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Autor: Ali Boriqee Source: Multaqa Ahlul-Hadeet Compiled by: al-Mustaqeem Publicatons This page left intentionally blank رب ا ، و ا و و رك و آ و أ ا م ور ا و ت
I initiate this discussion to enrich the understanding of the Muslims and to solidify what some of them can somewhat already perceive, but only in a general fashion. It may be funny, but it has a great element of tragedy in that those who follow the Ash’ari school of thought, who claim to be the followers of rationalism, simply do not see the rationale and conclusive ramifications of what their school of thought leads to.
Whenever the theological topics concerning “limit” and or “place” for Allah comes up, the two heated sides are usually the salafis who are labeled as the anthropomorphists versus the Ash’aris (and we can add the Maturidis) and who are labelled the “Jahmis”.
However, what many from Ahlu-Sunnah among the salafis/ahlul-hadeeth have been slightly unaware of, is that the polemic is much graver than simply the kalaam arguments for “limit”, “jism”, and “place” respectively. Little will they realize that discussion on each one of these topics are actually connected to the topic of ilhaad (atheism) and that the formulated doctrines of the later day Ash’aris is nothing less than an institutionalized form of atheism. We will, in this endeavor, highlight Athari Imaams who have either explicitly stated this fact or who have implied this fact. I implore the reader that when I say “implied” i don;t mean that it is a stretch of the imagination, rather the texts are very apparent towards its implication and is not something far fetched.
So what we will do is to first explain the concept of place and limit for Allah followed by the Ash’ari erroneous concoctions on the subject along with its repudiation based upon orthodox Islam. Then after which we will bring forth Athari Imaams who pinpointed the ummah as to the atheism of the proponents of kalaam theology inshaa’Allah. The Test of Imaam Ahmad on Allah’s Existentiality towards the Jahmiyyah
Issue: When Allah Created the Creation, Did He Do So Within Himself or Outside of Himself i.e. does He dwell within the creation or is He separate from it.
This argument actually stems from Imaam Ahmad in his Radd alal-Jahmiyyah. However, before I present the testimony of Imaam Ahmad, I will reveal it in answer to an inquiry I received on the topic. The following was a reply to a brother who was trying to understand this very issue better. The reason why I quote the following is because it is integral to the topic at hand
It was asked
As-salamu alaikum.
May Allah reward you all for your patience and generosity.
You say that Allah has “Infinite grandness in His Attributes (not in His being)” – why do you say this about His Attributes but not His Being?
I would be interested to see evidence from the Quran, the Sunnah or the Righteous Salaf to justify your opinion.
So my reply is the following
I’ll divide this in two, the first is the rationale argument while the second is the scholastic proof inshallah
1. The claim that He is infinite in His Attributes and NOT in His Being.
This means that His attributes are endless, they do not have a limit, His Mercy is infinite, His Benevolence is Infinite, His Power is infinite, His Might is Infinite, His Sovereignty, His Bounty infinite etc etc, are infinite. In short, every one of Allah’s qualities knows no bounds.
This also means that His actual being (dhaat) is limited. WHY? If Allah is unlimited in His being, then this necessitates that His very Being consumes all that exists as this means that His actual being is unlimited consuming everything, including the creation and other than the creation and this is the very belief that was being promulgated among the jahmiyyah. The modern lexical term for this belief is “Omnipresence” 2. The proofs
Imaam Ahmad recorded in his Radd ‘alal-Jahmiyyah in the chapter on the exposition regarding the denial of the jahmiyyah that Allah is not on His Throne, he mentioned that when he told Jahm about where is Allah, their reply was
“He is under the seven earths as He is on the throne; He is in heaven, on earth and in every place; there is no place where he is not, nor is He in one place to the exclusion of any other. And they quoted the verse: And He is God in the Heavens and on the Earth. “
Imaam Ahmad says in His radd
“We said: The Muslims know of many places where there is no trace whatsoever of the might of the Lord. They (jahm) said: And where is that? We replied: Your bodies, your insides and pigs’ insides, in privies and unclean places, and in all of which there is no trace of the Lord’s might.
