I

Studies of Islamic views on the subject of atoms and accidents commonly focus on the works of Muʿtazilite and Ashʿarite theology. One weakness with this approach is that it has created a division between schools of theology within early Islam, which has left their contributions still mostly incomprehensible to the modern scholarship, Ibāḍī texts in particular have received little attention in the study of Islamic theology, whether in the Western or Islamic context. The main aim of this article is to rectify this gap by presenting the development of Ibāḍī arguments on atoms and accidents during the 3^rd/9^th century drawing on recent discoveries of the monographic works by Bashīr b. Muḥammad b. Maḥbūb (d. 285/890).

Taking these works as its basis, this article will demonstrate the use of rational argument in early Ibāḍī texts, highlight the early evolution of Ibāḍī discourse regarding atoms and accidents in the middle of the 3^rd/9^th century and provide a comparison between the development of the Ibāḍī argument and other schools of Islamic theology.

Bashīr's volume consists of three overlapping and complementary texts which were recently discovered: respectively, Kitāb al-Raṣf wa-ḥudūth al-ʿālam and Kitāb al-Muḥāraba and Sīra fī al-ḥadth al-wāqiʿ bi-‘Umān. Footnote ¹ All these texts provide material that sheds new light on the Ibāḍī view of atoms and accidents, but the focus of this article will fall on two of these texts, Raṣf and al-Muḥāraba. These two texts have remained out of circulation, even among the Ibāḍīs, and even until recently were considered lost works.Footnote ² Nevertheless, they have been familiar to us from quotations, though the degree of their prominence has varied from text to text. Thus, quotes from Kitāb al-Muḥāraba have appeared more frequently in Ibāḍī theological and legal literature than ones from Kitāb al-Raṣf. For the first time in Ibāḍī scholarship, both texts mention issues related to metaphysics and the concepts of atoms and accidents, in the context of arguments concerning divine creation and divine power – two of the most controversial subjects debated by Islamic theologians and their adversaries among the philosophers and atheists.

The Muʿtazilite scholar Abū al-Hudhayl al-ʿAllāf (d. 226/841) was the first to introduce metaphysics into the domain of Islamic theology (kalām)Footnote ³ and his early contributions played a formative role in shaping the endeavours of later theologians.Footnote ⁴ This influence was firmly entrenched with the rise of Maturīdī and Ashʿarī Sunni schools and the development of kalām metaphysics, in which the concepts of atoms and accidents became foundational among Islamic schools of theology.Footnote ⁵ Likewise, the Islamic philosophers borrowed from this discussion, as evidenced in the work of al-Kindī (d. 252/866) who developed arguments of creation on the basis of atoms and accidents deriving from either Islamic theologians or philosophers in the middle of 3^rd/9^th century.Footnote ⁶

In addition to the principles of atoms and accidents, an additional important question these texts permit us to raise concerns the comparison between early Ibāḍī and Muʿtazilite theological views.Footnote ⁷ These texts include discussions of characteristic Muʿtazilite topics, such as cognisance, leadership, titles and conditions of places, commanding right and forbidding wrong, duty, and divine capability Comparison of these works with early Muʿtazilite thought clearly shows early theological interaction between the two schools. Additionally, the texts include topics belonging more narrowly to the concerns of Islamic jurisprudence, reflecting the way in which theologians during the 3^rd/9^th and 4^th/10^th centuries sought to integrate jurisprudence into their theological approaches. Thus, the texts deal with several topics that would normally appear under the heading of jurisprudence, such as questions about the interpretation of Qurʾanic texts, the prophetic traditions, abrogation, and dissidence.

The texts reflect many of the debates that took place between Ibāḍī and Muʿtazilite scholars, especially those that occurred between the major figures representing these groups in the second half of the 3^rd/9^th century. Notable among these are Bashīr b. Muḥammad b. Maḥbūb al-Ruḥaylī and his contemporary Abū ʿAlī al-Jubbāʾī (d. 303/915). Although they probably never met, they clearly held similar views on many issues, which were akin to those of the Muʿtazilite School of Baṣra. This is perhaps not surprising, given our knowledge that Bashīr's father Muḥammad b. Maḥbūb (d. 259/873) took an active role in Oman in the debate on the createdness of the Qurʾān. This caused deep controversy among Ibāḍī scholars during Imām al-Muhannā b. Jayfar's reign (226/841–236/851), and almost resulted in his expulsion from Oman.Footnote ⁸ This event had some influence on the development of Ibāḍīsm in North Africa, since it led the Rustamid Imām Abū al-Yaqẓān Muḥammad b. Aflaḥ b. ʿAbd al-Wahhāb (r. 207/823–257/871) to adopt the tenet of the createdness of the Qurʾān. Thus, while ʿAbd Allāh b. Yazīd al-Fazārī (d. c. 190s/810s) is usually mentioned as the first to have advocated this tenet among the IbāḍīsFootnote ⁹ it was rather the Ruḥaylīs, Muḥammad and Maḥbūb who contributed to the spread of this theological concept from Iraq to Oman.

