with them concerning their other fundamental principles. He exposes their inconsistencies and shows that their denials entail consequences analogous to those they charge against the affirmations of those who affirm the divine attributes. His debates with them thus reveal the falsity of many of their fundamental principles. Nevertheless, he conceded certain principles to them and agreed with them on these, such as the validity of the argument from accidents, despite its length, and his own demonstration of the Creator’s existence through this method, which is of the same kind. He based this on affirming the indivisible atom. His concessions to them therefore entailed consequences that he sought to reconcile with his affirmation of the vision of Allah, and of speech, attributes, and exaltedness for Allah Most High. The majority of rational thinkers across the various groups—Ahl al-Sunnah, the scholars of hadith, and others, as well as the Mu'tazilah, the philosophers, and others—said that this was a contradiction contrary to the clear dictates of reason.

Hence some said, “Traces of Mu'tazilism remained in him.” They said that he agreed with them on some of the fundamental principles upon which they based their doctrine, such as this principle.

[Abū Nasr al-Sijzī’s statement in al-Ibānah]

This is what Abū Nasr al-Sijzī mentioned in al-Ibānah (The Clarification). He said:

“Muhammad ibn 'Abd Allāh al-Maghribī al-Mālikī, a righteous jurist, related from Shaykh Abū Sa'īd al-Barqī, one of the leading Mālikī jurists in Barqah, from Ustādh Khalaf al-Mu'allim, who was a Mālikī jurist, that he said: ‘Al-Ash'arī adhered to Mu'tazilism for forty years. He then publicly declared his repentance, abandoning its subsidiary doctrines while retaining its fundamental principles.’”

Abū Nasr said:

“These are the words of someone thoroughly acquainted with al-Ash'arī’s doctrine and its intricacies.”