Ibn Taymiyya’s Worldview and the Challenge of Modernity 505
ya not agree upon the fact that the Koranic expressions for God’s
attributes may not be specified (bi-lā kayf)? He passed over the fact
that these different scholars used the same phrase to legitimize total-
ly different concepts. Unlike Thanāʾ Allāh suggested, Ibn Taymiyya
explicitly rejected the interpretation of istiwāʾ as istīlāʾ (also “to rule”,
but usually “to take over rule”) with reference to the very bayt the
Indian “muṣannif–publisher” quoted to justify his interpretation.
According to the latter the verb has to be understood ingressively in
the given context: Bishr takes power, which he did not possess before.
Of course such a statement is clearly unacceptable with regard to
God.^45 For al-Ghazālī bi-lā kayf implied the rejection of corporeal-
ism instead.^46 By quoting Abū Muslim al-Iṣfahānī (d. 934) as author-
ity for his interpretations Thanāʾ Allāh provoked the most hostile
reactions, because this scholar, whose ideas are only known from
citations by Shii authors in particular, was a Muʿtazilī (in)famous for
his strong tendency to allegorize. But Thanāʾ Allāh declared that the
general affiliation of a particular author with a heretical movement
does not as such undermine the value of his single statements. If they
accord to the Koran and the general conventions of the Arabic lan-
guage their interpretations ought to be accepted.^47
In general al-Ghazālī and al-Rāzī (d. 1210) were the authorities
whom Thanāʾ Allāh most often referred to. In spite of all their differ-
ences they had consciously engaged in the intellectual struggle with
philosophy. In this context they both stressed that a strong line should
be drawn between the exegesis of the Koran and issues raised by sci-
ence. For al-Ghazālī whoever insists that scriptural evidence overrules
findings gained by geometrical evidence does a disservice to religion for
he ridicules it in the eyes of the educated, whereas al-Rāzī insisted that
the main intention of the Koran is to teach religious duties (takālīf) not
astronomy. For Thanāʾ Allāh’s opponents these role models were one
more reason to denounce him. His staunchest enemy, ʿAbd al-Aḥad
Khānpūrī (1852–1928), who was, due to his fierce polemics and harsh
45 Ibn Taymiyya, Majmūʿ al-Fatāwā, vol. 5, pp. 144, 226, 232; al-ʿAqīda
al-ḥamawiyya, p. 53; al-Shawkānī justified his non-literal interpretation of
istiwāʾ with this verse; al-Shawkānī, Muḥammad b. ʿAlī: Fatḥ al-qadīr, vol. 2,
p. 219, vol. 3, p. 66.
46 Al-Ghazālī, Muḥammad b. ʿAlī, Abū Ḥāmid: Iljām al-ʿawāmm min ʿilm
al-kalām, Miṣr 1350/1931–32, pp. 2, 5, 30.
47 Amritsarī, Thanāʾ Allāh: al-Kalām al-mubīn bi-jawāb al-arbaʿīn, Amritsar 1904,
p. 15.
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