Islamic Thought

Open Theism, as a new perspective in theology, has attracted attention of many scholars and mainly claims that some teachings of classical theism are not in accordance with Scripture and depict God in the way of Greek metaphysic and Hermeneutical pattern. Therefore, Open Theists proposed a new model of theology based on the notion of Openness in reaction to deterministic model of classical theism. Their point of view had some implications like mutability, temporality and direct involvement of God. But these lead to some problems in their view like inconsistency and ambiguity in addition to denying absolute perfection from Him. In this paper, we will clarify these defects and give solutions based on Islamic thought and Lastly introduce Doctrine of Badāʾ by which we will answer many of unsolved problems that led some theologians toward Open Theism. It will be shown that by Badāʾ there will be no room for inconsistency in Devine properties. 

Abu Hamid Al-Ghazali is one of the most important thinkers of the Seljuk period in Iran. Ghazali’s Thought, based on his works, is very wide-ranging in various fields of religious sciences. At the beginning of his scientific life, he wrote a book entitled “Maqasid al Falasifa” (The Aims of Philosophers), but in the final period of his research, he wrote the “Tahafut al-Falasifah” (The Incoherence of the Philosophers) and joined the opponents of philosophy, in which he expressed the contradictions of philosophers. Consequently, many thinkers believe that he is not only against philosophy but also against reason, and as a result reach the conflict between reason and religion or the sharia of religion.This article examines the question of whether there is a conflict between reason and sharia in Ghazali's thought? Does al-Ghazali mean the philosophical views of philosophers only those that are incompatible with the Shari'a? And what should be done if there seems to be a contradiction? This article tries to address these questions by referring to Ghazali's intellectual works.