ected
the idea of eternal attributes, saying that eternity was the formal
attribute of the essence of God. "If," said they, "we admit the eternal
existence of an attribute then we must recognize the multiplicity of
eternal existences." They also rejected the attributes of hearing, seeing
and speech, as these were accidents proper to corporeal existences. They
looked upon the divine attributes as mental abstractions, and not as having
a real existence in the divine essence. The Mutazilites were emphatically
the Free thinkers of Islam. The origin of the sect was as follows: Al
Hasan, a famous divine, was one day seated in the Mosque at Basra when a
discussion arose on the question whether a believer who committed a mortal
sin became thereby an unbeliever. The Kharigites (Ante p. 76) {125}
affirmed that it was so. The orthodox denied this, saying that, though
guilty of sin, yet that as he believed rightly he was not an infidel.[112]
One of the scholars Wasil Ibn Ata, (who was born at Madina A.H. 80), then
rose up and said: "I maintain that a Muslim who has committed a mortal sin
should be regarded neither as a believer nor an unbeliever, but as
occupying a middle station between the two." He then retired to another
part of the Mosque where he was joined by his friend 'Umr Ibn Obaid and
others. They resumed the discussion. A learned man, named Katada, entering
the Mosque, went up to them, but on finding that they were not the party in
which Al Hasan was, said 'these are the Seceders (Al-Mutazila).' Al Hasan
soon expelled them from his school. Wasil then founded a school of his own
of which, after the death of his master, 'Umr Ibn Obaid became the head.

Wasil felt that a believer, though sinful, did not merit the same degree of
punishment as an infidel, and thus starting off on the question of
_degrees_ of punishment, he soon opened up the whole subject of man's
responsibility and the question of free-will. This soon brought him into
conflict with the orthodox on the subject of predestination and that again
to the subject of the inspiration, the interpretation and the eternity of
the Quran, and of the divine attributes. His followers rejected the
doctrine of the "divine right" of the Imam, and held that the entire body
of the Faithful had the right to elect the most suitable person, who need
not necessarily be a man of the Quraish tribe, to fill that office. The
principles of logic and the teaching of philosophy were brought