good works, we will not let go astray the reward
of those who do beautiful things” (Q 18:29–30).
al-hasan al-basri (d. 728), remembered in part
for being an early free will advocate, tried unsuc-
cessfully to explain to the Umayyad caliph Abd
al-Malik (r. 685–705) the correctness of this
belief. In developing his argument, he maintained
that God commanded only the good and that evil
was caused by humans or sata n. He and others
like him in iraq, syria, Arabia, and yemen were
called the Qadariyya (the party favoring human
self-determination). This early trend in Islamic
religious thought developed into the Mutazili tra-
dition of Islamic theology and contributed signifi-
cantly to the formation of the rationalist school of
thought in Shii theology, as opposed to the Ashari
school of the Sunnis.
Since the 19th century, Orientalists, missionar-
ies, and travelers from Europe and North America
have attributed fatalistic beliefs to ordinary Mus-
lims, particularly in regard to their explanations
of illness and misfortune. Some have reported that
critical medical care was refused out of a belief that
the fate of the patient was in God’s hands. However,
Muslims have indeed sought out remedies and cures
for illnesses when they were available, and fatalistic
acceptance is only one option, used when hope is
lost. This is true even where conservative prede-
terminist Islamic doctrines prevail, such as among
Wahhabis in saUdi arabia. One should remember
that medicine was one of the foremost applied
sciences in medieval Islamicate civilization. In a
different regard, modern Islamic reformers in many
Muslim lands have been incorporating notions of
free will into their thinking, further loosening the
hold of the Ashari brand of predeterminism and
promoting progressive change among Muslims.
See also allah; JUdgment day; mUtazili
school.
Further reading: Fazlur Rahman, Major Themes of
the Quran (Minneapolis: Bibliotheca Islamica, 1989);
Helmer Ringgren, Studies in Arabian Fatalism (Uppsala:
Lundequistska Bokhandeln, 1955); W. Montgomery
Watt, The Formative Period of Islamic Thought (Edin-
burgh: University of Edinburgh Press, 1973).Fatiha (Arabic: The Opening, or the
Opening of the Book)
The Fatiha is the first of the qUran’s 114 chapters.
It is the one most widely memorized by Muslims
and is used in their worship and daily life. Unlike
most of the other chapters, which have mixed
contents such as apocalyptic visions, sermons,
dialogues, stories, commandments, and prayers,
the Fatiha is strictly a verbal prayer. It consists of
seven verses:- In the name of God, the merciful, the com-
passionate. - Praise be to God, the lord of the worlds (or
beings), - The merciful, the compassionate,
- Master of the Day of Judgment.
- It is you whom we worship, and it is you to
whom we turn for help. - Guide us on the straight path,
- The path of those on whom you have
bestowed your blessing, and not of those
who have incurred your anger and have
gone astray.
Muslim and non-Muslim scholars generally
agree that this chapter dates to the time when
mUhammad was still living in mecca (ca. 619),
although it was probably not widely used until
the Islamic religion became more organized after
the hiJra to medina in 622. Some have argued
that it is comparable to the Jewish Shema prayer
(Deut. 6:4–9) and the Lord’s Prayer (Mt. 6:9–13)
in Christianity and that it was probably originally
intended for use in worship. Indeed, since as early
as the seventh century, it has been a required part
of the five daily ritual prayers (salat), the weekly
communal prayers, and the two annual Id prayers
(id al-Fitr and id al-adha). Muslim jurists have
ruled that performance of a salat is invalid if
recitation of the Fatiha is omitted. The fact that
Fatiha 229 J