit the mark. And the
Apostles of mankind are more excellent than the Apostles of the angels;
and the Apostles of the angels are more excellent than the generality
of mankind; and the generality of mankind of the true believers is more
excellent than the generality of the angels.
VI
THE CREED CALLED THE SUFFICIENCY OF THE COMMONALTY IN THE SCIENCE
OF SCHOLASTIC THEOLOGY, BY MUHAMMAD AL-FUDALI [D. FIRST HALF OF THE
THIRTEENTH CENTURY OF THE HIJRA]
[Translated from the Arabic text of Cairo, A.H. 1315, with the commentary
of al-Bayjuri.]
In the name of God, the merciful Compassionator. Praise belongeth unto
God who alone bringeth into existence, and blessing and peace be upon
our Lord Muhammad, his family and companions, possessors of beauty and
guidance.
To proceed: The creature who stands in need of the mercy of his exalted
Lord, Muhammad ibn ash-Shafi‘i al-Fudali says: One of the brethren asked
me that I should compose a tractate on the divine unity (_tawhid_), and
I agreed to that, following the example of the most learned Shaykh,
as-Sanusi, [d. 895,] in the establishing of proofs, except that I adduced
each proof (_dalil_) in connection with the doctrine that was to be
proved, and added to it an exposition on account of my knowledge of the
limitations of that student. So, in the ascription of praise to God Most
High, it became a tractate, useful and excellent for the establishing of
that which is in it. And I called it, THE SUFFICIENCY OF THE PEOPLE IN
THAT WHICH IS NECESSARY TO THEM OF THE SCIENCE OF SCHOLASTIC THEOLOGY
(_kalam_). And I pray God Most High that He will make it useful, for He
is my sufficiency, and excellent is the Guardian.
Know that it is incumbent upon every Muslim that he should know fifty
articles of belief (_aqidas_), and for each article that he should know
a proof, general (_ijmali_) or detailed (_tafsili_). Some say that it is
required that he should know a detailed proof, but the common opinion is
that a general proof suffices for each article of the fifty. An example
of a detailed proof is when someone says, “What is the proof of the
existence (_wujud_) of God?” that the answer should be, “These created
things.” That the asker should then say, “Do the created things prove the
existence of God on the side of their possibility or on the side of their
existence after non-existence (_adam_)?” and that his question should
be answered. And if the further question is not answered, but the only
answer is, “These created things,” and the answerer does not know whether
it is on the side of their possibility or of their existence after
non-existence, then the proof is said to be general; but it is sufficient
according to the common position. And with regard to _taqlid_ (blind
acceptance), which is that fifty articles are known but no proof of them
is known, either general or detailed, the learned differ. Some say that
it does not suffice, and that the _mukallad_ (blind accepter) is an
unbeliever (_kafir_). Ibn al-Arabi [d. 543] held this and as-Sanusi, and
the latter gave in his commentary on his _kubra_ a lengthy refutation of
those who hold that _taqlid_ is sufficient. Yet there is a report that he
retired from this position, and acknowledged the sufficiency of _taqlid_;
but I have never seen in his books anything but the opinion that it does
not suffice.
INTRODUCTION
Know that an understanding of the fifty following articles must be based
upon three things—the necessary (_wajib_), the impossible (_mustahil_),
and the possible (_ja’iz_). The necessary is that the non-existence
of which cannot be apprehended by the intellect (_aql_), that is, the
intellect cannot affirm its non-existence, as boundary to a body
(_jirm_), _i.e._, its taking up a certain measure of space (_faragh_). An
example of a body is a tree or a stone. Then, whenever a person says to
you, that a tree, for example, does not take up room (_mahall_) in the
earth, your intellect cannot affirm that, for its taking up room is a
necessary thing, the absence of which your intellect cannot affirm. The
impossible is that the existence of which cannot be apprehended; that
is, the intellect cannot affirm its existence. Then, whenever anyone
says that such a body is bare of motion and rest at the same time, your
intellect cannot affirm that, because being bare of motion and rest
at the same time is an impossibility, the occurrence and existence of
which the intellect cannot affirm, and whenever it is said that weakness
(_ajz_) is impossible in God, the meaning is that the occurrence or
existence of weakness in God is unthinkable. So, too, with the other
impossibilities. And the possible is that the existence of which at one
time, and the non-existence at another, the intellect can affirm, as the
existence of a child of Zayd’s. When, then, someone says that Zayd has a
child, your intellect acknowledges the possibility of the truth of that;
and whenever he says that Zayd has no child, your intellect acknowledges
the possibility of the truth of that. So the existence and the
non-existence of a child of Zayd is possible; the intellect can believe
in its existence or in its non-existence. And whenever it is said that
God’s sustaining Zayd with a _dinar_ is a possibility, the meaning is
that the intellect assents to the existence of that sustaining (_rizq_)
at one time and to its non-existence at another.
On these three distinctions, then, is based the science of the articles
of belief; and these three are necessary for every _mukallaf_ [one who
has a task imposed upon him; in this case of religious duty], male and
female, for that upon which the necessary is based is necessary. The
Imam al-Haramayn (d. 478) even held that an understanding of these three
constituted reason itself and that he who did not know the meaning of
necessary, impossible and possible, was not a reasoning being. So,
whenever it is said here that Power is necessary (_wajib_) in God, the
meaning is that the intellect cannot affirm its non-existence, because
the necessary is that the non-existence of which the intellect cannot
affirm, as has preceded. But necessary (_wajib_, incumbent) in the sense
of that the not doing of which is punished, is an idea which does not
enter into the science of the divine Unity. So, do not let the matter be
confused for you. It is true that if one says that belief in the Power
of God is incumbent (_wajib_) on the _mukallaf_, the meaning is that
he is rewarded for that and punished for omitting that. Thus there is
a distinction between saying that belief in such and such is incumbent
and that the knowledge, for example, is necessary. For when it is said
that knowledge is necessary in God, the meaning is that the intellect
cannot affirm the non-existence of knowledge in God. But when it is said
that belief in that knowledge is incumbent, the meaning is that belief
in it is rewarded and lack of belief punished. So, apply thyself to the
distinction between the two and be not of those who regard _taqlid_ in
the articles of Religion as right, that so your faith (_iman_) should
differ from the truth and you should abide in the Fire, according to
those who hold that _taqlid_ does not suffice. As-Sanusi said, “A person
is not a Believer when he says, ‘I hold by the Articles and will not
abandon them though I be cut in pieces;’ nay, he is not a Believer until
he knows each Article of the fifty, along with its proof.” And this
science of theology must be studied first of all sciences, as may be
gathered from the commentary [by at-Taftazani, d. 791] on as-Sanusi’s
_Articles_; for he made this science a foundation on which other things
are built. So a judgment as to anyone’s ceremonial ablution (_wudu_) or
prayer is not valid unless the person in question knows these articles
or, on the other hand, holds them without proof.
* * * * *
Now, let us state to you the fifty articles shortly, before stating them
in detail. Know, then, that twenty qualities are necessary in God Most
High, that twenty are impossible in Him and that one is possible. This
makes up forty-one. And in the case of the Apostles, four qualities are
necessary, four impossible and one possible. This makes up the fifty.
And there shall come an accurate account of doctrines along with the
statement of them, if it be the will of God Most High.
The first of the qualities necessary in God is existence (_wujud_); and
there is a difference of opinion as to its meaning. All except the Imam
al-Ash‘ari and his followers hold that existence is the state (_hal_)
necessary to the essence so long as the essence abides; and this state
has no cause (_illa_). And the meaning of it being a state is that it
does not attain to the degree of an entity (_mawjud_) and does not
fall to the degree of a non-entity (_ma‘dum_), so that it should be
non-existence pure, but is half way between an entity and a non-entity.
So the existence of Zayd, for example, is a state necessary to his
essence; that is, it cannot be separated from his essence. And when it
is said that it has no cause, the meaning is that it does not originate
in anything, as opposed to Zayd’s potentiality (_qadir_, powerful), for
example, which originates in his power (_qudra_). So Zayd’s potentiality
and his existence are two states which subsist in his essence,
unperceived by any of the five senses; only, the first has a cause in
which it originates, and it is power, and the second has no cause. This
is the description of a personal state (_hal nafsi_) and every state
subsisting in an essence, without a cause, is a personal quality (_sifa
nafsiya_). It is that without which the essence is unthinkable; that
is, the essence cannot be apprehended by the intellect and comprehended
except through its personal quality, like limitation for a body. For, if
you apprehend and comprehend a body, you have comprehended that it is
limited. So, according to this doctrine—that existence is a state—the
essence of God is not His existence and the essences of the created
things are not their existences. But al-Ash‘ari and his followers hold
that existence is the self (_ayn_) of an entity, and according to their
view the existence of God is the self of His essence and not an addition
to it externally, and the existence of a created thing is the self of
its essence. And, on this view, it is not clear how existence can be
reckoned as a quality, because existence is the self of the essence, and
a quality, on the other hand, as we have seen already, is something else
than the essence. But if he makes existence a quality, then the thing is
plain and the meaning that existence is necessary in God, according to
the first view, is that the personal quality is a state established in
God; and its meaning, on the second view, is that the essence of God is
an entity with external reality, so that if the veil were removed from
us we would see it. The essence of God, then, is a reality; only, its
existence is something else than it, on the one view, and is it, on the
other.