Bashīr's grandfather Abū Sufyān Maḥbūb b. al-Ruḥayl b. al-ʿAnbar b. Sayf/Sayyid b. Hubayra was considered the last Ibāḍī leader in Baṣra according to Crone and Zimmermann whose work corrects many historical inaccuracies related to the Baṣran Ibāḍī leaders.Footnote ¹⁰ I will not go into the biographical details here in order to avoid some of the controversies not relevant to the present discussion. In brief, according to Omani sources, Maḥbūb b. al-Ruḥayl was considered to have descended from the Quraysh,Footnote ¹¹ whereas, according to North African Ibāḍī sources, he was from Kinda or from ʿAbd al-Qays.Footnote ¹² This dispute aside, the more relevant question remains whether his arrival in Ṣuḥār coincided with the reign of Imām Ghassān b. ʿAbd Allāh (r. 192/808–207/823) or whether it took place after his argument with Hārūn b. al-Yamān, and if so, whether he remained in Oman after that time until his death. The sources available to us suggest that he continued visiting Oman with al-Rabīʿ b. Ḥabīb (d. c. 180/795), and then after he left Baṣra following the dispute among Ibāḍī scholars toward the late 3^rd/9th century. However, it appears that he never settled in Oman. This conclusion is based on two observations:

1. 1- There is no mention of him when ʿAbd al-Malik b. Ḥumayd (r. 208/824–226/841) was elected to the Imāmate, nor when his successor al-Muhannā b. Jayfar (226/841–236/851) was elected. As the most prominent scholar of his time, it is unlikely that he could have been excluded from the election procedures.

2. 2- There is no acknowledgement or reference to him in the Omani literature produced by those who would have belonged to the generation of his students. The Omani scholars mentioned in the sources are contemporaries of his son Muḥammad, or in the case of his peers, they were students of Hāshim b. Ghaylān and Sulaymān b. ʿUthmān, and then Mūsā b. Abī Jabīr (d. 182/798).Footnote ¹³ On the other hand, Abū Sitta (d. 1099/1688) mentions that after the death of al-Rabīʿ, Maḥbūb lived and died in Mecca.Footnote ¹⁴ Moreover, Ibn Madād states that Maḥbūb lived in Baṣra and not in Oman, which is confirmed by the fact that al-ʿAwtabī did not mention him among the scholars there at the time, as did later Omani sources.Footnote ¹⁵

Maḥbūb's two sons, Sufyān and al-Mujabbar, however, were orphaned at a young age, and were forced to sell their home in Basra. Omani sources mention with certainty only select narratives about Muḥammad b. Maḥbūb's stay in Ṣuḥār and migration to the city of Azkī to study under Mūsā b. ʿAlī b. ʿAzra al-Azkawī (d. 230/845 ).Footnote ¹⁶ This evidence suggests that Muḥammad b. Maḥbūb received some of his education earlier in Baṣra, and then completed it in Oman, and that his father was not present there. His sons, al-Mujabbar and Sufyān, lived in Baṣra. Some of al-Mujabbar's letters and legal opinions fatwās in response to queries from the provinces, including Khurasan, were recorded in Ibn Baraka's K. al-Taqyīd.Footnote ¹⁷

Both Bashīr and ʿAbd Allāh, sons of Muḥammad b. Maḥbūb, were born and died in Ṣuḥār, where their father was a judge. Many of Muḥammad b. Maḥbūb legal opinions are recorded in Omani classical scholarship. Wilkinson is correct in stating that the Ruḥayl family had a lasting influence on the intellectual life in Oman, especially in the city of Ṣuḥār, where Muḥammad b. Maḥbūb was the chief judge and played a central role in codifying the tax system in this major trading center.Footnote ¹⁸

