Abstract:

RAl-Ashari was undoubtedly one of the leading scholars who played an impor- tant role in the growth of Islamic culture and thought in the early 4th century hegira.   A lot of criticism has been directed against al-Ashari himself and the Ashari school by Islamic as well as Western scholars. It has been claimed that the Ash’ari teology school contributed greatly to the spread of a strong pre-determinist perception of fate (al-Cab- riyya) among Muslim societies. In this article, while examining al-Ashari’s opinions about will and his comments of Quranic verses, we usually look at the context from which his comments were made. While al-Ashari has agreed that human action has an existence, he could not take up a clear position about human’s role in his action. As a consequence of his overreaction against Mutazila, he made statements which amounted to restricting human’s freedom of action and stripped human of his power to choose his actions.

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