And the proof of the existence of God is the origin (_huduth_) of the
world; that is, its existence after non-existence. The world consists of
bodies (_jirms_) like essences; and accidents (_arads_) like motion, and
rest and colors. And the origin of the world is a proof of the existence
of God only because it is not sound reasoning that it should originate
through itself without someone bringing it into existence. Before it
existed, its existence equalled its non-existence; then, when it entered
existence and its non-existence ceased, we know that its existence
overbalanced its non-existence. But this existence had previously
equalled the non-existence; and it is not sound reasoning that it could
overbalance the non-existence through itself; so that it is clear that
there must have been one who caused the overbalancing, other than itself,
and it is He that brought it into existence; for it is impossible
that one of two equal things could overbalance the other without an
overbalancer. For example, before Zayd exists it is possible that he may
come into existence in such and such a year and also that he may remain
in non-existence. So, his existence is equal to his non-existence. So,
then, when he exists and his non-existence ceases, in the time in which
he exists, we know that his existence is by a bringer-into-existence and
not through himself. The proof, in short, is that you say:—The world,
consisting of bodies and accidents, is a thing originated (_hadith_),
_i.e._, an entity after non-existence. And every originated thing cannot
help but have an originator (_muhdith_). Therefore, the world must have
had an originator.
This is what can be gained by an intellectual proof. But as for the
Originator being named by the Glorious and Lofty Expression [_i.e._,
_Allah_, God] or the other Names (_asma_), knowledge of that is to be
gained from the Prophets only. So note this point carefully and also the
proof which has preceded, that the originating of the world is a proof of
the existence of Him Most High.
But as for the proof that the world has had an origin, know that the
world consists of bodies and accidents only, as has preceded. And the
accidents, like motion and rest, are originated, because you observe
their changing from existence to non-existence and from non-existence
to existence. You see it is so in the motion of Zayd. His motion is
lacking if he is at rest; and his rest is lacking if he is in motion.
Then his rest, which comes after his motion, exists after that it has
been lacking through motion; and his motion, which comes after his rest,
exists after that it has been lacking through his rest. And existence
after non-existence means having an origin. And bodies are inseparable
from attributes, because they are never free from either motion or
rest. And whatever is inseparable from a thing having origin must have
origin; _i.e._, must be an entity after non-existence. So, the bodies are
originated also, like the attributes. The proof, in short, is that you
say: Bodies are inseparable from attributes and these have an origin;
everything that is inseparable from that which has an origin, itself has
an origin; therefore, bodies have an origin. And the origin of the two
things—bodies and attributes—that is their existence after non-existence,
is a proof of the existence of Him Most High, because everything having
an origin must have an originator, and there is no originator of the
world save God Most High alone, who has no partner (_sharik_) as shall
be shown in the proof of His Unity. This, then, is the general proof, a
knowledge of which is incumbent upon every _mukallaf_, male and female,
according to the opinion of Ibn al-Arabi and as-Sanusi, who hold those
who do not know it to be unbelievers. So, beware lest there be a
contradiction in your faith.
The second Quality necessary in God is Priority (_qidam_); its meaning is
lack of beginning. And the meaning of God’s being Prior (_qadim_) is that
there was no beginning to His existence, as opposed to Zayd, for example.
Zayd’s existence had a beginning and it was the creation from the drop
from which he was created. And there is a difference of opinion whether
Prior and _Azali_ (eternal with respect to past time) mean the same or
not. Those who hold that they mean the same, define them as that which
has no beginning, and explain “that which” by thing (_shay_). That is,
prior and _azali_ are the thing which has no beginning; so the essence
of God and His qualities are included. And those who hold that their
meaning is different define prior as the entity which had no beginning
and _azali_ as that which had no beginning, covering thus both entity and
non-entity. So _azali_ is broader than prior, but they both come together
in the essence of God and His existential qualities. The essence of God
is _azali_ and His Power (_qudra_) is _azali_. But only _azali_ is said
of the states (_hals_) like God’s being powerful, in accordance with the
doctrine of the states. For God’s being powerful is called _azali_, in
accordance with that doctrine, and is not called prior, because in prior
there must be existence, and “being powerful” does not rise to the level
of existence [to being an entity], but is only a state (_hal_).
And the proof of God’s Priority is that if He were not Prior He would
be a thing originated (_hadith_), because there is no medium between
the prior and the thing originated; to everything of which priority is
denied, origin belongs. But if God were a thing originated, He would need
an originator, and His originator would need an originator, and so on.
Then, if the originators did not coincide, there would be the Endless
Chain (_tasalsul_), that is a sequence of things, one after another to
infinity; and the Endless Chain is impossible. And if the series of
originators comes to an end by it being said that the originator of God
was originated by Him, then we have the Circle (_dawr_) and it is that
one thing depends on another thing which again depends on the first. For
if God had an originator, He would depend on this originator; but the
hypothesis is that God originated this originator and so the originator
depends on Him. But the Circle is impossible; that is, its existence is
unthinkable. And that which leads to the Circle and to the Chain, both
being impossible, involves the originating of God. So, the originating
of God is impossible; for what involves an impossibility is impossible.
The proof, in short, is that you say, “If God were other than Prior,
through being a thing originated, He would have need of an originator.
Then the Circle or the Chain would be unavoidable; but they are both
impossible. So, the originating of God is impossible and His Priority is
established; and that is what has been sought.” This is the general proof
of the Priority of God, and by it the _mukallaf_ escapes from the noose
of _taqlid_, the remainer in which will abide eternally in the Fire,
according to the opinion of Ibn al-Arabi and as-Sanusi, as has preceded.
The third Quality necessary in God is Continuance (_baqa_). The meaning
of it is lack of termination of the existence; and the meaning of God’s
being continuing is that there is no end to His existence. And the proof
of God’s continuance is that if it were possible that any lack could be
joined to Him, then He would be a thing originated and would need an
originator and then the Circle or the Chain would necessarily follow.
A definition of each one of these two has preceded in the proof of
Priority and in the explanation that to a thing with which non-existence
is possible, priority must be denied. For the existence of everyone to
whom non-existence is joined is possible, and everything whose existence
is possible is a thing originated, and everything originated requires an
originator. But Priority has been established for God by the preceding
proof, and non-existence is impossible for everything for which Priority
has been established. So the proof of Continuance in God is the same
as the proof of Priority. That proof, in short, is that you say, “If
Continuance is not necessary in Him, then Priority must be negated of
Him. But Priority cannot be negated on account of the preceding proof.”
This is the general proof of Continuance, a knowledge of which is
incumbent on every individual. And similarly a knowledge of every article
is necessary and of its general proof. Then, if some of the articles are
known with their proofs, and the rest are not known with their proofs,
that is not sufficient according to the opinion of those who do not
regard _taqlid_ as sufficient.
The fourth Quality necessary in God is difference (_mukhalafa_) from
originated things. That is, from created things (_makhluqat_), for God
is different from every created thing, men, Jinn, angels and the rest;
and it is not good that He should be described with the descriptions
which apply to created things, as walking, sitting, having members of
the body, for He is far removed (_munazzah_) from members of the body,
as mouth, eye, ear and the like. Then, from everything that is in your
mind of length and breadth and shortness and fatness, God is different;
He has removed Himself far from all descriptions which apply to the
creation. And the proof of the necessity of this difference in God is
that if any originated thing resembled Him, that is, if it were laid
down that God could be described with any of the things with which an
originated thing is described, then He would be an originated thing. And
if God were an originated thing, then He would need an originator, and
His originator, another originator, and so we would come necessarily to
the circle or the chain, and both of these are impossible. This proof, in
short, is that you say, “If God resembles a created thing in anything,
He is an originated thing, because what is possible in one of two things
resembling each other, is possible in the other. But that God should be
originated is impossible, for priority is necessary in Him. And when
being originated is denied in Him, His difference from created things
stands fast and there is absolutely no resemblance between Him and the
originated things.” This is the general proof, the knowledge of which is
necessary, as has preceded.
The fifth Quality necessary in God is self-subsistence (_qiyam
bin-nafs_). That is in the essence; and its meaning is that there
is independence of a _locus_ (_mahall_, subject) and a specifier
(_mukhassis_). The _locus_ is the essence and the specifier is the
bringer-into-existence (_mujid_); then the meaning of God’s subsisting in
Himself is that He is independent of an essence in which He may subsist,
or of a bringer-into-existence; for He is the bringer-into-existence of
all things. The proof that He subsists in Himself is that you say, “If
God had need of a _locus_, that is an essence, in which He might subsist,
as whiteness has need of an essence in which it may subsist, He would be
a quality, as whiteness, for example, is a quality. But it is not sound
to say of Him that He is a quality, for He is described by qualities, and
a quality is not described by qualities, so He is not a quality. And if
He had need of a bringer-into-existence, He would be an originated thing,
and His originator would be an originated thing also, and the Circle or
the Chain would necessarily follow. Then it stands fast that He is the
absolutely independent, that is, He is independent of everything. But the
created thing that is independent is independent in a limited sense only;
that is, of one thing in place of another. And may God rule thy guidance.”
The sixth Quality in God is Unity (_wahdaniya_). It is unity in essence
and qualities and acts in the sense of absence of multiplicity. And the
meaning of God’s being one in His essence is that His essence is not
compounded of parts, and this compounding is called internal quantity
(_kamm muttasil_). And in the sense that there is not in existence
or in possibility an essence which resembles the essence of God,
this impossibility of resemblance is called external quantity (_kamm
munfasil_). The unity, then, in the essence denies both quantities,
external and internal. And the meaning of God’s Oneness in qualities is
that He has not two qualities agreeing in name and meaning, like two
Powers, or two Knowledges or two Wills—for He has only one Power and
one Will and one Knowledge, in opposition to Abu Sahl, who held that
He had knowledges to the number of the things known. And this, I mean
multiplicity in qualities, is called internal quantity in qualities. Or
the sense is, that no one has a quality resembling a quality of God.