II

The concepts of atom and accident were first mentioned among Ibāḍī theologians in recently discovered epistolary writings and monographs by ʿAbd Allāh b. Yazīd al-Fazārī, who was not only the flag bearer of Ibāḍī reform theology, but was also considered to be one of the greatest early Islamic theologians.Footnote ¹⁹ He argued in his writings in favor of the createdness of the Qurʾān. His positions, however, were not followed by other Ibāḍī scholars, who would have introduced them into Ibāḍī literature, especially during the post-Baṣran period, when Ibāḍīsm moved into new regions. There is no doubt about the influence of the al-Ruḥaylis in strengthening the links between the Eastern and the North African Ibāḍīs.Footnote ²⁰

It is worth noting that Ibāḍī and Muʿtazilite schools, both based in Baṣra towards the end of the 2^nd/8^th century, subsequently witnessed internal developments emanating from their theological debates. Thereafter, the Muʿtazilīs formed the Baghdad school, headed by Bishr b. al-Muʿtamir (d. 825), while the Ibāḍīs generated another branch represented by ʿAbd Allāh b. Yazīd al-Fazārī, Hārūn b. al-Yamān (d. c. 840) and Shuʿayb b. al-Maʿrūf (d. c. 815), all of whom were influenced by political events resulting from the legacy of the Ibāḍī and Muʿtazilī schools.Footnote ²¹ These Ibāḍīs were referred to by their followers as Shaʿbiyya or Shuʿaybiyya. Their beliefs subsequently spread among Ibāḍīs in Egypt and Yemen as well and in the North African Ibāḍī communities which dissented from the Rustamid State (the Ibāḍī Imāmate 776–909). These dissidents in North Africa were dubbed al-Nukkār (the “Deniers”). Other Ibāḍī Imāmates in Oman and North Africa, as well as their followers in Iraq and Central Asia, remained attached to mainstream Ibāḍīsm. They supported al-Rabīʿ b. Ḥabīb, Wāʿil b. Ayyūb al-Ḥaḍramī, and then the last Imām Maḥbūb b. al-Ruḥayl.Footnote ²² It may well have been that the influence of provincial Ibāḍīsm, combined with the strength of its scholarship, overcame the persuasive capacity of Baṣran central authority. This may also have explained Maḥbūb b. al-Ruḥayl's decision to reside in Ṣuḥār in Oman rather than in Baṣra. However, Shaʿbiyya/Shuʿaybiyya scholars held vigorous debates in Baṣra, Kūfā and to a lesser extent in Baghdad. Nevertheless, their followers dwindled for two reasons:

1. 1. The defeat of the Nukkār by the Rustamids in North Africa even as Ibāḍīs in Ḥaḍramawt and Oman rallied to the cause of Maḥbūb b. al-Ruḥayl. This left the Ibāḍīs of Yemen alone in their struggle to maintain their theological stance. Nevertheless, they faded completely with the establishment of the Zaydī State in 897 by al-Hādī Yaḥyā b. al-Ḥusayn b. al-Qāsim al-Rassī. Of their literature only one book seems to have been preserved by ʿAbd Allāh b. Yazīd al-Fazārī. This work is quoted in its entirety in the treatise K. al-Najāt, which was composed by the Zaydī Imām Aḥmad Nāṣir al-Dīn (d. 322/934).Footnote ²³ Ibāḍī literature also mentions that the aged Shuʿayb b. al-Maʿrūf lived in a town called Qidam after migrating to Yemen, and eventually died there.Footnote ²⁴ Omani historical accounts have interestingly preserved the texts recording a theological exchange between the Ibāḍī leaders in Baṣra Maḥbūb b. Ruḥayl and Hārūn b. al-Yamān.Footnote ²⁵ Al-Sālimī (d. 1914) reported that in the debate between Maḥbūb b. al-Ruḥayl and Hārūn b. al-Yamān the people of Yemen followed Hārūn while the people of Oman and Ḥaḍramawt supported the views of Maḥbūb.Footnote ²⁶ For this reason, Maḥbūb b. Ruḥayl set in motion the second most crucial development of Ibāḍīsm since the establishment of the constitution of the Qaʿda and the secession from the Muḥakkima, and therefore since the early Kharijite schism in the second half of 2^nd/8^th century. Therefore, the Ibāḍīs refused to rebel when the conditions made it impossible to rebel against illegal Islamic rulers. Moreover, they disassociated themselves from other Muslims, regarding them as unbelievers.Footnote ²⁷

2. 2. The Ibāḍī Imāmate arose following a century of strife, with Oman and North Africa constituting the axis of the Ibāḍī movement; as a result, scholars gradually migrated from the Ibāḍī center in Baṣra which had begun to lose its theological influence and political authority. Immediately this situation not only affected their position in Iraq, but also resulted in difficult communications or loss of contact with Central Asia and Iran.Footnote ²⁸ Revolutionary movements around the Imāmate lost their appeal, especially with the emergence of small states and Emirates.

