Wasel Ibn Ata

Wasel Ibn Ata, chief of the Mu’tazila (a religious movement founded at Basra); (699 – 748). He migrated to Basar where he belonged to the circle of Hasan Basri and entered into friendly relations with Bashashar Ibn Burd. His wife was a sister of “Amr Ibn Ubayd Abu Uthman”, next to himself the most celebrated of the earliest Mutazila. His deviation from the views of Hasan Basri is said to have become the starting point of the Mu’tazila. Four theses are ascribed to him: Denial of God’s eternal qualities; the doctrine of free will, which he shared ####with the Qadarites; the doctrine that the Muslim who commits a mortal sin enters into a state intermediate between that of a Muslim and that of an unbeliever; the doctrine that one of the parties who took part in the murder of “Uthman” in the battle of the Camel and in that of Siffin, was wrong.

Works:
1- The meanings of the Quran
2- The sermons (on justice and monotheism)
3- Repentance
4- The dispute between him and Amr Ibn Ubayd (one of the first of the Mu’tazila; d. ca. 761)
5- The path towards knowing God
6- The categories of the scholars and ignorant people, etc.

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