Intellectual Humility and the Ethical Challenge of Teaching Negative Theology in Kalām: A Comparison of Jahm b. Ṣafwān and Ḍirār b. ʿAmr's Models

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 PhD Candidate in Imāmiyya Kalām, Department of Islamic Philosophy and Theology, Faculty of Theology, College of Farabi, University of Tehran, Iran.

2 Assistant Professor and Head of the Department of Ethics, Islamic Sciences and Culture Academy (ISCA), Qom, Iran.

3 Assistant Professor in Imāmiyya Kalām, Department of Islamic Philosophy and Theology, Faculty of Theology, College of Farabi, University of Tehran, Iran.

Abstract

Negative theology in Kalām aims to preserve the unity and simplicity of the divine essence by refraining from affirming the attributes of God. However, teaching such theology raises a moral and epistemic question: How can one cultivate intellectual humility without dissolving meaningful theological discourse? This article investigates this dilemma by comparing the negative theological models of Jahm b. Ṣafwān and Ḍirār b. ʿAmr. Employing a conceptual and comparative methodology grounded in primary sources and virtue epistemology, this study demonstrates that Jahm’s extreme rejection of predication leads to epistemic skepticism and the collapse of theological reasoning. In contrast, Ḍirār’s approach grounds denial in a semantic strategy that preserves meaning and interpretive responsibility, offering a form of dynamic intellectual humility. The article concludes by proposing an educational model of “dialogical authority,” wherein theological expertise and humility mutually reinforce one another. This model fosters a classroom environment in which students are encouraged to ask difficult questions, acknowledge epistemic limits, and participate responsibly in theological inquiry. 

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References 
al-Asha‘arī, Abū l-Ḥasan. (1980). Maqālāt al-Islāmiyyīn wa Ikhtilāf al-Muṣallīn (H. Ritter, Ed.). Franz Steiner.
al-Dārimī, Abū Saʿīd ʿUthmān ibn Saʿīd. (2010). al-Radd ʿalā al-Jahmiyya (Abū ʿĀṣim al-Shawwāmī al-Atharī, Ed.). al-Maktabah al-Islāmiyyah.
al-Jāḥiẓ, Abū ʿUthmān ʿAmr b. Baḥr. (2003). Kitāb al-Ḥayawān. Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya.
al-Malṭī, Abū al-Ḥusayn Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān. (1968). Al-Tanbīh wa al-radd ʿalā ahl al-ahwāʾ wa al-bidaʿ (M. Z. ibn al-Ḥasan al-Kawtharī, Ed.). Maktabat al-Maʿārif.
Baehr, J. (2011). The inquiring mind: On intellectual virtues and virtue epistemology. Oxford University Press.
Berenjkar, R., & Zarepour, M. (2021). Āmuze-ye nafy al-ṣifāt dar aḥādīth-e shīʿa [The doctrine of the negation of attributes in Shiʿi hadiths]. Ulum-i Hadith, 26(2), 122–144.
Church, I. M. (2018). Intellectual humility and religious belief. Journal of Psychology and Theology, 46(2), 219–242. 
Church, I. M., & Samuelson, P. L. (2017). Intellectual humility: An introduction to the philosophy and science. Bloomsbury Academic.
Eslami, M.-T. (2024). Maʿnā va arzesh-i akhlāqī-yi tavāzuʿ-i maʿrifatī va forūtani-yi ʿilmī [The meaning and moral value of epistemological and scholarship humility]. Quarterly Journal of Moral Studies, 6(4), 5–22.. [In Persian]. 
Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī, Muḥammad ibn ʿUmar. (1999). Al-Tafsīr al-kabīr (Mafātīḥ al-ghayb). Dār Iḥyāʾ al-Turāth al-ʿArabī.
Fortes, C., De Brasi, D., & Baumtrog, B. (2024). Employing the intellectual virtues to better understand argumentation interventions in education. Frontline Learning Research, 12(2), 99–112. 
Ibn Ḥanbal, Abū ʿAbd Allāh Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad. (2003). Al-Radd ʿalā al-Jahmiyya wa al-Zanādiqa (S. b. Salāma Shāhīn, Ed.). Dār al-Thabāt li-l-Nashr wa-l-Tawzīʿ.
Roberts, R. C., & Wood, W. J. (2007). Intellectual virtues: An essay in regulative epistemology. Oxford University Press.
Schöck, C. (2016). Jahm b. Ṣafwān (d. 128/745–6) and the ‘Jahmiyya’ and Ḍirār b. ʿAmr (d. 200/815). In S. Schmidtke (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of Islamic theology (pp. 55–80). Oxford University Press.
Tanesini, A. (2018). Arrogance, anger and debate. Symposion, 5(2), 213–227. 
Thiele, J. (2016). Abū Hāshim al-Jubbāʾī’s (d. 321/933) theory of ‘states’ (aḥwāl) and its adaption by Ashʿarite theologians. In S. Schmidtke (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of Islamic theology (pp. 364–407). Oxford University Press.
van Ess, J. (2017–2019). Theology and society in the second and third centuries of the Hijra: A history of religious thought in early Islam (J. O’Kane, Trans.; Vols. 1–4). Brill. (Original work published in German as Theologie und Gesellschaft im 2. und 3. Jahrhundert Hidschra)
Wolfson, H. A. (1959). Philosophical implications of the problem of divine attributes in the Kalām. Journal of the American Oriental Society, 79, 73–80. 
Zagzebski, L. T. (1996). Virtues of the mind: An inquiry into the nature of virtue and the ethical foundations of knowledge. Cambridge University Press.

