Theology and sectarianism
Despite the notion of a unified and consolidated community, as taught by the Prophet Muhammad, serious differences arose within the Muslim community immediately after his death. consistent with the Sunnis—the traditionalist faction whose followers now constitute the bulk branch of Islam—the Prophet had designated no successor. Thus, the Muslims at Medina decided to elect a chief. Two of Muhammad’s fathers-in-law, who were highly respected early converts also as trusted lieutenants, prevailed upon the Medinans to elect a pacesetter who would be accepted by the Quraysh, Muhammad’s tribe, and therefore the choice received Abū Bakr, father of the Prophet’s favoured wife, ʿĀʾishah. All of this occurred before the Prophet’s burial (under the ground of ʿĀʾishah’s hut, alongside the courtyard of the mosque).
According to the Shiʿah, however, the Prophet had designated as his successor his son-in-law ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, husband of his daughter Fāṭimah and father of his only surviving grandsons, Ḥasan and Ḥusayn. His preference was public knowledge . Yet, while ʿAlī and therefore the Prophet’s closest kinsmen were preparing the body for burial, Abū Bakr, ʿUmar, and Abū ʿUbaydah, from Muhammad’s companions within the Quraysh tribe, met with the leaders of the Medinans and agreed to elect the aging Abū Bakr because the successor (khalīfah, hence “caliph”) of the Prophet. ʿAlī and his kinsmen were dismayed but agreed for the sake of unity to simply accept the accomplished fact because ʿAlī was still young.
After the murder of ʿUthmān, the third caliph, ʿAlī was invited by the Muslims at Medina to simply accept the caliphate. Thus, ʿAli became the fourth caliph (656–661), but the disagreement over his right of succession caused a serious schism in Islam, between the Shiʿah—those loyal to ʿAlī—and the Sunni “traditionalists.” Athough their differences were within the first instance political, arising out of the question of leadership, theological differences developed over time.
The Khārijites
During the reign of the third caliph, ʿUthmān, certain rebellious groups accused the caliph of nepotism and misrule, and therefore the resulting discontent led to his assassination. The rebels then recognized the Prophet’s cousin and son-in-law, ʿAlī, as ruler but later deserted him and fought against him, accusing him of getting committed a grave sin in submitting his claim to the caliphate to arbitration. The name Khārijite (khārijī) springs from the word khārajū, meaning “to withdraw,” because the Khārijites withdrew (by active dissent or rebellion) from a state of affairs they considered to be gravely impious.
The basic doctrine of the Khārijites was that an individual or a gaggle who committed a grave error or sin and didn't sincerely repent ceased to be Muslim. Mere profession of the faith—“there is not any god but God; Muhammad is that the prophet of God”—did not make an individual a Muslim unless this faith was amid righteous deeds. In other words, good works were an integral a part of faith and not extraneous thereto . The second principle that flowed from their aggressive idealism was militancy, or jihad, which the Khārijites considered to be among the cardinal principles, or pillars, of Islam. Contrary to the orthodox view, they interpreted the Qurʾānic command about “enjoining good and forbidding evil” to mean the vindication of truth through the sword. The placing of those two principles together made the Khārijites highly inflammable fanatics, impatient of almost any established political authority. They incessantly resorted to rebellion and, as a result, were virtually exhausted during the primary two centuries of Islam.
Because the Khārijites believed that the idea of rule was righteous character and piety alone, any Muslim, regardless of race, colour, and sex, could, in their view, become ruler—provided he or she satisfied the conditions of piety. This was in contrast to the claims of the Shiʿah (the party of Muhammad’s son-in-law, ʿAlī) that the ruler must belong to the family of the Prophet and in contrast to the doctrine of the Sunnis (followers of the Prophet’s way) that the top of state must belong to the Prophet’s tribe, the Quraysh.
A moderate group of the Khārijites, the Ibāḍīs, avoided extinction, and its members are to be found today in North Africa and in Oman and in parts of East Africa , including the island of Zanzibar. The Ibāḍīs don't believe aggressive methods and, throughout medieval Islam, remained dormant. due to the interest of 20th-century Western scholars within the sect, the Ibāḍīs became active and commenced to publish their classical writings and their own journals.
Although Khārijism is now essentially a story of the past, the reaction against it left a permanent influence on Islam. It forced the religious leadership of the community to formulate a bulwark against religious intolerance and fanaticism. Positively, it's influenced reform movements, which sprang up in Islam from time to time and treated spiritual and moral placidity and standing quo with a quasi-Khārijite zeal and militancy.
