Analysis of Ash'arites' Accusations against Mu'tazila: A case of Yahyâ b. Hamza

Takfir, which means declaring that a Muslim or someone claiming to be Muslim has strayed beyond the boundaries of the religion, first emerged in the Islamic community following the intense political conflicts that arose after the death of the Prophet Muhammad. It was frequently used as a tool by opposing sides to marginalise their opponents and establish sociological and psychological superiority over them. The discourse of takfir first emerged after the Battle of Siffin between Ali and Muawiya, following the arbitration between the two sides. Accordingly, a group that emerged from among Ali's supporters, known as the Khawarij, resorted to declaring those who accepted arbitration as apostates, using religious references taken out of context. In the subsequent period, the Khawarij's radical and intolerant stance towards Islamic society prompted Muslim scholars to define the boundaries of the concepts of faith and disbelief and their subjects, the believers and the disbelievers, and to discuss the religious status of those who committed major sins in particular. Groups that viewed these issues with a more tolerant and conciliatory perspective than the Khawarij sought to develop definitions of faith that would minimise takfir rhetoric and promote a more inclusive understanding. One of the principles articulated in this context was that ‘those who belong to the Ahl al-Kiblah shall not be declared unbelievers.’ However, it is difficult to say that these groups adhere to this principle in practice. Indeed, some groups have had the audacity to monopolise the truth and declare those who do not think like them to be infidels, despite this principle. It has been observed that the claims of these individuals, who can declare other groups to be infidels simply because they do not conform to their own paradigms, are generally inconsistent. In this context, the aim of this article is to examine the accuracy and validity of the counter-arguments and analogies employed by certain Ash‘arite theologians when responding to the Mu‘tazilites—who had accused them of unbelief—through the practice of takfir, based on the assessments of the Zaydi theologian Yahya b. Hamza (d. 749/1348). The study concludes that the evidence cited by the Ash‘arites when accusing the Mu‘tazilites of unbelief was insufficient, and that in their analogies, they compared the Mu‘tazilites to groups with which they shared no common characteristics.