 

References

References 
al-Asha‘arī, Abū l-Ḥasan. (1980). Maqālāt al-Islāmiyyīn wa Ikhtilāf al-Muṣallīn (H. Ritter, Ed.). Franz Steiner.
al-Dārimī, Abū Saʿīd ʿUthmān ibn Saʿīd. (2010). al-Radd ʿalā al-Jahmiyya (Abū ʿĀṣim al-Shawwāmī al-Atharī, Ed.). al-Maktabah al-Islāmiyyah.
al-Jāḥiẓ, Abū ʿUthmān ʿAmr b. Baḥr. (2003). Kitāb al-Ḥayawān. Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya.
al-Malṭī, Abū al-Ḥusayn Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān. (1968). Al-Tanbīh wa al-radd ʿalā ahl al-ahwāʾ wa al-bidaʿ (M. Z. ibn al-Ḥasan al-Kawtharī, Ed.). Maktabat al-Maʿārif.
Baehr, J. (2011). The inquiring mind: On intellectual virtues and virtue epistemology. Oxford University Press.
Berenjkar, R., & Zarepour, M. (2021). Āmuze-ye nafy al-ṣifāt dar aḥādīth-e shīʿa [The doctrine of the negation of attributes in Shiʿi hadiths]. Ulum-i Hadith, 26(2), 122–144.
Church, I. M. (2018). Intellectual humility and religious belief. Journal of Psychology and Theology, 46(2), 219–242. 
Church, I. M., & Samuelson, P. L. (2017). Intellectual humility: An introduction to the philosophy and science. Bloomsbury Academic.
Eslami, M.-T. (2024). Maʿnā va arzesh-i akhlāqī-yi tavāzuʿ-i maʿrifatī va forūtani-yi ʿilmī [The meaning and moral value of epistemological and scholarship humility]. Quarterly Journal of Moral Studies, 6(4), 5–22.. [In Persian]. 
Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī, Muḥammad ibn ʿUmar. (1999). Al-Tafsīr al-kabīr (Mafātīḥ al-ghayb). Dār Iḥyāʾ al-Turāth al-ʿArabī.
Fortes, C., De Brasi, D., & Baumtrog, B. (2024). Employing the intellectual virtues to better understand argumentation interventions in education. Frontline Learning Research, 12(2), 99–112. 
Ibn Ḥanbal, Abū ʿAbd Allāh Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad. (2003). Al-Radd ʿalā al-Jahmiyya wa al-Zanādiqa (S. b. Salāma Shāhīn, Ed.). Dār al-Thabāt li-l-Nashr wa-l-Tawzīʿ.
Roberts, R. C., & Wood, W. J. (2007). Intellectual virtues: An essay in regulative epistemology. Oxford University Press.
Schöck, C. (2016). Jahm b. Ṣafwān (d. 128/745–6) and the ‘Jahmiyya’ and Ḍirār b. ʿAmr (d. 200/815). In S. Schmidtke (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of Islamic theology (pp. 55–80). Oxford University Press.
Tanesini, A. (2018). Arrogance, anger and debate. Symposion, 5(2), 213–227. 
Thiele, J. (2016). Abū Hāshim al-Jubbāʾī’s (d. 321/933) theory of ‘states’ (aḥwāl) and its adaption by Ashʿarite theologians. In S. Schmidtke (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of Islamic theology (pp. 364–407). Oxford University Press.
van Ess, J. (2017–2019). Theology and society in the second and third centuries of the Hijra: A history of religious thought in early Islam (J. O’Kane, Trans.; Vols. 1–4). Brill. (Original work published in German as Theologie und Gesellschaft im 2. und 3. Jahrhundert Hidschra)
Wolfson, H. A. (1959). Philosophical implications of the problem of divine attributes in the Kalām. Journal of the American Oriental Society, 79, 73–80. 
Zagzebski, L. T. (1996). Virtues of the mind: An inquiry into the nature of virtue and the ethical foundations of knowledge. Cambridge University Press.
 
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