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- Title
ABBÂD B. SÜLEYMÂN'DA TENZİH VURGUSU: İLÂHÎ İSİMLER VE SIFATLAR.
- Authors
SARICA, A. İskender
- Abstract
Mu'tazilite thinkers put forward the first systematic ideas for the relationship of essence and attributes, one of the most fundamental and complicated issues of Islamic theology, and comprehensive explanations to the question of God's names, Although almost all the thinkers agreed on uṣūl al-khamsa, they differed in their approach to the principle of unity (tawḥīd), 'Abbād b, Sulaymān, who lived in the period when these approaches emerged, is a scholar who reveals his distinctive view of God's names and attributes in which heslightly differs from his contemporaries such as Abu al-Hudhayl al-'Allāf, Mu'ammar b, 'Abbād al-Sulami and Ibrāhīm b, Sayyār al-Naẓẓām from the Basran Mu'tazila, by his extreme opinions on the Mu'tazilite principle of tawḥīd. He is one of thefour principle thinkers who presented original opinions in the early Basran Mu'tazila, Also he is the only known student of Hishâm al-Fuwaṭī and constitutes the last major circle of this tradition of knowledge that ended after him. This article aims to reveal the relationship between essence and attributes, the names and attributes of God in a holistic and systematic way in the thought of 'Abbād b, Sulaymān, Unfortunately, his works have not survived to the present day and has not received the attention he deserves. Since his views were scattered in the classic books, our study was focused primarily on these classical sources. The modern literature was not ignored, either. The relevant records, analysis and criticism were re-contextualized, According to 'Abbād b, Sulaymān, the view that "Allah is a thing" is the same with the view that "Allah is other (ghayr)", he draws attention to a definite distinction between Allah and human beings. In his thought about the relationship between Allah and space, he rejects the idea that God could be related to space or anything spatial in order to refrain from an anthropomorphic conception of God, In the case of visibility (ru'ya) of Allah, he radically opposes the idea of "seeing Allah with the heart," which was adopted by the majority of the Mu'tazila, He tries to solve the issue in his own terms by avoiding the terms essence (dhāt) and nafs in the relationship between God's essence and His attributes, He reveals a unique classification of names and thus adopts the method of analogy. He does not accept essential attributes as the majority of the Mu'tazila did, On the other hand, he tacitly accepts that Allah's names have their own meanings in a way that they are not merely words (aqvāl), By a true comparison or perfect analogy (fīḥaqīqati'l-qıyās), while he rejects that God is ālim, qadīr etc,, he tries to ground that human beings is ālim, qadīr etc, He does not admit that God is eternally sam'i and baṣīr, Without interpreting sam'i as His knowledge or baṣīr as His power, he accepts that each name has a distinctive functionality. He rejects the assumption that God knows conditionally. Regarding the issue of whether living beings are in the knowledge of Allah before they exist, it makes a dual distinction: "a direction that can be subject to the eternal knowledge" and "the direction in which it actually came to existence". Because of his view of non-existent and creatures, Ibn al-Rāwandī and modern resources refer the view of the eternity of objects to him. However, when the relevant records are examined, it is seen that this claim is not valid. According to 'Abbād, Allah is capable of creating possible things that he knows, although He does not create impossible things that he knows, even though He is capable of creating them potentially (bi-al-quwwa). Allah has not created evil, neither literally nor figuratively; so much so that He created only man, not faith and unbelief. It is not possible to talk about any good that he did not create. He defends the createdness of the Qur'an (Khalq al-Qur'ān) by saying that the Qur'ān was created of accidents. About God's names, he states that God has the names indicating His relationship to the universe. He does not accept that in eternity He is a willing agent, creator etc. However, he also does not accept the otherwise. He emphasizes that creation is reserved only for Allah. On the other hand, according to him, Allah creates without secondary causes and thus does not create things for a specific purpose. Regarding the revealed attributes (or informative attributes, khabari), he recites these expressions only when reading of the Quran.He states that these expressions should not be used for Allah under any circumstances. He avoids naming Allah as wakīl, kafīl, laṭīf, kā'in, fard and mutakallim as he says that the name wahid should be used only for praising Him. In addition to his being a theologian, he established a close relationship between the theory of language and God's names because he was a Mutazilite linguist. 'Abbād b. Sulaymān remained in the sideline of the Basran school, of which he was a member, due to his "out-of-the-line" views even though he had a certain period of influence with the Mu'tazila thought. Although his general opposing attitude, especially to the Mu'tazila of Basra, sometimes resembles the views of Jahm b. Ṣafwān and Fatalism/Ash'arites, which are structurally opposite to each other, he lets him construct a unique theological framework. The fact that he lived in the period of formation, that is, when the systematic views of the Mu'tazila were not fully enlightened yet, caused the theory of tawḥīd to fall into some confusions. Some obscurity and contradictions are present in his views. Consequently, because of all these thoughts, 'Abbād b. Sulaymān adopts the idea that Allah is the absolute transcendent and absolute good.
- Subjects
ISLAMIC theology; MODERN literature; HUMAN beings; PHILOSOPHY of language; GOD; GOD in Islam; ATTRIBUTES of God
- Publication
KADER, 2020, Vol 18, Issue 2, p539
- ISSN
2602-2710
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.18317/kaderdergi.797450