Allah told us that He is in Heaven, saying:
What are ye sure that He who is in Heaven will not cleave the Earth beneath you?..
Or are you sure that He who is in Heaven will not send against you a stone- charged whirl-wind? 67-16,17 And again:
…The good word riseth up to Him. 35-2
And again:
…O Jesus! Verily I will cause thee to die, and will take thee up to myself. 3-48 And again: …But Allah took him up to Himself. 4-156 And again: All beings in Heaven and in Earth are His, and they who are in His presence… 21-19 And again: They fear their Lord who is above them… 16-52 And again: …The Master of those ascents 70-3 And again: …He is the High, the Great. 2-256
This then tells us that He is in Heaven.
The following verses show us that all beneath Him are villainous: Verily the hypocrites shall be in the lowest abyss of the fire…4-144 And again: And they who believe not shall say, O our Lord! Show us those of the jinn and men who led us astray: both of them will we put under our feet that they be of the humbled. 41-29
We added: Do you not know that iblis has his place and the devils have theirs? Allah and Iblis can not be both in one place. The meaning of Allah’s word:
‘He is God in heaven and upon earth’ is that to him belong those in Heaven and those in earth; that He is on the throne and that His knowledge embracess all that lies beneath the throne; and that there is no place not embraced by His knowledge. “[1]
Logically speaking, to claim the belief that Allah is unlimited in His being, then this by default entails that He is infused with, or envelopes or consumes the creation with His being and to have an opinion different than the opinion that I have claimed above is kufr of apostasy because this is not merely likening Allah to His creation, rather this is the saying of some of the esoteric sects of the sufis who follow the school of Ibn ‘Arabi who stated that Allah is everywhere which provided the basis of the doctrine of wahdatul-wujood and itihaad which originated from al-Hallaaj.
However, if this is not enough, then allow me to quote an irrefutable excerpt that Imam Ahmad superbly made an acid test for those who have doubt about this matter of Allah being limited in His being. Check this out
The title of this chapter from his radd is
“Bab: If you wish to know that the Jahmi lies against Allah, in saying that Allah is in every place and is not in one place to the exclusion of any other”
So that is the title
So he begins by saying
“Say: Was there not Allah when there was nothing else? “ In this line, he is telling the people of the sunnah to ask these people infect by theosophical dialectic the above question. So Ahmad says
“He will assent“
Meaning he (the one being asked) will agree. So Ahmad continues
“Then say: When He made a thing, did He do so inside or outside of Him?
Then he addresses the Sunni by saying
“Three possibilities follow meaning, there can only be three different views, no more and no less, and two of them is apostasy and only one is correct. He says
“If he asserts that Allah created all things within Himself, including jinn, men and devils, he denies the faith.”
Thus one who holds this belief cannot be a Muslim. Next he says
“If he says that He created them outside of Himself and then entered into them, including all the wild, squalid and vile places –this too is infidelity”.
Again, a belief such as this invalidates the faith and the testimony of faith.
“And if he says He created them outside of Himself and then did not enter into them, he has abandoned his position for that of ahl-Sunna. i.e. if the one who agrees with us that Allah has created the creation outside of Himself and remains outside and thus separate and distinct from His creation, then such an individual has abandoned the view that Allah is unlimited in His Being and has agreed with us (ahlu-sunnah) that He is limited in His being because believing that He is unlimited in His being equals the belief that He coexist with His creation or that He is “omnipresent”. So if it is agreed by any individual that Allah created the creation outside of Himself and remained so has just conceded to our view that Allah is limited in His being
For those who wish to see further evidence for Imaam Ahmad’s position on the application of the term “hadd” or ‘limit” for Allah, then read below The Issue of Affirmation of al-Hadd (limit) for Allah
There is a saying of Abdullahi ibnul-Mubaarak, the Imaam, on affirmation of al- Hadd.
