Reviving Rāzian determinism: Muṣṭafā Ṣabrī and Islamic debates on human freedom in the 20th century
Publication Date
July 20, 2023
Creator
Abstract
This study of Muṣṭafā Ṣabrī’s Mawqif al-Bashar Taḥta Sulṭān al-Qadar (Humanity’s Stance Under the Sway of Divine Determination) seeks to highlight an example of intellectual verification (taḥqīq) by a 20th century theologian of the truth of their chosen position on human agency. It demonstrates how Ṣabrī adopts, and creatively readapts, Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī’s theory of determinism through preponderating motives in the will as an argument against his erstwhile libertarian Māturīdī beliefs and other competing positions on the human act.
The also thesis shows how Ṣabrī uses scriptural and logical modes of argumentation drawn from the Islamic tradition to offer novel proofs for Rāzian determinism, and how he deploys these against Ottoman and Egyptian Māturīdīs; Islamic compatibilists such as Juwaynī, Ibn al-Qayyim, and Muḥamad ʿAbduh; European compatibilists and behavioural positivists; and, finally, Ibn ʿArabī’s mystical theology of the Oneness of Being. The study argues that Ṣabrī adopts a strictly occasionalist version of Rāzī’s model of the human act from a desire to uphold both God’s omnipotence and His encompassing will or freedom. It also shows how Ṣabrī accounts for our subjective sense of agency within his deterministic framework, and how he defends individual moral responsibility in this schema. Finally, the study reveals the existence and significance of high intellectual activity in Ottoman and Arab lands up to the middle of the 20th century.
Item Type
ethesis
Thesis Type
PhD
Supervisors
Subjects (LC)
Associated Schools / Departments
eprints ID
73772
UoN Repository URI
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