The Reasons of Foundation of the Asha’irah School

Examination of the reasons of the separation of al-Ash’ari from his previous school, the Mu’tazilah, is one of the historical Kalami issues and nowadays is one of the important philosophical and controversial issues between the theologians. By distinguishing two stances of “the reasons of the al-Ash’ari’s separation of the Mu’tazilah” and “the reasons of the foundation of the Asha’rah school”, the author in this article examines the causes of these two axes. In the present article, the reasons of the foundation of the Asha’irah school are discussed in two negative and positive aspects. In the negative reasons, the influential factors in the Ash’ari withdrawal of the Mu’tazilah are divided into two kinds of “epistemological-reasoning” and “non-epistemological-causal”. The epistemological reasons (the epistemological shortcomings of the Mu’tazilite school and preventing the Ahl ul-Hadith extremist beliefs) are of more impressive role than the non-epistemological causes (the Prophet command in dream, changing the government and ambition). In the positive reasons, two factors have been analyzed: joining together the rational and narrative approaches (the Mu’tazilah and Ahl ul-Hadith) and rivalry with Abu Hashim for gaining the presidency of the Mu’tazilite school.