III

It would be useful before going further to give a brief preliminary survey of the Ibāḍī theological sources dealing with questions of metaphysics, and more specifically with the notions of atoms and accidents. This literature begins in the mid 2^nd/8^th century with Abū al-Mūʾthir al-Ṣalt b. Khamīs al-Kharūṣī (d. c. 295/907),Footnote ²⁹ who was a contemporary of Bashīr. Abū al-Mūʾthir mentions in his introduction to the K. al-Tawḥīd the concepts of ‘essence’ and ‘accident’ and their connection to the creation of the universe. The aim of this book, as its introduction states, is to establish God's existence.Footnote ³⁰ Abū al-Mūʾthir then goes no further in his work to demonstrate how the theory might support the notion of creation. Subsequently, it is Ibn Baraka's works (d. c. 355/966) that develop these connections and articulate the argument based on the notions of atoms and accidents in the beginning of the 4^th/10^th century, particularly in his work K. al-Taqyīd where a partial reference to those concepts appears in the initial chapters. Ibn Baraka's arguments concern two aspects: the demonstration of divine power and the creation of the universe.Footnote ³¹

It seems that the issue of atoms and accidents aroused the interest of his student Abū al-Ḥasan al-Basyawī (d. c. 375/985), who detailed the subject in his book al-Jāmiʿ,Footnote ³² and later, in his epistolary monograph. Al-Basyawī went further in detailing the divine attributes without delving into essential characteristics, as well as responding to the fatalists.Footnote ³³ This type of argumentation soon flourished in the Rustāq school even more than in the Nizwā school in Oman.Footnote ³⁴ Between the 4–5/10–11 centuries it was developed extensively and used by Abū al-Mundhir Salāma b. Muslim al-ʿAwtabī, in his encyclopaedic work al-Diyāʾ especially in the first three volumes, where he sets out Ibāḍī theology in meticulous detail.Footnote ³⁵ His theological approach was closer to Ashʿarī than to Muʿtazilite doctrine, although it draws on Muʿtazilite views on the divine attributes, the vision of God in the after-life, the creation of the universe, death and resurrection, and their response to atheists. On the other hand, he adopted Ashʿarī's views in his response to the Fatalists and the Mujbarites, as well as in the case of the creation of the Qurʾān.Footnote ³⁶ He confirmed and upheld Ashʿarite views on the creation of Qurʾān which became the Ibāḍī position in Oman against the North African Ibāḍīs, and remained constant in Oman until the 10^th /17^th century. Since that time Ibāḍīs have combined both views on the createdness of the Qurʾān.Footnote ³⁷

During the 5^th/11^th century, the issue of atoms (al-jawhar) and accidents (al-ʿaraḍ) was debated among Ibāḍī scholars and we can find some references to it scattered in various discussions in Ibāḍī works. For example, a discussion of it can be found in a correspondence between Imām Khalīl b. Shādhān and the Judge Abū Zakariyyā Yaḥyā b. Zakariyyā (d. 472/1079),Footnote ³⁸ as well as in Kitāb al-Akilla wa-ḥaqāʾiq al-adilla by Nijād b. Mūsā (d. 513/1119).Footnote ³⁹ Later important work on this topic can be seen in Kitāb al-Jawhar al-Muqtaṣar by Abū Bakr b. ʿAbd Allāh Aḥmad al-Kindī (d. 557/1162), who is also the author of the famous collection of Ibāḍī traditions in Oman entitled al-Muṣannaf.Footnote ⁴⁰ In his work Kitāb al-Jawhar al-Muqtaṣar,Footnote ⁴¹ he extensively explains sections of K. al-Muḥāraba and compares the approaches of Ibāḍī and other theological schools on this subject in his book al-Dhakhīra. Finally, Abū Saʿīd Muḥammad b. Saʿīd al-Qalhātī was probably the last Omani scholar to deal with the issue of atoms and accidents, which he did in his work al-Kashf wa-al-Bayān.Footnote ⁴²