It is reported in the Tabaqaat al-Hanaabilah (1/267) the following
“I said to Ahmad bin Hanbal ‘It is narrated about Ibnul-Mubaarak that it was said to him , ‘How do we know our Lord?’, and he replied, ‘Above (fee) the seventh heaven, Upon His Throne, with a limit (bi-haddin),” so Ahmad said “This is how it is with us
Ibn Taymiyyah makes the following comment on this point “For (al-hadd) is that by which a thing is distinguished from others in terms of its description (sifa) and extent (qadr), as is well know regarding ‘al-hadd’ for those things which brings about separation (non-contact) between things. So it is said, ‘The hadd (end, limit) of so and so’ or ‘to such and such extent (hadd)’, and this is from the attributes that demarcate something from others“[2] On The Concept of “Place”: The Ash’ari Contention With Ahlu-Sunnah
Modern day proponents to the Ash’ari school place great emphasis on the sunni doctrine of Allah’s whereabouts because they have taken the Aristotelian concept of “place” and what it necessitates in Aristotelian philosophical theory. So then it was asked
You have affirmed “place” inside creation and “place” outside creation, and this affirmation entails that the “place” inside creation should be created and the “place” outside creation should be uncreated,
Therefore, you have asserted an uncreated “place” for Allah (quote: “These two covers up everything that exists”) – I wonder what the Righteous Salaf would have made of such an assertion.
Do you have any evidence from the Righteous Salaf that they ever asserted an uncreated “place” for Allah?
The Sunni/Athari response is as follows The salaf would not have mentioned nothing. WHY? Because when the prophet inquired to the slave women “aiynallah” i.e. where is Allah, the term aiyn already implies the meaning of place and since it is the prophet Muhammad who asked this question, then this makes Muhammad a mushabih (anthropomorphist) in the view of those who claim that place does not apply to Allah from their concocted formula “Allah does not have place” theory.
Secondly, regarding this point, the salaf did not view the idea of “place” in the manner that you have viewed it under the implication of your words. Place, as viewed under the kalaam premise, is an area that is confined to spatial direction and surrounded by the six directions. We say this applies to the creation. But if Allah is above the Throne as He said He was, and then at the same time someone accused this claim made by Allah as ascribing place to Him in a manner that is meant by the philosophers as expounded by the ash’aris, then we reject the notion that Allah is surrounded by the six directions and confined to a place just as our Athari Imaam Abu J’afar at-Tahaawee commented in his Aqeedah[3]. That is because when place is attributed to other than Allah, then it requires the properties mentioned by the philosophers, which is confinement and in spatial direction. But when we are speaking of Allah, then the properties, attributes, and laws applicable to creation is inapplicable to Allah. So when we say Allah is in the direction of highness and in the place which is above the throne, then all the properties that have been applied upon the definitions of space or place are inapplicable if the one who “place” is being attributed to is Allah.
Failing to make this distinction between Allah and His creation is the true nature of tashbeeh. In other words, if we say that above has the meaning of being in a direction and therefore limited, and therefore claiming that if we affirm Allah’s highness then we are affirming a direction for Allah, then you are really likening Allah into how you view the creation, and this is exactly the tashbeeh that the early orthodox community warned from of which the Ash’aris are guilty of.
And this is exactly where the acclaimed “rationalist” mindset of the ash’aris has been abandoned them because these formulas they have made for Allah are illogical and does not make sense and is incoherent and ultimately it does not match the beliefs of the salaf. The Proponents of Kalaam and Their Silent Agreement With Atheists
What are the Belief of Atheists
The following is a general extraction of certain slants of atheism
Theoretical atheism Further information: Existence of God, Evolutionary origin of religions, and Evolutionary psychology of religion Theoretical, or contemplative, atheism explicitly posits arguments against the existence of gods, responding to common theistic arguments such as the argument from design or Pascal’s Wager. The theoretical reasons for rejecting gods assume various psychological, sociological, metaphysical, and epistemological forms.
