The Attributes of God in Islamic Thought: Contemplating Allah

The debate over Allah’s attribute—the “nature” and the inner articulation of Allah—is one of the focal debates in the intellectual history of Islam. This edited collection aims to highlight and examine some aspects of this debate in their original context, based on the relevant primary literature. Showing that even an apparently self-evident concept such as Allah, which lies at the heart of every reading of Islam, is highly ambiguous and polysemous, the chapters also emphasise the plurality that has always existed in Islamic thought. Through highlighting the philosophical and theological reflections on the concept of Allah, the results of this study challenge the juristic reading of Islam, in which Allah’s function consists mainly in providing a detailed plan for human life and rewarding or punishing those who deviate from it. The book also demonstrates the relevance and actuality of the tradition and stresses its contemporaneity. This volume makes a significant part of the intellectual tradition of Islam accessible for students and scholars of Islamic theology, Islamic philosophy, and Islamic studies, as well as providing a secondary source for teaching on the debate in question.