According to the Ibāḍīs of North Africa, the writings to which we have access show that the discussion of metaphysics started in the late 6^th/12^th century, which then attracted the attention of the most celebrated Ibāḍī theologians. We can see this chronologically with Kitāb al-Waḍʿ by Abū Zakariyyā al-Jinnāwnī (alive during 6^th/12^th century),Footnote ⁴³ where he briefly deals with the theological chapters. This became a topic of discussion in Ibāḍī theology with his late contemporaries Abū ‘Ammār ‘Abd al-Kāfī al-Warjilānī (d. before 560/1165) in his works Sharḥ al-Jahālāt and al-Mūjaz Footnote ⁴⁴ and then Abū Yaʿqūb al-Warjilānī (d. 570/1174) in his work al-Dalīl al-Burhān.Footnote ⁴⁵ These two are in fact representative of North African Ibāḍī classical theology, and their works have been considered transitional between early and later classical Ibāḍī theological literature. They touch upon many of the issues related to the metaphysics of atoms and accidents, such as the creation of the universe, the proof of God's existence, the affirmation of the divine attributes, and the question of divine power. After these scholars, Abū Ṭāhir al-Jītālī (d. 750/1350) combined mysticism and theology in his works Qawāʿid al-Islām and Qanātir al-Khayrāt.Footnote ⁴⁶ After that, Abū al-Qāsim al-Barādī (who lived during first half of the 9^th/15^th century) examined theological terminology in his work Kitāb al-Ḥaqāʾiq, as well as in his work Shifāʾ al-ḥāʾim ʿalā baʿḍ al-Dāʾim, which contains commentary on some of the Ibn Naẓr's theological poetry.Footnote ⁴⁷ The last celebrated classical Ibāḍī theologian in North Africa is Abū al-ʿAbbās Aḥmad b. Saʿīd al-Shammākhī (d. 928/1522), specifically with regard to his treatment of issues pertaining to atoms and accidents.Footnote ⁴⁸ Later scholarship was mainly restricted to commentary on earlier texts.

The above has offered a brief overview of the Ibāḍī literature concerned with the notions of atoms and accidents. Among the conclusions it permits us to draw, certainly, is that the contribution of Ibāḍīsm was parallel to other Islamic theological schools in this field.

IV

Bashīr starts in the first paragraph of both texts explaining that both atoms and accidents are empowered by God to “do all things as they are mentioned, in their infinitesimal wholeness, without justification for the inherent meaning of creation.” This view is similar to that of Abū al-Hudhayl al-ʿAllāf who holds to the idea of atoms and accidents as necessary constructions according to the principle that divine power negates the Creator, or that divine power and the creator are the same entity. The divine power and the Creator are an infinitesimal totality, a finality, both all similarity and all difference coexisting.Footnote ⁴⁹ Al-ʿAllāf seeks to reconcile the Qurʾanic doctrine of creation ex nihilo with Aristotelian cosmology, according to which the world, set in motion by God, is eternal, its movement being co-eternal with the prime mover himself. While accepting movement as a principle of the universal process, he declared it to be created in the Qurʾanic sense. In consequence, movement also will reach its end and cease. For this reason, Abū Bakr al-Kindī in his commentary of the texts referred to Nijād b. Mūsā's argument in his work K. al-Akilla, that the Eternal cannot be described as the creator of power regardless of the two qualities of atoms and accidents, because what else is the Eternal without the epithet of His power.Footnote ⁵⁰ Therefore, the developing theology of the Eternal led the theologians to a controversy over whether the world was created out of nothing or out of a pre-existent matter, whether the non-existent is nothing or something. Al-Shahrastānī (d. 548/1153) states that al-Shaḥḥām (d. 235/850), a Baṣran Muʿtazilite, originated the view that the non-existent is a thing.