Epistemological arguments Further information: Agnostic atheism, Theological noncognitivism Epistemological atheism argues that people cannot know God or determine the existence of God. The foundation of epistemological atheism is agnosticism, which takes a variety of forms. In the philosophy of immanence, divinity is inseparable from the world itself, including a person’s mind, and each person’s consciousness is locked in the subject. According to this form of agnosticism, this limitation in perspective prevents any objective inference from belief in a god to assertions of its existence. The rationalistic agnosticism of Kant and the Enlightenment only accepts knowledge deduced with human rationality; this form of atheism holds that gods are not discernible as a matter of principle, and therefore cannot be known to exist. Skepticism, based on the ideas of Hume, asserts that certainty about anything is impossible, so one can never know the existence of God. The allocation of agnosticism to atheism is disputed; it can also be regarded as an independent, basic world-view.
Other forms of atheistic argumentation that may qualify as epistemological, including logical positivism and ignosticism, assert the meaninglessness or unintelligibility of basic terms such as “God” and statements such as “God is all- powerful”. Theological noncognitivism holds that the statement “God exists” does not express a proposition, but is nonsensical or cognitively meaningless. It has been argued both ways as to whether such individuals classify into some form of atheism or agnosticism. Philosophers A. J. Ayer and Theodore M. Drange reject both categories, stating that both camps accept “God exists” as a proposition; they instead place noncognitivism in its own category
Metaphysical arguments Further information: Monism, Physicalism Metaphysical atheism is based on metaphysical monism—the view that reality is homogeneous and indivisible. Absolute metaphysical atheists subscribe to some form of physicalism, hence they explicitly deny the existence of non-physical beings. Relative metaphysical atheists maintain an implicit denial of a particular concept of God based on the incongruity between their individual philosophies and attributes commonly applied to God, such as transcendence, a personal aspect, or unity. Examples of relative metaphysical atheism include pantheism, panentheism, and deism.
The source of this was extracted from Wikipedia as I merely wished to gloss over the general concept on the forms of atheism rather than trying to pinpoint the total accuracy of what they mean as many academics do not prefer Wikipedia as a source for reference. At any rate, our main concern is the metaphysical argument here, which as the bottom line proves that what gives the argument of atheist a leg to stand upon is the fact that there was never some physical form of contact between the created and the Creator, at least as they see it.
With that being said, this entire subject should stem from, and MUST ONLY stem from the issue of the relationship between the Creator and the Created. It should NOT be construed that the Creator and that which is ascribed to the Creator, in any way, shape, or form, is dependent upon the creation. The Ash’ari View of Where is Allah (Himself) and the Notion of Atheism
I will quote Ibnul-Jawzee as it seems to be the best argument for the ash’aris (such an irony, that it took a hanbali to present their heresy in a manageable fashion)
Haafidh Ibnul-Jawzee states the following absurd logic in reply to Ibn Zaghuni, a Hanbali jurisprudent, who he is trying to refute
Furthermore, from another point of view, it can be pointed out that He is neither in this world nor outside it because entering and exiting are inseparable attributes of things which occupy space. Entering and exiting are just like movement and stillness and all other accidents which apply to bodies only.
Notice that Ibn al-Zaghūnī claims above [Ibn al-Jawzī had quoted from one of his books] that He did not create things in His Essence (dhāt); therefore, he presumes it is established that they are separate from Him. (In refutation of this claim) we declare that the Essence of the Transcendent God (dhātuhū al- muqaddasah) is beyond having things created in it, or that things should occur in it. Now, material separation in relation to Him requires of Him what it requires of substances [namely, that He be defined by finite limits]. Indeed, the definition of location is that what occupies it prevents a similar thing from being found there; [whereas, nothing is similar to God in any way].
It is apparent that what [these anthropomorphists] presume is based on sensory analogy. Their inability to conceive of a reality beyond material experience led them into bewilderment, and to liken the attributes of the Transcendent God to the attributes of originated things [that is, to commit tashbīh]. A Breakdown of Ibnul-Jawzi’s Erroneous Deduction
How is this?
Firstly: Islam did not come with anything that is irrational (contradicts intellect \reason\’aql) Rather, Islam came with