in opposition to at least some part of the status quo around the Islamic world;
and they sometimes looked for allies among unorthodox factions on the intel-
lectual front. Thus one could find unholy alliances between IsmaÀili or Imamite
conspirators and hard-pressed rationalist theologians and philosophers.
Four Factions
Fractionation of the intellectual field moved slowly at first, then picked up
speed in the generations after 800. Four main groups of intellectuals gradually
formed, three of them religious, one secular. First came the practitioners of
rational theology, kalam, of which the most important group was the MuÀtaz-
ilites; in opposition emerged the scriptural literalists. In addition there were
the Sufi mystics, and on the secular side, the translators and practitioners of
Greek and other foreign science and philosophy, falsafa.^5
Indigenous Theological Philosophers
The prevailing attitude of intellectual historians is that only the Greek falasifa
(philosophers) are worth paying attention to, since it was they who transmitted
the main line of European philosophy. These blinders prevent us from seeing
what is more significant: the dynamics by which Islamic theologians broke into
philosophical terrain of their own accord. Indigenous theological disputes, like
any other sustained intellectual conflict, spontaneously drive up the level of
abstraction and uncover issues of metaphysics and epistemology. We have a
laboratory for how philosophy emerges nearer to us than the obscure begin-
nings of the Chinese, Indians, and Greeks, as well as a picture of the inde-
pendent path by which were created positions paralleling those of later Euro-
pean developments at the time of Descartes, Locke, and Malebranche.
The first notable intellectuals appeared in the early 700s (see Figure 8.1).
At first there was an undifferentiated style of scriptural scholar, such as Hasan
al-Basri, who was famous for his pronouncements in law as well as theology,
and was claimed as a predecessor to the Sufis for his asceticism. In the next
two generations the field began to crystallize into factions. The early center of
theological discussion was at Basra, founded by the Arab conquerors in the
Mesopotamian river delta. When Baghdad was founded in the 760s as the
capital for the new ÀAbbasid caliphate, these two cities about 250 miles apart
became the twin centers of intellectual life, displaying the familiar pattern of
intersecting networks circulating at rival centers.
The earliest issues emerged out of religious politics. On one front there was
a dispute between predestination and free will, on the other flank the question
of the unity of God as against dualism or anthropomorphism. Predestination
Tensions of Ideas: Islam, Judaism, Christendom^ •^395