Bashīr developed an argument which was later further developed by Abū Bakr al-Kindī about the existence of non-existence and whether non-existence can be considered an atom. Abū Bakr explained that non-existence is not part of essence, as it cannot be measured in size. The Baghdādī Muʿtazilites hold the same view, according to the position of Abū al-Qāsim al-Balkhī. In contrast, Bashīr agreed with the Baṣran Muʿtazilites who are presumed to have held the views of both Abū ʿAlī and his son Abū Hāshim al-Jubbāʾī and also Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥusayn b. ʿAlī al-Baṣrī, that non-existence becomes substantial in the case of its non-existence.Footnote ⁵¹

Therefore, the Ibāḍī seem to be in agreement with the Muʿtazilite that non-existence is something.Footnote ⁵² However, Ibn Ḥazm (d. 1064) and al-Baghdādī (d. 1037) mentioned that al-Ṣālaḥī (d. 276/ 890) and Hishām al-Fuwaṭī (d. c. 225/840) from the Muʿtazilite objected to calling non-existence something, which later was the belief of the Ashʿarite.Footnote ⁵³ Up on this controversy Wolfson asserted that the Muʿtazilite in their belief of non-existence were influenced by the Platonic belief in a pre-existent eternal matter. He added that the Muʿtazilite, according to their perspective, might be similar to the philosopher Muḥammad b. Zakariyyā al-Rāzī (d. 323/935) who conceived of the pre-existence of eternal matter as consisting of atoms.Footnote ⁵⁴ Bashīr also attempted to support the creation argument with the concept of aggregation and segregation.Footnote ⁵⁵ The divine power, he asserts, has the ability to create out of nothing, to originate matter, to expand, segregate, divide, destroy and re-aggregate all that exists. This becomes for Bashīr the philosophical basis for his theology of the resurrection of human bodies on the day of judgement. If the divine power can create out of nothing and destroy matter, then the divine power can also re-assemble matter, re-create and resurrect. This is for Bashīr an argument in opposition to atheism.

Another contention listed by Bashīr is the argument of finitudes and reconstruction:

Bashīr's argument is based upon two propositions; the first is that the force within the world, that which preserves the existence of the world, is finite. The second proposition is that a finite force cannot produce infinite existence. According to Bashīr's references, he supports the idea that the world must have a beginning and an end. He offers the following supporting argument:

In the basis of Bashīr's quote above, we may now attempt to streamline his vision of the original form of the creation of the world. Along with the monotheist theologians, Bashīr restates a rejection of the Aristotelian theory of the incorruptibility of the world on the grounds of the finitude of the elements within it. It is possible to summarize his argument in three points. First, he makes the case that the finitude of the universal elements is due to their being surrounded by the air. Second he states the impossibility of the eternal nature of the world by saying, “we realized that the creation must have an end even though part of the world is hidden from our minds.” Third, he reasons that any element that has a beginning should also have an ending.

We can end by illustrating his argument with two syllogisms:

Bashīr's discussion had developed toward an understanding of the creation of the world based upon the accident of its component parts. Bashīr later discussed the construction of accidents, that they exist in both bodies and parts (atoms), that they have a beginning and an ending, and that the bodies are created. He then moves into a serious and controversial issue relating to the essential existence of atoms and accident, whether they are considered similar or different, unified or separate. Ibāḍīs generally believe that atoms and accidents are not differentiated in categories, but are to be considered as one, albeit they may differ in their specific conditions or accidents, due to their individual characteristics.Footnote ⁵⁸ This is precisely the opinion of Baṣran Muʿtazilites, while Baghdādī Muʿtazilites admit the differences and similarities between atoms and accidents.Footnote ⁵⁹

After a discussion of the argument proceeding from the construction of accidents, Bashīr addressed the issue of the diversions between atoms and accidents by asserting their underlying finiteness, and arguing that they have limits with beginnings and endings. The construction of events means an endless subdivision ad infinitum. Similarly Abū al-Hudhayl al-ʿAllāf's argument which denied the possibility of an infinite succession was also the opinion of most Baṣran Muʿtazilite scholars.Footnote ⁶⁰ Al-Khayyāṭ (d. 290/903) preserved an interesting argument of al-Naẓẓām's, that successive movements of finite bodies must be treated as an act of creation, arguing that an infinite place would be impossible to traverse.Footnote ⁶¹ Moreover, he argued that in an infinite series there is no first. Immediately this will lead to other theories such as those of latency (al-kumūn) and leap (al-ṭafra).Footnote ⁶² Wolfson argues that at the same time that atomism was introduced into the Kalām, another theory was introduced, the theory of the infinite divisibility of matter, which in Greek philosophy meant a theory in opposition to atomism.Footnote ⁶³ The Ibāḍī had an identical view as that of the Baṣran Muʿtazilites, represented by Abū al-Hudhayl al-ʿAllāf. While the Baghdādī Muʿtazilites, who were influenced by al-Naẓẓām and Hishām b. al-Ḥakam, believe that particles are dividable ad aeternum and ad infinitum, despite a specific capacity of limitations. As al-Naẓẓām stated, God is one in meaning and entity: God is Himself not prone to subdivision or fragmentation, and none of His creatures may be similar to Him.Footnote ⁶⁴ This case was one of the main difficult dissuasions with both groups. Indeed they were anxious to agree with the externalization and at the same time wanted to respond to their argument. Eventually, Wolfson assumed that the above arguments on the impossibility of the infinite extension of the body and the possibility of its infinite division, and the explanation of the former on the ground that infinite extension cannot be traversed, reflect statements in Aristotle's Physics and De Caelo. Therefore, the argument of al-Naẓẓām and Hishām is, like Aristotle's argument of infinite divisibility, based on the notion of potential infinite and not actual infinite. Wolfson in his discussion refers to the influence of Aristotle's infinite divisibility, which was infinite only in a potential sense, and could have been known by both al-Naẓẓām and Hishām from the Arabic translation of pseudo-Plutarch's De Placitis Philosophorum.Footnote ⁶⁵