And this, I mean anyone possessing a quality, etc., is called external
quantity in qualities. Oneness, then, in qualities, negates quantity in
them, internal and external. And the meaning of God’s Oneness in acts is
that no created thing possesses an act, for God is the creator of the
acts of created things, prophets, angels and the rest. And as for what
happens when an individual dies or falls into pain on opposing himself
to a saint (_wali_), that is by the creation of God, who creates it when
the saint is angry with the man who opposes him. Do not then explain
Oneness in acts by saying that no other than God has an act like God’s
act, for that involves that some other than God has an act, but that it
is not like the act of God. That is false. God it is who is the creator
of all acts. What comes from you by way of movement of the hand, when you
strike Zayd, for example, is by the creation of God. He has said (Qur.
37, 99), “God created you, and what do ye do?” And another than God being
possessor of an act is called external quantity in acts.
So the unity necessary in God denies the five impossible quantities.
Internal quantity in the essence makes the essence a compound of parts;
external quantity means that there is an essence which resembles it.
Internal quantity in the qualities is that God has two Powers, for
example; external quantity in them means that someone else has a quality
which resembles one of His qualities. External quantity in acts means
that some other than God possesses an act. These five quantities deny the
unity necessary in God. The meaning of quantity is number (_adad_).
The proof that Unity is necessary in God is the existence of the world.
If God had a partner (_sharik_) in divinity (_uluhiya_), the case could
not be in doubt. Either they would agree on the existence of the world,
in that one of them would say, “I will cause the world to exist,” and
the other would say, “I will cause it to exist along with thee, that we
may help one another in it.” Or they would disagree, and one of them
would say, “I will cause the world to exist by my power,” and the other,
“I will that the existence be lacking.” Then, if they agreed upon the
existence of the world in that both of them together caused it to exist,
and it existed through their action, that would necessarily involve the
coincidence of two impressors upon one impression, which is impossible.
And if they disagreed, it is plain that the will of one either would
be carried out or it would not be carried out. If the will of one,
rather than the other, is carried out, then the other whose will is not
carried out must be weaker. But our hypothesis was that he was equal in
divinity to the one whose will was carried out. So whenever weakness is
established in the case of the one, it is established in the case of the
other, for he is like the other. And if the wills of both are not carried
out, they are both weak. And upon every alternative, that they agree
or differ, the existence of a single thing of the world is impossible;
because if they agree on its existence, there necessarily follows the
coincidence of two impressors upon one impression if their will is
carried out, and that is impossible. So the carrying out of their will
is not affected, and it is not possible that a single thing of the world
should come into existence then. And if they disagree and the will of one
of them is carried out, the other is weak. But he is his like. So it is
not possible that there should come into existence a single thing of this
world, for he is weak. So _the_ God is not except one. And if they differ
and their will is not carried out, they are weak and not able to cause
the existence of a thing of the world. But the world exists, by common
witness (_mushahada_). So it stands fast that _the_ God is one; and that
was what was sought. So the existence of the world is proof of the Unity
of God and that He has no partner in any act, and no second cause in an
action. He is the independent (_al-Ghani_), the absolutely independent.
And from this proof it may be known that there is no impression, by fire
or a knife or eating, upon anything, consisting of burning or cutting or
satiety, but God makes the being burnt in a thing which fire touches,
when it touches it, and being cut in a thing with which a knife is
brought into contact, when it is brought into contact with it, and
satiety at eating and satisfaction at drinking. And he who holds that
fire burns by its nature (_tab_), and water satisfies by its nature, and
so on, is an unbeliever (_kafir_) by agreement (_ijma_). And he who holds
that it burns by a power (_quwa_) created in it by God, is ignorant and
corrupt, because he knows not the true nature (_haqiqa_) of Unity.
This is the general proof a knowledge of which is incumbent upon every
individual, male and female: and he who knows it not is an unbeliever,
according to as-Sanusi and al-Arabi. And may God rule thy guidance.
And Priority and Continuance and Difference from originated things and
Self-Subsistence and Unity are negative qualities (_sifat salabiya_),
that is, their meaning is negation and exclusion, for each of them
excludes from God what does not beseem Him.
The seventh Quality necessary in God is Power (_qudra_). It is a quality
which makes an impression on a thing that is capable of existence
or non-existence. So it comes into connection (_ta‘allaqa_) with a
non-entity and makes it an entity, as it came into connection with you
before you existed. And it comes into connection with an entity and
reduces it to a non-entity, as it comes into contact with a body which
God desires should become a non-entity, that is, a not-thing (_la shay_).
This connection is called accomplished (_tanjizi_) in the sense that it
is actual (_bil-fi‘l_), and this accomplished connection is a thing that
takes place (_hadith_). But this quality has also an eternal, potential
connection (_saluhi qadim_), and it is its potentiality from eternity of
bringing into existence. It is potential in eternity to make Zayd tall or
short or broad, or give him knowledge; but its accomplished connection
is conditioned by the state in which Zayd is. So it has two connections;
one eternal, potential, which has been described, and one accomplished,
happening. The last is its connection with a non-entity, when it makes
it an entity; and with an entity, when it makes it a non-entity. And
this, I mean its connection with an entity or a non-entity, is a
real (_haqiqi_) connection. But it has also a figurative (_majazi_)
connection. That is, its connection with an entity after it has become
so and before it has become a non-entity, as it is connected with us
after we have come to exist and before we have ceased to exist. It is
called the connection of grasping (_ta‘alluqu-l-qabdati_) in the sense
that the entity is in the grasp (_qabda_) of the Power of God. If God
will, He makes it remain an entity; and if He will, He reduces it to
non-entity. And its connection with the non-entity before that God wills
its existence is like its connection with Zayd at the time of the Flood
(_tufan_), for example; it also is a connection of grasping in the sense
that the non-entity is in the grasp of the Power of God. If God wills,
He makes it remain in non-existence, and if He wills, He brings it out
into existence. And similar is its connection with us after our death and
before the resurrection (_ba‘th_). It, too, is called a connection of
grasping in the sense of what has preceded. So the quality of Power has
seven connections: (1) eternal, (2) connection of grasping (that is, its
connection with us before God wills our existence), (3) actual connection
(that is, God’s bringing the thing into existence), (4) connection of
grasping (that is, connection with a thing after existence and before God
has willed non-existence), (5) actual connection (that is, God’s making a
thing a non-entity), (6) connection of grasping after non-existence and
before the resurrection, (7) actual connection (that is, God’s making us
exist on the day of resurrection).
But the real connections of these are two; God’s bringing into existence
and bringing into non-existence. This is a detailed statement; and a
general statement would be that God’s Power has two connections—as is
commonly accepted—a potential and an accomplished; but the accomplished
is limited to actual bringing into existence and non-existence. And
the connection of grasping is not to be described as accomplished, nor
as eternal. And what has preceded about this quality connecting with
existence and non-existence is the opinion of the multitude on the
subject. But some hold that it does not connect with non-existence; that
whenever God desires the non-existence of an individual, He takes away
from him the aids (_imdadat_) which are the cause of his continuance.
The eighth Quality necessary in God is Will (_irada_). It is the quality
which specifies the possible with one of the things possible to it. For
example, tallness and shortness are possible to Zayd; then Will specifies
him with one,—tallness, say. Power brings tallness out of non-existence
into existence. So Will specifies and Power brings out. And the
possibilities (_mumkinat_) with which Power and Will connect are six: (1)
existence, (2) non-existence, (3) qualities, like tallness and shortness,
(4) times, (5) places, (6) directions.
And the possibilities are called “the mutual opposers” (_mutaqabilat_),
existence opposes non-existence and tallness opposes shortness and
direction upward opposes direction downward, and one place, like Egypt,
opposes another place, like Syria. And this, in short, means that it
is possible in the case of Zayd, for example, that he should remain in
non-existence and also that he should enter existence at this time.
Then, whenever he enters existence, Will has specified existence instead
of non-existence, and Power has brought out existence. And it would
have been possible that he might have entered existence at the time of
the Flood (_tufan_) or at some other time; so that which specifies his
existence at this time instead of any other is Will. And it is possible
that he should be tall or short; then that which specifies his tallness
instead of shortness is Will. And it is possible that he should be in
the direction upward, then that which specifies him in the direction
downward is Will. And Power and Will are two qualities subsisting in
God’s essence—two entities; if the veil were removed from us we could
see them. They have connection with the possible only; but none with the
impossible, such as a partner for God. He is far removed from that! Nor
with the necessary, like the essence of God and His qualities. Ignorance
is the saying of those who hold that God has power to take a son
(_walad_); for Power has no connection with the impossible and taking a
son is impossible. But it should not be said that because He has no power
to take a son, He is therefore weak. We say that weakness would follow
only if the impossible were of that which is allotted to Power. But
Power has not been connected with that, seeing that nothing is allotted
to it except the possible. And Will has two connections, one eternally
potential, and it is its potentiality to specify from all eternity. So,
in the case of the tall or the short Zayd, it is possible that he might
be otherwise than what he is, so far as relationship to the potentiality
of Will is concerned. For Will is potential that Zayd should be a Sultan
or a scavenger, so far as the potential connection is concerned. And Will
has also an eternal accomplished connection, and it is the specifying
by God of a thing with a quality which it possesses. So God specified
Zayd from all eternity by His Will with the knowledge that he possesses.
