Through Force or Faith? — Page 229
Chapter 5 — Faith and Reason: Islamic Perspective 229 concept of Islam as opposed to the views of the Mu‘tazilites school of thought. Without getting into the details of these debates, we think it is sufficient to say here that both parties suffered from excesses in their thinking. Mu’tazilites were of the viewpoint that God is bound by certain rules in all His deeds, His actions, and His works. For instance, it is incumbent on God that He should call virtue a virtue and sin a sin; because only a matter which is pious in its essence is called to be a virtue by God, and God only declares a matter which is impious in essence a sin. (S. H. Nasr, Encyclopaedia of Islamic Philosophy, 2002, p. 108–109) Here, it should be understood that they did not mean that God is bound by any power beside Him, but it is the attributes of God which bind Him to such principles. Whereas Ibn H azm and many other elders showed a severe reaction to the idea that one should consider any kind of limitation for God. Therefore, they held the opinion that if God so wills, He can declare what we consider pious to be a sin and vice versa, because nothing is good or bad in its nature. It becomes good or bad by virtue of what God considers it to be. Therefore, he writes: Nothing is evil except the one which is called evil by God and nothing is good except what is called good by God. … Even if He desires to cast all the faithful, the angels and the prophets to fire of eternal hell, He is entitled to do so and it shall be considered fair and just for Him. And if He gives Satan and infidels the bounties of eternal heaven, He is entitled to do so and it shall be considered fair and just for Him. But, since God has denied all this and has said about Him that He does not do so, all these are false and