The Abrahamic Dilemma in the Islamic Tradition Whose Problem-Abraham’s or the God of Abraham

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Associate professor Department of Philosophy Faculty of Literature and Humanities

2 MSc Student at Department of philosophy, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, Kharazmi University, Tehran, Iran.

Abstract

This article examines the Abrahamic dilemma in Islamic thought, a central problem in the philosophy of religion concerning the relation between divine command and rational morality. Based on the Qur'anic account of Abraham's dream to sacrifice his son and its parallel biblical narrative, the dilemma asks whether obedience to God can justify actions that conflict with basic moral intuitions, such as killing an innocent child. The article analyzes four major responses in Islamic theology: the Trial Theory, the Command-to-the-Prerequisites Theory, the Abrogation Theory, and the Interpretive Theory. Particular attention is given to Ibn ʿArabī's hermeneutical reading, which attributes the apparent conflict not to an immoral divine command but to Abraham's literal interpretation of a symbolic dream. The article argues that the interpretive theory shifts the problem from ethics to the epistemology of revelation. Instead of asking whether God may command an immoral act, it asks how revelatory dreams should be interpreted. This reframes the Abraham narrative as a problem of hermeneutics rather than moral philosophy. By preserving both divine moral perfection and objective moral norms, the interpretive theory provides a more coherent account of the Abrahamic dilemma than its principal rivals.

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Journal of Philosophical Theological Research

Articles in Press, Accepted Manuscript
Available Online from 19 July 2026

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