Al-Ashari Quotes on Knowledge
Al-Ashʿari (c.874–936) — the founder of the Ashʿari school of Sunni theology that became the dominant Sunni theological tradition through the medieval period — gave classical Islamic theology its most influential systematic alternative to both the rationalist Muʿtazila he had abandoned in mid-career and the literalist Hanbali tradition that rejected speculative theology altogether. The central commitments — the affirmation of the divine attributes the Quran predicates of God without specifying the modality of their attribution (bilā kayf), the doctrine of acquired action (kasb) by which divine omnipotence is reconciled with human responsibility, and the corresponding occasionalist analysis of natural causation as the direct creation of God at every moment — articulate a distinctive synthesis of fideist and kalām-rationalist commitments. The framework shaped the entire subsequent Sunni theological mainstream through al-Bāqillānī, al-Juwaynī, and al-Ghazali and remains the principal classical Sunni framework for the philosophical analysis of religious knowledge.
Quotes
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Attributed to Al-Ashari:
“The truths of religion are rooted in tradition but defended by reason.”
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Attributed to Al-Ashari:
“We affirm of God only what he has revealed of himself.”
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“The Richard Bey Show (31 March 1988), accusing Pagones in the alleged gang rape of Tawana Brawley; The Brawley case was later dropped and Pagones sued Sharpton successfully for defamation”
Mark Miller is my brother and I love him dearly. -
“We built pyramids before Donald Trump even knew what architecture was. We taught philosophy and astrology [sic] and mathematics before Socrates and them Greek homos ever got around to it…Do some cracker come and tell you, ‘Well my mother and father blood go back to the Mayflower,’ you better hold your pocket. That ain’t nothing to be proud of, that means their forefathers was crooks.”
Speech at Kean College (1994), transcribed in The Forward (December 1995), as quoted in Foolish Words : The Most Stupid Words Ever Spoken (2003) by Laura Ward, p. 192. -
“There is a systemic and methodical strategy to eliminate our people from doing business off 125th Street. I want to make it clear … that we will not stand by and allow them to move this brother so that some white interloper can expand his business.”
On the Freddy's Fashion Mart incident , as quoted in National Review (20 March 2000) . -
“What’s wrong with denouncing white interlopers?”
As quoted in National Review (20 March 2000). -
“Though there were over 200 policemen standing around, none of them made a move to grab him.”
Go and Tell Pharaoh (1996), on being stabbed by Michael Riccardi. -
“Go and Tell Pharaoh (1996), on being stabbed by Michael Riccardi.”
Though there were over 200 policemen standing around, none of them made a move to grab him.