And his being specified with knowledge, for example, is eternal and is
called an eternal accomplished connection. And the potentiality of Will
to specify him with knowledge, etc., in relationship to the essence of
Will, cutting off all consideration of actual specifying, is called an
eternal potential connection. And some say that Will has also a temporal,
accomplished connection. It is, for example, the specifying of Zayd with
tallness, when he is actually brought into existence. According to this
view, Will has three connections; but the truth is that this third is
not a connection but is the making manifest of the eternal, accomplished
connection.
And the connection of Power and Will is common to every possible thing to
the extent that the affections of the mind (_khatarat_) which arise in
the mind of an individual are specified by the Will of God and created
by His Power as the Shaykh al-Malawi [Ahmad al-Malawi, d. 1181] has said
in some of his books. But know that the attributing of specifying to
Will and of bringing out into existence to Power is only metaphorical;
for the true specifier is God by His Will and the true producer and
bringer-into-existence is God by His Power. Then, in the case of the
saying of the common people that Power does such and such to so and so,
if it is meant that the doing belongs to Power actually, or to it and to
the essence of God, that is unbelief (_kufr_). Rather, the doing belongs
to the essence of God by His Power.
The ninth Quality necessary in God is Knowledge (_ilm_). It is an
eternal quality subsisting in the essence of God, an entity by which
what is known is revealed with a revealing of the nature of complete
comprehension (_ihata_), without any concealment having preceded. It
is connected with the necessary, the possible and the impossible. He
knows His own essence and qualities by His Knowledge. And He knows
impossibilities in the sense that He knows that a partner is impossible
to Him and that, if one existed, corruption would accrue from it. And
Knowledge has an eternal, accomplished connection only. For God knows
these things that have been mentioned from all eternity with a complete
knowledge that is not by way of opinion (_zann_) or doubt (_shakk_);
because opinion and doubt are impossibilities in God. And the meaning of
the saying, “without any concealment having preceded,” is that He knows
things eternally; He is not first ignorant of them and then knowing them.
But an originated being (_hadith_) is ignorant of a thing and then knows
it. And God’s Knowledge has no potential connection in the sense that
there is a potentiality that such and such should be revealed by it,
because that involves that the thing in question has not been actually
revealed, and lack of actual revealing of it is ignorance.
The tenth Quality necessary in God is Life (_hayah_). It is a quality
which in him in whom it subsists validates perception, as knowledge and
hearing and seeing: that is, it is valid that he should be described
therewith. But being characterized by actual perception does not
necessarily follow from possessing the quality, Life. And it is not
connected with anything, entity or non-entity.
The proof that Knowledge and Power and Will and Life are necessary is the
existence of the created things. Because, if any one of these four is
denied, why does the created world exist? So, since the created things
exist, we know that God is to be described by these qualities. And the
reason of the existence of the created things depending on these four
is this. He who makes a thing does not make it except when he knows
the thing. Then he wills the thing which he would make and, after his
willing, he busies himself with making it by his power. Further, it is
known that the maker cannot but be living. And Knowledge and Will and
Power are called qualities of impression (_sifat at-ta’thir_), for making
an impression depends upon them. Because he who wills a thing must have
knowledge of it before he aims at it; then, after he has aimed at it, he
busies himself with doing it. For example, when there is something in
your house and you wish to take it, your knowledge precedes your wish
to take it, and after your wish to take it, you take it actually. The
connection of these qualities, then, is in a certain order, in the case
of an originated being; first comes the knowledge of the thing, then the
aiming at it, then the doing. But in the case of God, on the other hand,
there is no sequence in His qualities, except in our comprehension; in
that, Knowledge comes first, then Will, then Power. But as for the making
of an impression externally, there is no sequence in the qualities of
God. It is not said that Knowledge comes into actual connection, then
Will, then Power; because all that belongs to originated beings. Order is
only according to our comprehensions.
The eleventh and twelfth Qualities of God are Hearing (_sam_) and Seeing
(_basar_). These are two qualities subsisting in the essence of God and
connected with every entity; that is, by them is revealed every entity,
necessary or possible. And Hearing and Seeing are connected with the
essence of God and His qualities; that is, His essence and qualities are
revealed to Him by His Seeing and Hearing, besides the revealing of His
Knowledge. And God hears the essences of Zayd and Amr and a wall and He
sees them. And He hears the sound of the possessor of a sound and He sees
it, that is the sound. Then, if you say, “Hearing a sound is plain,
but hearing the essence of Zayd and the essence of a wall is not plain;
so, too, the connection of seeing with sounds, for sounds are heard
only,” we reply, “Belief in this is incumbent upon us because these two
qualities are connected with every entity; but the _how_ (_kayfiya_) of
the connection is unknown to us. God hears the essence of Zayd, but we do
not know how hearing is connected with that essence. And it is not meant
that He hears the walking of the essence of Zayd, for the hearing of his
walking enters into the hearing of all the sounds (_sawt_), but what is
meant is that He hears the essence of Zayd and his body (_juththa_),
besides hearing his walking. But we do not know how the hearing of God
is connected with the person (_nafs_) of the essence. This is what is
binding upon every individual, male and female—Our trust is in God!”
The proof of Hearing and Seeing is the saying of God that He is a
Hearer and Seer. And know that the connection of Hearing and Seeing in
relation to originated things is an eternal, potential connection before
the existence of these, and after their existence it is a temporal,
accomplished connection. That is, after their existence, they are
revealed to God by His Hearing and Seeing besides the revealing of His
Knowledge. So they have two connections. And in relation to God and His
qualities, the connection is eternal, accomplished, in the sense that His
essence and His qualities are revealed to Him from all eternity through
His Hearing and Seeing. So, God hears His essence and all His existential
qualities [all except the states and the negative qualities], Power,
Hearing, and all the rest; but we do not know how the connection is, and
He sees His essence and His qualities of existence, Power, Seeing and
the rest, but again we do not know how the connection is. The preceding
statement that Hearing and Seeing are connected with every entity is the
opinion of as-Sanusi and those who follow him; it is the preponderating
one. But it is said, also, that Hearing is only connected with sounds
and Seeing with objects of vision. And God’s Hearing is not with ear or
ear-hole, and His Seeing is not with eyeball or eyelid.
The thirteenth Quality of God is Speech (_kalam_). It is an eternal
quality, subsisting in God’s essence, not a word or sound, and far
removed from order of preceding and following, from inflection and
structure, opposed to the speech of originated beings. And by the
Speech that is necessary to God is not meant the Glorious Expressions
(_lafz_) revealed to the Prophet, because these are originated and
the quality that subsists in the essence of God is eternal. And these
embrace preceding and following, inflection and chapters and verses;
but the eternal quality is bare of all these things. It has no verses
or chapters or inflections, because such belong to the speech which
embraces letters and sounds, and the eternal quality is far removed from
letters and sounds, as has preceded. And those Glorious Expressions are
not a guide to the eternal quality in the sense that the eternal quality
can be understood from them. What is understood from these expressions
equals what would be understood from the eternal quality if the veil were
removed from us and we could hear it. In short, these expressions are a
guide to its meaning, and this meaning equals what would be understood
from the eternal Speech which subsists in the essence of God. So meditate
this distinction, for many have erred in it. And both the Glorious
Expressions and the eternal quality are called Qur’an and the Word
(_kalam_) of God. But the Glorious Expressions are created and written
on the Preserved Tablet (_al-lawh-al-mahfuz_); Jibril brought them down
[_i.e._, revealed them] to the Prophet after that they had been brought
down in the Night of Decree (_laylatu-l-qadr_; Qur. 97, 1) to the Mighty
House (_baytu-l-izza_), a place in the Heaven nearest to the earth;
it was written in books (_sahifas_) and placed in the Mighty House.
It is said that it was brought down to the Mighty House all at once
and then brought down to the Prophet in twenty years, and some say, in
twenty-five. And it is also said that it was brought down to the Mighty
House only to the amount that was to be revealed each year and not all at
once.
And that which was brought down to the Prophet was expression and
meaning. And it is said also that only the meaning was brought down to
him. There is a conflict of opinion on this; some say that the Prophet
clothed the meaning with expressions of his own, and others, that he
who so clothed the meaning, was Jibril. But the truth is that it was
sent down in expressions and meaning. In short, the quality subsisting
in the essence of God is not a letter nor a sound. And the Mu‘tazilites
called in doubt the existence of a kind of Speech without letters. But
the People of the Sunna answered that because thoughts in the mind
(_hadith an-nafs_), a kind of speech with which an individual speaks
to himself, are without letter or sound, there exists a kind of speech
without letters or words. By this the People of the Sunna do not wish
to institute a comparison between the Speech of God and thoughts in the
mind; for the Speech of God is eternal and thoughts in the mind are
originated. They wished to disprove the contention of the Mu‘tazilites
when they urged that speech cannot exist without letter or sound.
The proof of the necessity of Speech in God is His saying (Qur. 4, 162);
“and God spoke to Moses.” So He has established Speech for Himself. And
Speech connects with that with which Knowledge connects, of necessary and
possible and impossible. But the connection of Knowledge with these is a
connection of revealing, in the sense that they are revealed to God by
His Knowledge; and the connection of Speech with them is a connection of
proof, in the sense that if the veil were taken away from us and we heard
the eternal Speech we would understand these things from it.
