his opponent. Thus, in this matter, a dispute flared up between the materialist philosophers and the Qadariyyah theologians, its sparks flying far and wide, although the Qadariyyah were closer to knowledge and justice.

Some people are bewildered, while others agree with one group at one time and the other group at another, contradicting themselves at different times or holding two contradictory positions simultaneously.

Had they followed the guidance and religion of truth sent by Allah and His Messenger, they would have attained the knowledge and justice that would resolve the dispute and lead them to follow the revealed texts and scholarly consensus. A fuller discussion of this question belongs elsewhere.

The point here is to explain his saying:

“Every child is born upon the natural disposition.”

Affirming divine decree, and that Allah has recorded who will be wretched and who will be blessed, does not preclude a person’s being born upon Islam and then changing thereafter, just as an animal is born with all its limbs intact and is then altered. Allah Most High knows things as they truly are: He knows that a person is born sound and then changes.

The reports transmitted from the early generations indicate only the position we have preferred: that people were born upon the natural disposition and then came to the blessedness or wretchedness previously known to Allah concerning them. They do not indicate that, at birth, a person lacked a sound natural disposition that inclines toward faith and would necessarily lead to it were it not for an opposing influence.