Lecture 4: Kasp, Moral Responsibility, and the First Forms of Shirk

This lecture completes the discussion of the second muqaddima on human actions and begins the next muqaddima on shirk (شرك), associating partners with Allah. The central Sunni position is that Allah alone creates every act, while human beings acquire their voluntary acts through kasp (كسب), “acquisition.” This avoids both jabriyya, a fatalistic denial of real human choice, and qadariyya, the view that humans create their own acts. The key point is that responsibility depends on choice, not on being the creative cause of the act.

The instructor stresses that Islamic theology does not normally frame the issue as “free will.” The inherited kalam vocabulary speaks instead of kasp, irada (إرادة), choice or volition, qudra haditha (قدرة حادثة), a created human capacity, and taklif (تكليف), moral-religious responsibility. Human beings do not create outcomes; we know this by everyday experience, such as a basketball shot or golf putt: one may choose, aim, and act, yet the final result is not under one’s creative control. This supports the Ash'ari occasionalist picture: Allah creates the outcome at every moment, while the servant is responsible for what he or she chooses and acquires.

A major clarification is that causal power and accountability are not the same thing. Even if, under a naturalist assumption, one imagined fire “causing” the burning of paper, one would still blame the person who chose to light the match, not the fire. Fire has no choice. Similarly, in Sunni theology, one need not create an action in order to be responsible for it. Courts often reason in a comparable way when they ask whether a defendant had volition, awareness, and intent; they are not usually asking metaphysical questions about the ultimate ontological source of the action.

The lecture then explains an intra-Sunni nuance between Ash'aris and Maturidis regarding the status of choice. The Maturidis can describe choice as an amr i'tibari (أمر اعتباري), a relational or اعتبار-based matter rather than an extra thing existing outside the mind, like “being on top of” in the relation between a cup and an iPad. The Ash'aris say that even the choice is created by Allah, but in accordance with His perfect knowledge of what the servant would have chosen. Both remain within Ahl al-Sunna because both affirm Allah as the sole creator and affirm meaningful human responsibility.

After the break, the class begins the muqaddima on the six types of shirk. Shirk is not only crude polytheism; it is giving to other than Allah what belongs only to Allah in uluhiyya (ألوهية), His sole right to be worshipped, or rububiyya (ربوبية), His lordship and creative authority. This directly contradicts wahdaniyya (وحدانية), Allah’s absolute oneness in His essence, attributes, and acts. The first type is shirk al-istiqلال, affirming two independent deities, as in dualist systems that posit one source for good and another for evil. This is refuted by reason, by the impossibility of two independent necessary beings, and by dalil al-tamanu' (دليل التمانع), the argument that multiple gods would conflict or limit one another.

The second type is shirk al-tab'id (شرك التبعيض), treating the divine reality as composed of parts, illustrated through Christian Trinitarian or incarnational theology as presented in the lesson. If God were composed of parts, He would depend on those parts, whereas Allah is al-Ghani (الغني), the absolutely independent. The third type introduced is shirk al-taqrib (شرك التقريب), worshipping other beings as intermediaries to gain nearness to God, as among some pre-Islamic Arabs. This is distinguished from tawassul (توسل) and istighatha (استغاثة), which, when understood correctly, are not shirk if one believes Allah alone creates and grants benefit. Tawassul through a living person, good deeds, or Allah’s names and attributes is agreed upon as permissible; tawassul through the deceased and istighatha are treated as fiqh questions by the jurists, not automatically as violations of tawhid.