The fourteenth Quality subsisting in God is Being Powerful (_kawn
qadir_). It is a Quality subsisting in His essence, not an entity
and not a non-entity. It is not Power, but between it and Power is a
reciprocal inseparability. When Power exists in an essence, the quality
called “Being Powerful” exists in that essence, equally whether that
essence is eternal or originated. So, God creates in the essence of
Zayd Power actual, and He creates also in it the quality called Zayd’s
Being Powerful. This quality is called a state (_hal_) and Power is a
cause (_illa_) in it in the case of created things. But in the case of
God, Power is not said to be a cause in His Being Powerful; it is only
said that between Power and God’s Being Powerful there is a reciprocal
inseparability. The Mu‘tazilites hold also the reciprocal inseparability
between the Power of an originated being and its Being Powerful. But they
do not say that the second quality is by the creation of God, only that
when God creates Power in an originated being, there proceeds from the
Power a quality called Being Powerful, without creation.
The Fifteenth Quality necessary in God is Being a Willer (_kawn murid_).
It is a quality subsisting in His essence, not an entity and not a
non-entity. It is called a state (_hal_) and it is not Will, equally
whether the essence is eternal or created. So, God creates in the essence
of Zayd Will actual, and He creates in it the quality called Zayd’s Being
a Willer. And what is said above, about the disagreement between the
Mu‘tazilites and the People of the Sunna on Being Powerful, applies also
to Being a Willer.
[The same thing applies exactly to Qualities Sixteen, Seventeen,
Eighteen, Nineteen and Twenty,—Being a Knower (_alim_), a Living One
(_hayy_), a Hearer (_sami_), a Seer (_basir_), a Speaker (_mutakallim_).]
NOTICE. The Qualities, Power, Will, Knowledge, Life, Hearing, Seeing,
Speech, which have preceded, are called, “Qualities consisting of
ideas” (_sifat al-ma‘ani_, thought-qualities as opposed to active
qualities; see below); on account of the connection of the general
with the particular (_idafatu-l-amm lil-khass_), or the explanatory
connection (_al-idafatu-l-bayaniya_). And those which follow these,
God’s Being Powerful, etc., are called “Qualities _derived_ from ideas”
(_sifat ma‘nawiya_), by way of derivation (_nisba_) from the “Qualities
consisting of ideas,” because they are inseparable from them in a thing
eternal and proceed from them in a thing originated, according to what
has preceded.
And the Mataridites added to the “Qualities consisting of Ideas,” an
Eighth Quality and called it, Making to Be (_takwin_). It is a quality
and an entity like the rest of the “Qualities consisting of Ideas”; if
the veil were removed from us we would see it, just as we would see
the other “Qualities consisting of Ideas” if the veil were removed
from us. But the Ash‘arites opposed them and urged that there was no
advantage in having a quality, Making to Be, besides Power, because the
Mataridites said that God brought into existence and out of existence by
the quality of Making to Be. Then these replied that Power prepared the
possibility for existence, that is, made it ready to receive existence
after it had not been ready; that thereafter Making to Be brought it
into existence actually. The Ash‘arites replied that the possible was
ready for existence without anything further. And on account of their
having added this quality, they said that the active qualities (_sifat
al-af‘al_), such as Creating (_khalq_), Bringing to Life (_ihya_),
Sustaining (_razq_), Bringing to Death (_imata_), were eternal, because
these expressions are names of the quality Making to Be, which is a
quality and an entity, according to them. But it is eternal; therefore
these active qualities are eternal. But according to the Ash‘arites,
the active qualities are originated, because they are only names of the
connections of Power. So Bringing to Life is a name for the connection
of Power with Life, and Sustaining is a name for the connection of
Power with the creature to be sustained, and Creating is a name for its
connection with the thing to be created, and Bringing to Death, a name
for its connection with death. And the connections of Power, according to
them, are originated.
And among the Fifty Articles are twenty which express the opposites of
the twenty above. They are Non-existence, the opposite to Existence.
The Second, Origin (_huduth_), is the opposite of Priority.
The Third, Transitoriness (_fana_), is the opposite of Continuance.
The Fourth, Resemblance (_mumathala_), is the opposite of Difference. It
is impossible that God should resemble originated things in any of those
things with which they are described; time has no effect upon Him and He
has not a place or movement or rest; and He is not described with colors
or with a direction; it is not said with regard to Him that He is above
such a body, or on the right of such a body. And He has no direction
from Him. So it is not said, “I am under God.” And the saying of the
commonalty, “I am under our Lord,” and “My Lord is over me,” is to be
disapproved. Unbelief is to be feared on the part of him who holds the
use of it to be an article of his faith.
The Fifth is having need of a _locus_ (_ihtiyaj ila mahall_), that
is, an essence in which He may subsist, or a Specifier, that is a
bringer-into-existence. This is the opposite of Self-subsistence.
The Sixth is Multiplicity (_ta‘addud_), in the sense of combination in
the essence or the qualities, or the existence of a being similar in
essence or qualities or acts. This is the opposite of Unity.
The Seventh is Weakness (_ajz_) and it is the opposite of Power. So,
being unequal to any possibility is impossible in God.
The Eighth is Unwillingness (_karaha_, lit. dislike). It is the opposite
of Will, and it is impossible in God that He should bring into existence
anything of the world, along with Unwillingness toward it, that is, lack
of Will. Entities are possibilities which God brought into existence by
His Will and Choice (_ikhtiyar_). And it is derived from the necessity
of Will in God, that the existence of created things is not through
causation (_ta‘lil_), or by way of nature (_tab_). And the difference
between the two is that the entity which exists through causation is
whatever exists whenever its cause exists, without dependence on another
thing. The movement of the finger is the cause of the movement of the
ring; when the one exists, the second exists, without dependence on
anything else. And the entity which exists, by way of nature, depends
upon a condition and upon the nullifying of a hindrance. So, fire does
not burn except on the condition of contact with wood and the nullifying
of moistness which is the hindrance of its burning. For fire burns by its
nature according to those who hold the doctrine of nature—Whom may God
curse!—But the truth is, that God creates the being burned in the wood
when it is in contact with the fire, just as He creates the movement of
the ring when movement of the finger exists. And there is no such thing
as existence through causation or nature. So it is an impossibility in
God that there should be a cause in the world which proceeds from Him
without His choice, or that there should be a course of nature and that
the world should exist thereby.
The Ninth is Ignorance (_jahl_). Ignorance of any possible thing is
impossible in God, equally whether it is simple, that is, lack of
knowledge of a thing; or compound, that is, perception of a thing as
different from what it really is. And Inattention (_ghafala_) and Neglect
(_dhuhul_) are impossible in God. This is the opposite of Knowledge.
The Tenth is Death (_mawt_). It is the opposite of Life.
The Eleventh is Deafness (_samam_). It is the opposite of Hearing.
The Twelfth is Blindness (_ama_). It is the opposite of Seeing.
The Thirteenth is Dumbness (_kharas_). In it is the idea of Silence
(_bakam_) and it is the opposite of Speech.
The Fourteenth is God’s Being Weak (_kawn ajiz_). It is the opposite of
His Being Powerful.
The Fifteenth is His Being an Unwilling One (_kawn karih_). It is the
opposite of His Being a Willer.
The Sixteenth is His Being an Ignorant One (_kawn jahil_). It is the
opposite of His Being a Knower.
The Seventeenth is His Being a Dead One (_kawn mayyit_). It is the
opposite of His Being a Living One.
The Eighteenth is His Being Deaf (_asamm_). It is the opposite of His
Being a Hearer.
The Nineteenth is His Being Blind (_a‘ma_). It is the opposite of His
Being a Seer.
The Twentieth is His Being Silent (_abkam_). In it is the idea of
Dumbness (_kharas_) and it is the opposite of His Being a Speaker.
All these twenty are impossible in God. And know that the proof of each
one of the twenty qualities necessary in God establishes the existence
of that quality in Him and denies to Him its opposite. And the proofs of
the seven thought-qualities are proofs of the seven derived from these.
Thus, there are Forty Articles; twenty of them are necessary in God;
twenty are denied in Him; and there are twenty general proofs, each proof
establishing a quality and annulling its opposite.
NOTICE. Some say that things are four, entities, non-entities, states
and relations (_i‘tibarat_). The entities are like the essence of Zayd
which we see; the non-entities are like your child before it is created;
the states are like Being Powerful; and so, too, the relations, like the
establishing of standing in Zayd. This—I mean that things are four—is the
view which as-Sanusi follows in his _Sughra_, for he asserts in it the
existence of states and makes the necessary qualities to be twenty. But
elsewhere, he follows the opinion which denies states, and that is the
right view.
According to that view, the Qualities are thirteen in number, because
the seven derived qualities—God’s Being Powerful, etc., drop out.
God has no quality called Being Powerful, because the right view is
denial that states are things. According to this, then, things are
three:—entities, non-entities and relations. Then when the seven derived
qualities drop out from the twenty necessary qualities, seven drop also
from the opposites, and there is no quality called, Being Weak, etc.,
and there is no need to number these among the impossibilities. So, the
impossibilities are thirteen also; at least, if existence is reckoned as
a quality. That it should be is the opinion of all except al-Ash‘ari.
But the opinion of al-Ash‘ari was that Existence is the self (_ayn_) of
an entity. So, the existence of God is the self of His essence and not
a quality. The necessary qualities, on that view, are twelve. Priority
and Continuance and Difference and Self-subsistence—expressed also as
Absolute Independence—and Unity and Power and Will and Knowledge and Life
and Hearing and Seeing and Speech; and the derived qualities drop out,
because their existence is based upon the view that there are things
called states; but the right view is the opposite.
And if you wish to instruct the commonalty in the qualities of God, then
state them as names (_asma_) derived from the qualities just mentioned.
So it is said that God is an Entity. Prior, Different from originated
things, Independent of everything, One, Powerful, a Willer, a Knower,
Living, a Hearer, a Seer, a Speaker. And they should know their opposites.
