This Religion Is a Science 141over whether the Quran was created by God or not holds no interest
for him. He is a military commander, not a scholar. There are revolts
to crush and battles to win throughout the Empire. And yet, here he
must sit, flanked by his scarlet-robed viziers (themselves theologians,
not soldiers), in command not of an army, but of an inquisition that
was forced upon him by his older brother, the seventh Abassid Caliph,
al-Ma’mun.
“Stand together, all of you, and speak well of me if you can,” al-
Mu’tasim recalls his older brother muttering on his deathbed. “If you
know of evil I have done, refrain from mentioning it, for I will be
taken from among you [and judged] by what you say.”
There is so much to say, al-Mu’tasim thinks, as yet another religious
scholar is taken away to be tortured by his guards. Nevertheless—
always dutiful, always loyal to his family—al-Mu’tasim remains silent,
if only for the sake of his brother’s immortal soul, and allows the next
scholar to be dragged into his presence.
This one is a dark-skinned old man wearing a coarse white turban
and filthy loincloth. His long beard is dyed with henna, which has bled
onto his cheeks and chest. His face is bruised, his eyes blackened. He
has been tortured already, and more than once. Like the rest, he is in
chains. Yet he stands tall and faces the Caliph without fear. He has
been here many times before to defend his position on the Quran
against the former Caliph, al-Ma’mun. But this is the first time he has
stood before al-Ma’mun’s successor.
The weathered old man is forced to sit while his name is read to
the court. When he is revealed to be none other than Ahmad ibn
Hanbal—the immensely popular scholastic theologian and founder of
the Traditionalist Hanbali school of law—al-Mu’tasim stiffens. Rising
from his throne, he points an angry finger at his chief inquisitor, Ibn
Abi Du’ad (another man forced upon him by his brother), and shouts,
“Did you not allege that ibn Hanbal is a young man? Is this not a
middle-aged Shaykh?”
The Inquisitor tries to calm al-Mu’tasim, explaining that the
accused has already been questioned by al-Ma’mun on a number of
occasions and, in light of his eminence, has been given many chances
to reconsider his position with regard to the nature of the Quran.