V

In this passage we shall reflect upon the discussions in the texts on the nature of atoms and accidents, and how these were understood in the early Islamic kalām. In addition, I will review the subject from the point of view of theologians regarding the phenomenal being and how the constituent parts of the body can be organized and understood. Bashīr agreed with Abū al-Hudhayl al-ʿAllāf that atoms do not have length because length is based on line. In order to form a line it must be started by conjoining two atoms. The example for this argument is the impossibility of representing a line by drawing one point because the point has no length. Length is based on the line and the line on an alignment of points. Accordingly, the line, if it is parted and then ends at a point, it will not have length or space. This argument originated as a response to al-Naẓẓām that the single atom is defined and limited by the incidents, and also that it is corruptible, hence their divergences. For this reason, some insist that division requires length, so that division by folding may be possible.Footnote ⁶⁶ As for the shape of atom, Bashīr agreed with Abū al-Hudhayl al-ʿAllāf that body is made of six constituent parts. Al-Ashʿarī said that body is formed by at least two parts, because he considered body to be an essence. Furthermore, the later Ibāḍī theologian Abū Bakr al-Kindī held similar views to those of Muʿammar b.ʿAbbād al-Sulamī (d. 220/835) according to whom body has eight constituent parts. In contrast, al-Naẓẓām and Hishām b. al-Ḥakam considered the body to be indivisible. Perhaps they meant that the human body cannot be subdivided, but its atoms can be.Footnote ⁶⁷

While discussing the interconnection between the atoms, Bashīr acknowledges the possibility of the contiguity (tajāwur) of particles, but not their mutual interpenetration (tadākhul). Bashīr justifies his view about accidents with an illustration of the absorber and the expander. The absorber cannot at the same time expand into the expander. Neither the absorber nor the expander can be both active and passive at the same time. Therefore he argues that when the two bodies interpenetrate they will require more expansion space than that required by one single entity. This opinion is corroborated by Abū Bakr al-Kindī and also by most Ibāḍī theologians.Footnote ⁶⁸ Likewise, among the Baṣran Muʿtazilites distinguished this case of contiguity (tajāwur) and interpenetration (tadākhul) as argued by Abū ʿAlī al-Jubbāʾī and Abū Hāshim al-Jubbāʾī (d. 321/933).Footnote ⁶⁹ On the other hand, Ibrāhīm al-Naẓẓām (d. 230/845) who opposed this argument was likely influenced by the Shiite theologian Hishām b. al-Ḥakam (d. 186/803). Al-Naẓẓām believed in interpenetration, that it is possible for two bodies to occupy one space. They argued that an apple is an “incidental entity”, as are its colour, taste and smell; the apple is found at the same place as its colour, taste and smell; if these characteristics were not interconnected, the colour could be there, but not the taste.Footnote ⁷⁰ This argument provides evidence for another important issue for the Baṣran Muʿtazilites and the Ibāḍīs: the composite nature of the universe, which is related to the creation of the universe on the principle of contiguity, does not overlap or interpenetrate.