And know that some of the Shaykhs distinguish between states and
relationships and say of both that they are not entities and also not
non-entities. But each has a reality in itself, except that a state has
a connection with and a subsistence in an essence, and a relation has no
connection with an essence. And it is said that a relation has a reality
outside of the mind. But to this it is opposed that a relation is a
quality, and if it has no connection with an essence and has a reality
outside of the mind, where is the thing qualified by it? A quality does
not subsist in itself, but must needs have a thing which it qualifies.
So the truth is that relations have no reality except in the mind. And
they are of two kinds; the invented relation (_i‘tibara ikhtira‘i_), it
is that which has no ground in existence, as your making a generous man
niggardly; and second, the apprehended relation (_intiza‘i_, claiming),
it is that which has ground outside of your mind, as asserting the
subsistence of Zayd, for that may be claimed from your saying, “Zayd
subsists”; so the describing of Zayd as subsisting is existent outside of
your mind.
The forty-first Article is Possibility in the case of God. It is
incumbent upon every _mukallaf_ that he should believe that it is
possible for God to create good and evil, to create Islam in Zayd and
unbelief in Amr, knowledge in one of them and ignorance in the other.
And another of the things, belief in which is incumbent upon every
_mukallaf_, is that the good and the bad of things is by Destiny (_qada_)
and Decree (_qadar_). And there is a difference of opinion as to the
meaning of destiny and decree. It is said that destiny is the will of God
and the eternal (_azali_) connection of that will; and decree is God’s
bringing into existence the thing in agreement with the will. So the Will
of God which is connected eternally with your becoming a learned man or
a Sultan is destiny; and the bringing knowledge into existence in you,
after your existence, or the Sultanship, in agreement with the Will, is
decree. And it is said that destiny is God’s eternal knowledge and its
connection with the thing known; and decree is God’s bringing things into
existence in agreement with His knowledge. So, God’s knowing that which
is connected eternally with a person’s becoming a learned man after he
enters existence is destiny, and the bringing knowledge into existence
in that man after he enters existence is decree. And according to each
of these two views, destiny is prior (_qadim_), because it is one of the
qualities of God, whether Will or Knowledge; and decree is originated,
because it is bringing into existence, and bringing into existence is one
of the connections of Power, and the connections of Power are originated.
And the proof that possible things are possible in the case of God is
that there is general agreement on their possibility. If the doing of any
possible thing were incumbent upon God, the possible would be turned into
a necessary thing. And if the doing of a possible thing were hindered
from Him, the possible would be turned into an impossible. But the
turning of the possible into a necessary or an impossible is false. By
this, you may know that there is nothing incumbent upon God, against the
doctrine of the Mu‘tazilites, who say that it is incumbent upon God to do
that which is best (_salah_) for the creature. So, it would be incumbent
upon Him that He should sustain the creature, but this is falsehood
against Him and a lie from which He is far removed. He creates faith in
Zayd, for example, and gives him knowledge out of His free grace, without
there being any necessity upon Him. And one of the arguments which may
be brought against the Mu‘tazilites is that afflictions come upon little
children, such as ailments and diseases. And in this there is not that
which is best for them. So, if doing that which is best is incumbent upon
Him, why do afflictions descend upon little children? For they say that
God could not abandon that which is incumbent upon Him, for abandoning
it would be defect, and God is far removed from defect, by Agreement.
And God’s rewarding the obedient is a grace from Him, and His punishing
the rebellious is justice from Him. For obedience does not advantage
Him, nor rebellion injure Him; He is the Advantager and the Injurer. And
these acts of obedience or rebellion are only signs of God’s rewarding or
punishing those described by them. Then him whom He wills to draw near to
Himself, He helps to obedience: and in him whose abandoning and rejection
He wills, He creates rebellion. And all acts of good and bad are by the
creation of God, for He creates the creature and that which the creature
does, as He has said (Qur. 37, 94), “and God hath created you and that
which ye do.”
And the belief is also incumbent that God may be seen in the Other World
by believers, for He has joined the seeing (_ru’ya_) of Him with the
standing fast of the mountain in His saying (Qur. 7, 139), “And if it
standeth fast in its place, thou wilt see Me.” And the standing fast
of the mountain was possible: then, that which is connected with it of
seeing must also have been possible; because what is connected with the
possible is possible. But our seeing God must be without inquiring how
(_bila kayfa_); it is not like our seeing one another. God is not seen in
a direction, nor in a color, nor in a body; He is far removed from that.
And the Mu‘tazilites—may God make them vile!—deny the seeing of God. That
is one of their perverse and false articles of belief. And another of
their corrupt articles is their saying that the creature creates his own
actions. For this, they are called Qadarites, because they say that the
actions of the creature are by his own _qudra_ (power), just as the sect
which holds that the creature is forced to the action he does, is called
Jabrite, derived from their holding a being forced (_jabr_) on the part
of the creature, and a being compelled. It, too, is a perverse article.
And the truth is that the creature does not create his own actions and
is not forced, but that God creates the actions which issue from the
creature, along with the creature’s having a free choice (_ikhtiyar_)
in them. As-Sa‘d [Sa‘d ad-Din at-Taftazani, see above] said, in his
commentary on the _Articles_, “It is not possible to render this free
choice by any expression, but the creature finds a difference between the
movement of his hand when he moves it himself and when the wind moves it
against his will.”
And to that which is possible in God belongs also the sending of a number
of Apostles (_rasuls_). And God’s sending them is by His grace, and by
way of necessity, as has preceded.
And it is necessary to confess that the most excellent of created beings,
absolutely, is our Prophet [Muhammad], and there follow him in excellency
the rest of the Endowed with Earnestness and Patience (_ulu-l-azm_; see
Qur. 46, 34); they are our Lord Ibrahim, our Lord Musa, our Lord Isa, and
our Lord Nuh; and this is their order in excellency. And that they are
five along with our Prophet, and four after him is the correct view. And
it is said, too, that the Endowed with Earnestness and Patience are more
numerous. And there follow them in excellency the rest of the Apostles.
Then, the rest of the Prophets (_nabis_), then the Angels.
And it is necessary to confess that God has aided them with miracles
(_mu‘jizat_) and that He has distinguished our Prophet in that he is the
seal of the Apostles, and that his law (_shar_) will not be abrogated
till time is fulfilled. And Isa, after his descent, will judge according
to the law of our Prophet. It is said that he will take it from the
Qur’an and the Sunna. It is said also that he will go to the Glorious
Tomb [of Muhammad] and learn from him. And know that he will abrogate one
part of the law of our Prophet with a later part, just as the waiting
period of a woman after the death of her husband was changed from a year
to four months and ten days. And in this there is no defect.
And it is necessary also that every _mukallaf_, male and female, should
know in detail the Apostles who are mentioned in the Qur’an, and should
believe in them in detail. As for the other Prophets, belief is necessary
in them as a whole. As-Sa‘d handed down an authority in his commentary on
the _Maqasid_ that belief in all the Prophets as a whole suffices, but he
was not followed.
And someone put them into verse as follows:
“There is imposed upon every _mukallaf_ a knowledge
Of Prophets in detail, who have been named
In that document of ours [_i.e._, the Qur’an]. Of them are eight
After ten [_i.e._, eighteen]. And there remain seven who are
Idris, Hud, Shu‘ayb, Salih, and similarly,
Dhu-l-Kifl, Adam, with the Chosen One [Muhammad] they close.”
And it is necessary to confess that the Companions (_sahibs_) of the
Prophet are the most excellent of the generations. Then their followers
(_tabi‘s_); then the followers of their followers. And the most excellent
of the Companions is Abu Bakr, then Umar, then Uthman, then Ali—in
this order. But al-Alqami said that our Lady Fatima and her brother,
our Lord Ibrahim, were absolutely more excellent than the Companions,
including the Four [Khalifas]. And our Lord Malik [ibn Anas] was wont to
say, “There is none more excellent than the children of the Prophet.”
This is that the confession of which is incumbent; and we will meet God
confessing it, if it is His Will.
And of that the confession of which is also necessary, is that the
Prophet was born in Mecca and died in al-Madina. It is incumbent on
fathers that they teach that to their children. Al-Ajhuri said, “It is
incumbent on the individual that he know the genealogy of the Prophet on
his father’s side and on his mother’s.” A statement of it will come in
our Conclusion, if God will. The learned have said, “Every individual
ought to know the number of the children of the Prophet and the order in
which they were born, for an individual ought to know his Lords, and
they are the Lords of the People.” But they do not explain, in what I
have seen, whether that is required (_mawjub_) or desired (_mandub_);
the analogy (_qiyas_) of things similar to it would say it was required.
His children were seven, three male and four female, according to the
right view. Their order of birth was: al-Qasim, he was the first of his
children, then Zaynab, then Ruqayya, then Fatima, then Umm Kulthum, then
Abd Allah, he had the to-names (_laqab_) at-Tayyib and at-Tahir, which
are to-names of Abd Allah, not names of two other different persons.
These were all children of our Lady Khadija. And the seventh was our Lord
Ibrahim, born of Mariya, the Copt. So it stands. Let us now return to the
conclusion of the Articles.
The Forty-second is the Veracity (_sidq_) of the Apostles in all their
sayings.
The Forty-third is their trustworthiness (_amana_), that is, their being
preserved (_isma_) from falling into things forbidden (_muharram_) or
disliked (_makruh_).
