Abdal Hakim Murad - The Cambridge Companion to Islamic Theology

322 Marcia Hermansen
qur’anic verses such as ‘‘Indeed the religion of God is Islam’’ (3:19) and
‘‘Whosoever desires a religion other than Islam it will not be accepted of
him’’ (3:35). Yet if God’s compassion ensured that sinning Muslims
could be saved – at least on non-Mu‘tazilite views – through God’s forgiveness
and the intercession of the Prophet, then there seemed to be a
need to extend this compassion to non-Muslim monotheists, particularly
where these had never had the opportunity to accept Islam, but had
still led lives of virtue. The Qur’an itself can praise the virtues of
Christian clergy: ‘‘You will find the nearest of them [Muslims] in
affection to be those who say: ‘We are Christians.’ That is because there
are among them priests and monks, and because they are not proud’’
(5:82). As a result, Ghazalı, the theologian who was perhaps most preoccupied
with issues of divine providence, was able to allow salvation to
the non-Muslims of his day, provided always that Islam had not been
accurately presented to them, and that they had not wilfully refused it. 32
In conclusion, the tenor of Islamic eschatology stresses the inexorable
triumph of good over evil. God has created the universe and human
nature as signs of His goodness; and the final Hour will reflect both His
wrath at their subversion, and His final vindication of beauty and mercy.
Needless to remark, in any religious tradition teachings and symbols
related to final things are particularly susceptible to the workings of the
human imagination. This imagination may be developed toward the
most sublime and positive spirituality or may be employed to project
more mundane and limited fantasies and anxieties. The Islamic spectrum
has manifested all these possibilities abundantly. Yet the topic of
eschatology, lying within the field of sam‘iyyat, illustrated how areas of
theology that were deemed inaccessible to reason were not readily productive
of unity based on acquiescence in scriptural reading alone; on
the contrary, these were among the most hotly contested doctrines of
all. Ash‘arism here showed itself characteristically concerned with
maintaining the omnipotence of God, but also insisted on doctrines
which emphasised his sovereign mercy and forgiveness, notably the
doctrines of prophetic intercession, the vision of God, and the desire of
God to forgive sins outright, bi-ghayri h _
isab: without reckoning.
Further reading
Arjomand, Said, The Shadow of God and the Hidden Imam: Religion, Political
Order and Societal Change in Shi‘ite Iran from the Beginning to 1890
(Chicago, 1984).
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