Now, we will turn to another argument of Bashīr's in which he tried to identify the accidents, and asserted that they are not all of the same nature. Accidents are made up of characteristics that can be similar or different or even contradictory. The same view is held later by Ibāḍī theologians such as al-Qāḍī Abū Zakariyyā (d. 475/ 1082), Abū Bakr al-Kindī and also Aḥmad b. Mūsā b. Nijād in his work K. al-Akilla.Footnote ⁷¹ The argument of the Ibāḍīs, with the exception of Abū al-Qāsim al-Kaʿbī, who differs from the Baṣran Muʿtazilites,Footnote ⁷² is that one instance may not necessarily be identical to another: the quality of blackness (or whiteness, or capability) does not imply that all other states of blackness (or whiteness, or capability) are similar to it. The Ibāḍīs also admit the possibility that entities be either identical or different, even when their appearances show consistent similarity. To support this position, they argue that opposites are by definition different and dissimilar, but not all difference or dissimilarity necessarily entails opposition. For instance, volition and cognition are different and dissimilar, but volition and action are different but not dissimilar.Footnote ⁷³ Interestingly, one of the main arguments in support of atoms was, in the beginning 3^rd/9^th century, whether accidents exist or not. Hishām al-Fuwaṭī and Abū Bakr al-Āṣamm (d. 201/816) denied the existence of accidents because according to them, bodies are perceived through their spatial dimensions “with length, breadth and depth”, hence the conclusion that the accidents are the same as atoms.Footnote ⁷⁴ They justified their position by arguing that the components (al-taʾlīf) of accidents result in the atoms. This argument may have been confusing in that it identified the body first and then the atom. Their argument was rejected by the Baghdādī Muʿtazilites; Abū al-Qāsim al-Kaʿbī al-Balkhī (d. 319/913) who argued instead that components (al-taʾlīf) are but indicators of essence.Footnote ⁷⁵ It is important to indicate that al-Balkhī's theory of components (al-taʾlīf) influenced later theologians especially the Ashʿarīte, and became an aspect of their argument on the creation of the world.Footnote ⁷⁶

Bashīr then moved on to the issue of bodies and their dimensions. Although Abū al-Qāsim al-Kaʿbī al-Balkhī does not relate the extension of bodies to their dimensions and therefore restricts them to accidents, a view which was later adopted by the Ashʿarites. Abū ʿAlī al-Jubbāʾī held that essences are not bodies with dimensions.Footnote ⁷⁷ Al-Fuwaṭī, on the other hand, assumed that the atom is not considered a body and therefore it should not be considered to bear accidents neither in its composition nor in its contiguity. Abū al-Hudhayl al-ʿAllāf and Muʿammar b. ʿAbbād, followed by Bashīr, differentiate between the body and atom. They argue that indivisibility is the very definition of a body.Footnote ⁷⁸ Al-Kindī in his commentary on the text shows that Bashīr denies the principle of integration in heterogeny, and that what is intended by “integration” is the accident into the subject of accident. Bashīr's argument attempts to establish a coherence between particles and capacity by saying that if God removes all integration from the subject of accident, it will not become void and non-existent, however, they are essentially separated.Footnote ⁷⁹

VI

Most of the modern research in Islamic theology when dealing with atom and accidents are based on the controversy between Muʿtazilite and Ashʿarite theologians, therefore it is rare to find arguments based on this subject prior to the 3^rd/9^th century and Muʿtazilite views mostly are preserved by al-Jāḥiẓ.Footnote ⁸⁰ The early Ibāḍī presentation of atoms and accidents as seen in the work of Bashīr b. Muḥammad b. Maḥbūb reflects the importance of the development of Islamic theological literature, a move away from a polemic style in response to the polemic theology of other schools within early Islam. Bashīr's monographic prose presents a genre that sought to define broad themes for discussion with other schools of philosophy during the first half of the 3^rd/9^th century. It is rare to find texts such as this that present arguments in prose form during this period. The oldest Islamic theological texts that have been discovered in recent years, generally do not date earlier than the 4^th/10^th century. Thus these texts reflect an important transformation in Islamic theological literature.

Bashīr borrowed from Aristotelian philosophy to support the sovereignty of divine power, the universal creation and the finitude of universal matter within Islamic theology. Indeed it is a remarkable quality of Bashīr and the Ibāḍī theologians that they endeavored to revise the Aristotelian philosophy in a way that both rejected his conclusions and accepted his terms and framework, elements of his theology, and employed them to develop an Islamic theology of atoms and accidents that preserved the primacy of God's sovereignty within early Ibāḍī theology.