The Forty-fourth is their Conveying (_tabligh_) to the creatures that
which they were commanded to convey. The Forty-fifth is intelligence
(_fatana_). These four things are necessary in the Apostles in the
sense that the lack of them is unthinkable. And Faith depends on the
knowledge of these, according to the controversy between as-Sanusi and
his opponents.
The opposites of these four are impossible in the Apostles, that is,
Lying (_kidhb_), Unfaithfulness (_khiyana_) in a thing forbidden or
disliked, Concealment (_kitman_) of a thing they have been commanded to
convey, and Stupidity (_balada_). These four are impossible in them, in
the sense that the existence of them is unthinkable. And Faith depends
upon the knowledge of these, as has preceded.
These are Nine and Forty Articles and the Fiftieth is the possibility of
the occurrence of such fleshly accidents in them as do not lead to defect
in their lofty rank.
And the proof of the existence of Veracity in them is that if they were
to lie, then information from God would be a lie, for He has guaranteed
the claim of the Apostles by the manifestation of miracles at their
hands. For the miracle is revealed in place of an utterance from God, “My
servant is truthful in all that he brings from Me.” That is, whenever an
Apostle comes to his people and says, “I am an Apostle to you from God,”
and they say to him, “What is the proof of your apostolate?” then he
shall say, “The splitting of this mountain,” for example. And when they
say to him, “Bring what you say,” God will split that mountain at their
saying, as a guarantee of the claim of the Apostle to the apostolate. So,
God’s splitting the mountain is sent down in place of an utterance from
God, “My servant is truthful in all which he brings to you from Me.” And
if the Apostle were lying, this information would be lying. But lying is
impossible in the case of God, so lying on the part of the Apostles is
impossible. And whenever lying is denied in them, Veracity is established.
And as for the proof of the Trustworthiness, that is, their being
preserved internally and externally from forbidden and disliked things;
if they were unfaithful in committing such things, we would be commanded
to do the like. But it is impossible that we could be commanded to do
a forbidden or disliked thing, “for God does not command a vile thing”
(Qur. 7, 27). And it is evident that they did nothing except obedience,
whether required or desired, and “permitted” (_mubah_) things entered
among their actions only to show, whenever they did a “permitted” thing,
that it was allowable (_ja’iz_).
And as for the proof of Intelligence, if it were failing in them, how
would they be able to establish an argument against an adversary? But
the Qur’an indicates in more than one place, that they must establish
arguments against adversaries. And such establishing of arguments is only
possible with intelligence.
And the proof that fleshly accidents do befall them is that they do not
cease to ascend in their lofty rank; for the occurrence of such accidents
is in them for increase in their lofty rank, for example, and that others
may be consoled, and that the thoughtful may know that the world is not
a place of recompense for the lovers of God; since if it were, why should
aught of the defilements of the world befall the Apostles? The Blessing
of God be upon them and upon their Mighty Head, our Lord Muhammad, and
upon his family and Companions and descendants, all!
The Fifty Articles are completed with their Glorious Proofs.
Let us mention to you now somewhat of that which must be held of the
things whose proofs are authority (_sam‘i_): Know that it must be
believed that our Prophet has a Tank (_hawd_); and ignorance as to
whether it is on one side or the other of the Bridge (_as-sirat_) does
not hurt. On the Day of Resurrection (_yawm al-qiyama_) the creatures
will go down to drink of it. It is different from _al-Kawthar_, which is
a River in the Garden.
And it must also be believed that he will make intercession (_shafa‘a_)
on the Day of Resurrection in the midst of the Judgment, when we shall
stand and long to depart, even though it be into the Fire. Then he shall
intercede that they may depart from the Station (_mawqif_); and this
intercession belongs to him only.
And it must also be believed that falling into great sins (_kabiras_),
other than Unbelief (_kufr_), does not involve Unbelief, but repentance
(_tawba_) from the sin is necessary at once; and if the sin be a small
one (_saghira_) repentance is necessary to him who is liable to fall into
it. And repentance is not injured by returning to sin; but for the new
sin a new repentance is necessary.
And it is incumbent upon the individual that he set aside arrogance
(_kibr_) and jealousy (_hasad_) and slander (_ghiba_) on account of what
the Prophet has said, “The gates of the Heavens have curtains which
reject the works of the people of arrogance, jealousy and slander.” That
is, they prevent them from rising, and so they are not received. Jealousy
is a desiring that the well-being of another should pass away, equally
whether it is desired that it should come to the jealous one or not.
And arrogance is considering the truth to be falsehood and rejecting it,
and despising God’s creation. And it is incumbent also upon him that he
should not spread malicious slanders among the people, for a tradition
has come down, “A slanderer (_qattat_) shall not enter the Garden.” And
jealousy is forbidden, as is said above, when the well-being does not
lead its possessor to transgression, and if it does, then desire that the
well-being should pass away is allowable.
It is necessary also to hold that some of those who commit great sins
will be punished, though it is only one of them.
CONCLUSION. Faith (_iman_), in the usage of the language, is
acknowledgment that something is true (_tasdiq_), in general. In that way
it is used by God, when he reports the words of the sons of Ya‘qub (Qur.
12, 17). “But thou dost not believe us [art not a believer (_mu’min_)
in us].” Legally, it is belief in all that the Prophet has brought.
But there is a difference of opinion as to the meaning of belief, when
used in this way. Some say that it means knowledge (_ma‘rifa_) and that
everyone who knows what the Prophet has brought is a believer (_mu’min_).
But this interpretation is opposed by the fact that the unbeliever
(_kafir_) knows, but is not a believer. Nor does this interpretation
agree with the common saying, that the _muqallad_ is a believer, although
he does not know. And the right view as to the interpretation of belief
is that it is a mental utterance (_hadith an-nafs_) following conviction,
equally whether it is conviction on account of proof, which is called
knowledge, or on account of acceptance on authority (_taqlid_). This
excludes the unbeliever because he does not possess the mental utterance,
the idea of which is that you say, “I am well pleased with what the
Prophet has brought.” The mind of the unbeliever does not say this.
And it includes the _muqallad_; for he possesses the mental utterance
following conviction, though the conviction is not based on a proof.
And of that which must be believed is the genealogy of the Prophet, both
on his father’s side and on his mother’s. On his father’s side he is our
Lord, Muhammad, son of Abd Allah, son of Abd al-Muttalib, son of Hashim,
son of Abd Manaf, son of Qusay, son of Kilab, son of Murra, son of Ka‘b,
son of Lu’ay, or Luway, son of Ghalib, son of Fihr, son of Malik, son of
Nadr, son of Kinana, son of Khuzayma, son of Mudrika, son of Alyas, son
of Mudar, son of Nizar, son of Ma‘add, son of Adnan. And the Agreement
(_ijma_) unites upon this genealogy up to Adnan. But after him to Adam
there is no sure path in that which has been handed down. And as to his
genealogy on his mother’s side, she is Amina, daughter of Wahb, son of
Abd Manaf, son of Zuhra—this Abd Manaf is not the same as his ancestor on
the other line—son of Kilab, who is already one of his ancestors. So the
two lines of descent join in Kilab.
And it is necessary also to know that he was of mixed white and red
complexion, according to what some of them have said.
This is the last of that which God has made easy by His grace. His
Blessing be upon our Lord Muhammad and upon his family and his Companions
and his descendants, so so long as the mindful are mindful of him and the
heedless are heedless of the thought of him. And Praise belongeth unto
God, the Lord of the Worlds.
VII
ANALYSIS OF THE _Taqrib_ OF ABU SHUJA AL-ISPAHANI[7]
_Book I. Of Ceremonial Purity (Tahara)_
1. The water which may be used for ceremonial ablutions.
2. Legal materials for utensils; what can be purified and what cannot.
3. The use of the toothpick.
4. Description of the different stages of a ceremonial ablution (_wudu_).
5. On cleansing from excrement and its ritual generally.
6. The five things which require a fresh _wudu_.
7. The six things which require a complete ablution of the whole body
(_ghusl_) and its ritual.
8. The seventeen occasions on which a _ghusl_ is prescribed.
9. When it is allowable to wash the inner shoes (_khuffs_) instead of the
feet.
10. The conditions and ritual for the use of sand (_tayammum_) instead of
water.
11. On uncleannesses (_najasat_) and how and how far they can be removed.
12. On ailments of women; duration of pregnancy and their conditions.
_Book II. Of Prayer_
1. The times of prayer (_salat_).
2. Upon whom prayer is incumbent, and
3. On what occasions.
4. The antecedent requirements of prayer.
5. The eighteen essential parts of prayer.
6. The four things in which the prayer of a woman differs from that of a
man.
7. The eleven things which nullify prayer.
8. A reckoning of the occurrences of certain frequently repeated elements
in prayer.
9. On omissions in prayer.
10. The five occasions on which prayer is not allowable.
11. The duty and ritual of congregational prayer.
12. The prayer of a traveller.
13. The conditions under which congregational prayer is required and
those under which it is lawful.
14. The requirements in congregational prayer.
15. The prayers of the Two Festivals and their ritual.
16. The prayers on occasion of an eclipse.
17. Prayer for rain.
18. Prayer in presence of the enemy.
19. What is forbidden of clothing.
20. The ritual of the dead.
_Book III. Of Rates for the Poor, etc._
1. The condition of the rate (_zakat_) and of the rate-payer; what it is
levied on and consists of.
2. On camels.
3. On cattle.
4. On sheep.
5. How it affects partners.
6. On gold and silver.
7. On grain-stuff.
8. On merchandise.
9. The conditions and nature of the rate to be paid at the end of the
fast.
