Ahl al-Sunnah across all their various groups. It is also the position of many adherents of al-Ash'arī, such as Abū Ishāq al-Isfarāyīnī and Abū al-Ma'ālī al-Juwaynī, known as Imām al-Haramayn, among others (1).

Since this is the position of leading Mu'tazilite and Shi'ite scholars, and is also the position (2) of the majority of Ahl al-Sunnah and their imams, the remaining disagreement is between the Qadariyya, who maintain that the motive arises in the servant’s heart without being brought about by Allah’s will or power, and the compulsionist Jahmiyya, who maintain that the servant’s capacity has no effect whatsoever upon his act and that the servant is not the agent of his own act—as was held by Jahm ibn Safwān, the leader of the compulsionists, and those who followed him (3)—even if one of them (4) affirms an unintelligible “acquisition,” as al-Ash'arī and those who agreed with him did.

Given that (5) the dispute over this fundamental principle is between the Qadariyya, who deny that Allah assists believers in obedience, instills within them a motive toward it, and singles them out (6) for this favor over the unbelievers, and the extreme compulsionists, who say that servants do not perform (7) any acts and possess no capacity to do anything—or that they possess a capacity by which they do nothing and which has no effect whatsoever—both positions are false. This is so even though many Shi'ites uphold the position of the compulsionists.

By contrast, the early generations and leading scholars who affirmed the imamate of the three caliphs hold neither this position