Abstract
Sadr al-Sharī‘a (d. 747/1346) tried to refute Fakhr al-Din al-Rāzī’s (d. 606/1210) argument related to the n on of human’s voluntary acts. He justified principles of Hanafī-Maturidī tradition using a theoretical-philosophical language and put forward his “four premises” (muqaddimāt al-arba‘). The proof of muqaddimāt al-arba‘ as well as the explanation of Mehmed Birgīvī (d. 981/1573) for this proof guided the discussion on free will and human action in the lands of Rūm later on. Ibrāhīm al-Kūrānī, an influential Akbarī-Ash‘arī scholar in Hejāz, Damascus and North Africa during the seventieth century, wrote a lot of treatise about human action. With his epistle Cilā al-anzār, al-Kūrānī also got involved in the discussions about free will and human action in the lands of Rūm. In this work, he analyzed Sadr al-Sharī‘a’s and Birgivī’s views on the relevant discussion and aimed at confronting dominant Hanafī-Maturidī tradition in his time. al-Kūrānī discussed the possibility and creation of making acts (īqā‘) and predestination of free will in order to prove human responsibility. In addition he searched for a mid-way between absolute freedom (tafvīdh) and absolute neccesity (cabr). This paper aims to contextualize al-Kūrānī’s views and criticisms within the related intellectual history. It suggests that al-Kūrānī criticized dominant Hanafī-Maturidī tradition in his time by commenting on the proof of “muqaddimāt al-arba‘” and Birgīvī’s explanation based on it. By doing so he is attending to open up space for his controversial ideas that reconciliates Islamic sects (madhhabs).