10. Uses to which the rate may be applied.
_Book IV. Of the Fast_
1. The conditions for the fast (_siyam_); its description; what breaks it.
2. What is meritorious in fasting; when and for whom it is forbidden; how
breaking the fast must be expiated.
3. The conditions and nature of religious retreat (_i‘tikaf_).
_Book V. Of the Pilgrimage_
1. The conditions of pilgrimaging (_hajj_); its essentials and other
elements.
2. The ten things forbidden on pilgrimage.
3. The five sacrifices of the pilgrimage.
_Book VI. Of Barter and Other Business Transactions_
1. Conditions and kinds of barter (_bay_); what may be bartered and what
not.
2. Description and conditions of the bargain with payment in advance
(_salam_).
3. Of pledging (_rahn_).
4. Of those who are not to be permitted to administer their own property
(_hajar as-safih_).
5. Of bankruptcy and composition and common rights in a highway (_sulh_).
6. The conditions for the transfer of debts and credits (_hawala_).
7. Of security for debts (_daman_).
8. Of personal security for debts (_kafala_).
9. Of partnership (_shirka_).
10. Of agency (_wakala_).
11. Of confession (_iqrar_).
12. Of loans (_i‘ara_).
13. Of illegal seizure and use of property; indemnity for it and its
damage (_ghasb_).
14. Of right of pre-emption (_shuf‘a_).
15. The conditions of advancing capital with participation in the profits
(_qirad_).
16. Of the letting of date-palms and vines (_musaqat_).
17. Of hiring a thing out (_ijara_).
18. Of reward for return of a thing lost (_ja‘ala_).
19. That land may not be let for a fixed amount of its produce
(_mukhabara_).
20. Of irrigation of waste lands (_ihya al-mawat_).
21. Of foundations in mortmain (_waqf_).
22. Of gifts (_hiba_).
23. Of found property (_luqta_).
24. Of foundlings (_laqit_).
25. Of deposits (_wadi‘a_).
_Book VII. Of Inheritance and Wills_
1. Of legal heirs (_warith_).
2. The conditions and proportions of inheritance (_farida_).
3. Of legacies (_wasiya_).
_Book VIII. Of Marriage and Related Subjects_
1. The conditions of marriage (_nikah_). What women a man may see and to
what extent.
2. The form of a legal marriage.
3. The conditions of asking (_khitba_) and giving in marriage; whom a man
may not marry; conditions for nullity of marriage.
4. The settlement (_mahr_) on a wife by her husband.
5. On the wedding feast (_walima_).
6. On the equality of the rights of the wives and the authority of the
husband.
7. On divorce for incompatibility (_khul_).
8. The forms of divorce (_talaq_).
9. On taking a wife back and the threefold divorce.
10. The oath not to cohabit (_ila_).
11. The temporary separation by the formula, _zihar_ Qur. 58.
12. The form of accusation of adultery and the defence (_li‘an_).
13. The period during which a previously married woman cannot remarry
(_idda_).
14. Of relations with female slaves.
15. The support and behavior of a woman, divorced or a widow; mourning.
16. Law of relationship through suckling (_irda_).
17. The support (_nafaqa_) due to a wife.
18. The support due to children and parents, slaves and domestic animals.
19. Of the custody of children (_hidana_).
_Book IX. Of Crimes of Violence to the Person (jinaya)_
1. On murder, homicide and chance medley.
2. The _lex talionis_ (_qisas_) for murder, and
3. For wounds and mutilations.
4. The blood-wit (_diya_).
5. Use of weak evidence in case of murder.
6. Personal penance for homicide.
_Book X. Of Restrictive Ordinances of God (hadd)_
1. Of fornication (_zina_) of one who has been or is married (_muhsan_),
and of one who has not been or is not married.
2. Of accusing of fornication.
3. Of drinking wine or any intoxicating drink.
4. Of theft.
5. Of highway robbery.
6. Of killing in defence.
7. Of rebelling against a just government.
8. Of apostasy.
9. Of abandoning the usage of prayer.
_Book XI. Of the Holy War (jihad)_
1. The general law of _jihad_.
2. The distribution of booty taken in the field (_ghanima_).
3. The law of the tax on unbelievers (_fay_).
4. The law of the poll-tax on unbelievers (_jizya_).
_Book XII. Of Hunting and the Slaughter of Animals_
1. How an animal may be killed in the chase or otherwise.
2. What flesh may be eaten.
3. The ritual of sacrifice (_udhiya_).
4. The ritual of sacrifice for a child (_aqiqa_).
_Book XIII. Of Racing and Shooting with the Bow_
_Book XIV. Of Oaths and Vows (yamin, nadhr)_
1. What oaths are allowable and binding; how expiated.
2. Lawful and unlawful vows.
_Book XV. Of Judgments and Evidence (qada, shahada)_
1. Of the judge (_qadi_) and court usage.
2. The division (_qasm_) of property held in common.
3. Of evidence and oaths.
4. The conditions of being a legal witness (_adil_).
5. The difference of claims (_haqq_), on the part of God, and on the part
of man, and their legal treatment.
_Book XVI. Of Manumission of Slaves_
1. General conditions of manumission (_itq_).
2. The clientship which follows (_wala_).
3. Of freeing at death (_tadbir_).
4. Of the slave buying his freedom (_kitaba_).
5. Of the slave (_umm walad_) that has borne a child to her master or to
another and of her children.
APPENDIX II
I. BOOKS AND ARTICLES, GENERAL AND FUNDAMENTAL, FOR THE STUDY
OF ISLAM.
II. ON MUSLIM HISTORY AND ON PRESENT CONDITION OF MUSLIM WORLD.
III. ON MUSLIM TRADITIONS AND LAW.
IV. ON MUSLIM THEOLOGY, PHILOSOPHY AND MYSTICISM.
I
BOOKS AND ARTICLES, GENERAL AND FUNDAMENTAL, FOR THE STUDY OF ISLAM
The non-Arabist will gain much insight into Muslim life and thought
by reading such translations as that of Ibn Khallikan by De Slane
(Paris-London; 1843-71), the Persian Tabari, by Zotenberg (Paris;
1867-74), Ibn Batuta by Defrémery and Sanguinetti (Paris; 1853-58),
Mas‘udi by C. Barbier de Meynard and Pavet de Courteille (Paris;
1861-77), Ibn Khaldun’s _Prolégomènes_ by De Slane (Paris; 1862-68),
ad-Dimishqi by Mehren (Copenhagen; 1874), al-Beruni’s _Chronology_ by
Sachau (London; 1879).
The translations and notes in De Sacy’s _Chrestomathie arabe_ (Paris;
1826) can also be used to advantage.
Very many valuable articles will be found scattered through the
_Zeitschrift_ of the German Oriental Society (hereafter ZDMG), the
_Journal asiatique_ (hereafter JA), the _Journal of the Royal Asiatic
Society_ (hereafter JRAS) and the Vienna _Zeitschrift für die Kunde des
Morgenlandes_ (hereafter WZ).
It is always worth while to consult the _Encyclopædia Britannica_.
The best translations of the Qur’an into English are those by E. H.
Palmer (2 vols., Oxford; 1880) and J. M. Rodwell (London; 1871). The
first more perfectly represents the spirit and tone, and the second more
exactly the letter. The commentary added by Sale to his version and his
introduction are still useful.
The _Thousand and One Nights_ should be read in its entirety in Arabic or
in a translation by every student of Islam. English translation by Lane
(incomplete but accurate and with very valuable commentary); Burton (last
edition almost complete; 12 vols., London: 1894). Payne’s translation
is complete, as is also Burton’s privately printed edition; but, while
exceedingly readable, Payne hardly represents the tone of the original.
There is an almost complete and very cheap German version by Henning
(published by Reclam, Leipzig); Mardrus’ French version is inaccurate and
free to such an extent as to make it useless. Galland’s version is a work
of genius; but it belongs to French and not to Arabic literature.
R. P. A. DOZY: _Essai sur l’histoire de l’islamisme._ Leyden,
1879. A readable introduction.
A. MÜLLER: _Der Islam im Morgen-und-Abendland._ 2 vols. Berlin,
1885, 1887. The best general history of Islam.
STANLEY LANE-POOLE: _The Mohammedan Dynasties; chronological
and genealogical tables with historical introductions._
Westminster, 1894. An indispensable book for any student of
Muslim history.
C. BROCKELMANN: _Geschichte der arabischen Litteratur._ 2 vols.
Weimar, 1898, 1899. Indispensable for names, dates, and books,
but not a history in any true sense.
T. B. HUGHES: _A Dictionary of Islam._ London, 1896. Very full
of information, but to be used with caution. Based on Persian
sources largely.
E. W. LANE: _An Account of the Manners and Customs of the
Modern Egyptians._ First edition, London, 1836; third, 1842.
Many others. Indispensable.
C. M. DOUGHTY: _Travels in Arabia Deserta._ 2 vols. Cambridge,
1888. By far the best book on nomad life in Arabia. Gives the
fullest and clearest idea of the nature and workings of the
Arab mind.
J. L. BURCKHARDT: _Notes on the Bedouins and Wahabys._ 2 vols.
London, 1831.
J. L. BURCKHARDT: _Travels in Arabia._ 2 vols. London, 1829.
R. F. BURTON: _Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to al-Madinah
and Meccah._ 2 vols. Last edition, London, 1898. On the Hajj
and Muslim life, thought and studies generally in the middle of
the nineteenth century. Readable and accurate to a degree.
C. SNOUCK HURGRONJE: _Mekka._ 2 vols. and portfolio of plates.
Haag, 1888, 1889. Is somewhat dull beside Burton, but very full
and accurate.