The Muʿtazilah
The question of whether good works are an integral a part of faith or independent of it, as raised by the Khārijites, led to a different important theological question: Are human acts the results of a free human choice, or are they predetermined by God? This question brought with it an entire series of questions on the character of God and of attribute . Although the initial impetus to theological thought, within the case of the Khārijites, had come from within Islam, full-scale religious speculation resulted from the contact and confrontation of Muslims with other cultures and systems of thought.
As a consequence of translations of Greek philosophical and scientific works into Arabic during the 8th and 9th centuries and therefore the controversies of Muslims with dualists (e.g., gnostics and Manichaeans), Buddhists, and Christians, a more powerful movement of rational theology emerged. Its representatives are called the Muʿtazilah (literally “those who stand apart,” a regard to the very fact that they dissociated themselves from extreme views of religion and infidelity). On the question of the connection of religion to works, the Muʿtazilah—who called themselves “champions of God’s unity and justice”—taught, just like the Khārijites, that works were an important a part of faith but that an individual guilty of a grave sin, unless he repented, was neither a Muslim nor yet a non-Muslim but occupied a “middle ground.” They further defended the position, as a central a part of their doctrine, that citizenry were liberal to choose and act and were, therefore, liable for their actions. Divine predestination of human acts, they held, was incompatible with God’s justice and human responsibility. The Muʿtazilah, therefore, recognized two powers, or actors, within the universe—God within the realm of nature and humanity within the domain of ethical act .
The Muʿtazilah explained away the apparently predeterministic verses of the Qurʾān as being metaphors and exhortations. They claimed that human reason, independent of revelation, was capable of discovering what's good and what's evil, although revelation corroborated the findings of reason. citizenry would, therefore, be under duty to try to to the proper albeit there have been no prophets and no divine revelation. Revelation has got to be interpreted, therefore, in conformity with the dictates of rational ethics. Yet revelation is neither redundant nor passive. Its function is twofold. First, its aim is to assist humanity in choosing the proper , because within the conflict between good and evil citizenry often falter and make the incorrect choice against their rational judgment. God, therefore, must send prophets, for he must do the simplest for humanity; otherwise, the stress of divine grace and mercy can't be fulfilled. Secondly, revelation is additionally necessary to speak the positive obligations of religion—e.g., prayers and fasting—which can't be known without revelation.
God is viewed by the Muʿtazilah as pure Essence, without eternal attributes, because they hold that the idea of eternal attributes in conjunction with Essence will end in a belief in multiple coeternals and violate God’s pure, unadulterated unity. God knows, wills, and acts by virtue of his Essence and not through attributes of data , will, and power. Nor does he have endless attribute of speech, of which the Qurʾān and other earlier revelations were effects; the Qurʾān was, therefore, created in time and wasn't eternal.
The promises of reward that God has made within the Qurʾān to righteous people and therefore the threats of punishment he has issued to evildoers must be administered by him on the Day of Judgment, for promises and threats are viewed as reports about the future; if not fulfilled exactly, those reports will become lies, which are inconceivable of God. Also, if God were to withhold punishment for evil and forgive it, this is able to be as unjust as withholding reward for righteousness. There are often neither undeserved punishment nor undeserved reward; otherwise, good may also become evil and evil into good. From this position it follows that there are often no intercession on behalf of sinners.
When, within the early 9th century, the ʿAbbāsid caliph al-Maʾmūn raised Muʿtazilism to the status of the state creed, the Muʿtazilah rationalists showed themselves to be illiberal and persecuted their opponents. Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal (died 855), an eminent orthodox figure and founding father of one among the four orthodox schools of shariah , was subjected to flogging and imprisonment for his refusal to subscribe the doctrine that the Qurʾān, the word of God, was created in time.
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Sunnism
In the 10th century a reaction began against the Muʿtazilah that culminated within the formulation and subsequent general acceptance of another set of theological propositions, which became Sunni, or “orthodox,” theology. the problems raised by these early schisms and therefore the positions adopted by them enabled the Sunni orthodoxy to define its own doctrinal positions successively . Much of the content of Sunni theology was, therefore, supplied by its reactions to those schisms. The term sunnah, which suggests a “well-trodden path” and within the religious terminology of Islam normally signifies “the example set by the Prophet,” within the present context simply means the normal and well-defined way. during this context, the term sunnah usually is amid the appendage “the consolidated majority” (al-jamāʿah). The term clearly indicates that the normal way is that the way of the consolidated majority of the community as against peripheral or “wayward” positions of sectarians, who by definition must be erroneous.
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