Attributes of God in Islam

Part of a series on Islam
Allah (God in Islam)
Allah Jalla Jalālah in Arabic calligraphy
Theology Allah Names Attributes Phrases and expressions Islam (religion) Throne of God Sufi metaphysics Theology Schools of Islamic theology Oneness Kalam Anthropomorphism and corporealism
Expressions and phrases Tasbih (Subhan Allah) Takbir (Allahu Akbar) Hamd (Praise) Shahada Basmala Hawqala Ta'awwudh Inna Lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji'un Allahumma Be, and it is
Terms Shirk (polytheism) Iman (belief) Ihsan (development) Nifaq (hypocrisy) Kufr (disobidience/denial) Ta'til (denial of divine attributes) Tanzih (transcendance) Bila Kayf Tafwid
Scripture Quran Al-Ikhlas Throne Verse Verse of Light Al-Mu'awwidhatayn Hadith Qudsi
Others Inshallah Mashallah Alhamdulillah Jazakallah Istighfar Fi sabilillah Al-Ism al-A'zam Dhikr Ghaib Ilah
Islam portal • Category
v t e

In Islamic theology, the attributes (ṣifāt, also meaning "property" or "quality"^[1]) of God can be defined in one of two ways. Under divine simplicity, the attributes of God are verbal descriptions understood apophatically (negatively). God being "powerful" does not impute a distinct quality of "power" to God's essence but is merely to say that God is not weak. This view was held by the Mu'tazila and prominent Islamic philosophers like Ibn Sina (Avicenna) to preserve the notion of God's oneness (tawḥīd) and reject any multiplicity within God. Under the now more widespread view, attributes represent ontologically real and distinct properties or qualities that God has.^[2][3]

The relationship between the attributes of God and God's essence or nature has been understood in different ways. At one end of the spectrum, the Jahmiyya rejected the existence of God's attributes at all to maintain their understanding of God's transcendence (tanzih), in what has been called "divesting" God of attributes (ta'til). This is put in opposition to those who "support the attributes" (al-ṣifātiyya). Advocates of divine simplicity, like the Mu'tazilites, held that God's attributes are identical to God's essence and amount to mere verbal descriptions of God. Sunnism accepted the view that the attributes of God are distinct and ontologically real, and identified both Jahmites and Mu'tazilites as deniers of God's attributes.^[4] Within the Sunni paradigm, Al-Maturidi held that God's attributes collectively comprise God's nature. Later, and what would become the classical view of Islamic theology, held instead that God has an eternal nature or essence and that the attributes of God, separate from this essence, are predicated or superadded onto it. The difference between the former and the latter, among those affirming the ontological reality of God's attributes, can be understood as a version of bundle theory versus substrate attribute theory.^[5][6]

Beginning with the Mu'tazila, God's attributes have been divided into attributes of essence (ṣifāt al-dhāt) and attributes of action (ṣifāt al-fiʿl). Essential attributes cannot be true both positively and negatively of God: God cannot be both powerful and weak, making "powerful" an essential attribute. God can both be approving and disapproving, making God's approving-ness an attribute of action. In addition, whereas God's essential attributes originate in God's essence, his attributes of action originate in relations with his creations.^[7] Not all Muslims accepted this: Al-Maturidi argued that attributes of action are also eternal and substituent in God's essence. Eastern Hanafis rejected a distinction between attributes of essence and action entirely.^[8]

Historically, Islamic debates about the relationship between the essence and attributes of God, and how to interpret or understand God's attributes, have figured in and underlined a variety of questions and debates, including those related to the question of Quranic createdness and anthropomorphism and corporealism.