The following text presents a summary translation of a lecture delivered by Dr. ʿAzza Ramaḍān, Professor of Doctrine and Philosophy at Al-Azhar University at the “Journey of Learning” conference in Cairo held on Monday, June 3rd, 2024. The conference was a joint project of the Centre for Christian-Muslim Understanding and Partnership (Anglican/Episcopal Church of Egypt) and the Center for Arab-West Understanding. It was attended by more than twenty Muslim and Christian leaders, CAWU interns, and others.

The English translation and additional notes have been prepared by Sophie Cooper, a CAWU intern and undergraduate student at Harvard University studying the Middle East, Arabic literature, and translation.

Publication Date:  August 5, 2024

1.            Three Domains of Religion

From The Corpus of Ibn ʿĀshir, entitled, Guide to the Requisites of Religious Science:

"Then with help from the Lord, in his majesty awed, to teach the unlettered with verses conveyed

On the Ashʿarī doctrine, the Mālikī law, and the spiritual path of the mystic Junayd."

In this verse, the Moroccan jurist Ibn ʿĀshir (d.1631/1042) divides theology into three categories: theological doctrine (al-ʿaqīdah), jurisprudence (al-fiqh), and mysticism or Sufism (al-taṣawwuf). Each one systematizes a separate dimension of religion. Doctrine corresponds to belief (al-imān); law to submission (al-islām); and Sufism to morality or spiritual purification (al-iḥsān).

 The study of doctrine concerns the creed (ʿitiqād) of Sunni Muslims (ahl al-sunnah wal-jamāʻah). In the verse above, Ibn ʿĀshir describes the school of Ashʿarism. Others adhere to an alternate school, Māturīdism (al-māturīdīyah). As for jurisprudence, there are four Sunni schools (madhāhib) of religious law (sharīʿah). Ibn ʿĀshir describes the Mālikī school; the others are the Ḥanafī, Shāfiʿī, and Ḥanbalī schools. Finally, under the domain of morality (al-akhlāq), Ibn ʿĀshir refers to the Sufi theology of Imām al-Junayd and those who follow his example.

We can subdivide these categories further. Doctrine, for instance, entails three distinct areas of study. First, there is theology (al-ilāhiyāt) concerned with the nature of God. Second, there is the study of prophecy (al-nubuwwah). Third, the transcendental or traditional (al-samʿīyat, lit. "things heard"). This realm includes knowledge of things like heaven and hell, passed down through revelation (​​al-waḥīy), inaccessible to reason (al-ʿaql) alone.