The _Mu`tazilites_ of whom _Wasil b. `Ata_ (d. 131) is generally regarded as the founder, were a sect of rationalistic tendencies, and they were opposed to the doctrine of the eternity of the Qur´an and the claim that it was uncreated because the conclusions to be drawn seemed to them to introduce distinct personalities corresponding to the persons of the Christian Trinity, and in these views they were undoubtedly influenced by the form in which St. John Damascene presented the doctrine of the Trinity. As it was implied that there was an attribute of wisdom possessed by God which was not a thing created by God but eternally with him, and this wisdom may be conceived as not absolutely identical with God but possessed by him, the Mu`tazilites argued that it was something co-eternal with God but other than God, and so an eternal Qur´an was a second person of the Godhead and God was not absolutely one. Al-Muzdar, a Mu`tazilite greatly revered as an ascetic, expressly denounces those who believe in an eternal Qur´an as ditheists. The Mu`tazilites called themselves _Ahlu t-Tawhid wa-l-`Adl_ “the people of unity and justice,” the first part of this title implying that they alone were consistent defenders of the doctrine of the Divine Unity.
(b) As to the freedom or otherwise of the human will, the Qur´an is perfectly definite in its assertion of God’s omnipotence and omniscience: all things are known to him and ruled by him, and so human acts and the rewards and punishments due to men must be included: “no misfortune happens either on earth or in yourselves but we made it,--it was in the book” (Qur. 57. 22); “everything have We set down in the clear book of our decrees” (Qur. 36); “had We pleased We had certainly given to every soul its guidance, but true is the word which hath gone forth from me,--I shall surely fill hell with jinn and men together.” (Qur. 32. 13). Yet the appeal for moral conduct implies a certain responsibility, and consequently freedom, on man’s part. In the mind of the Prophet, no doubt, the inconsistency between moral obligations and responsibility on the one hand, and the unlimited power of God on the other, had not been perceived, but towards the end of the `Umayyad period these were pressed to their logical conclusions. On the one side were the _Qadarites_ (_qadr_ “power”), the advocates of free will. This doctrine first appears in the teaching of _Ma´bad al-Yuhani_ (d. 80 A.H.) who is said to have been the pupil of the Persian Sinbuya and taught in Damascus. Very little is known of the early Qadarites, but it is stated that Sinbuya was put to death by the Khalif `Abdu l-Malik, and that the Khalif Yazid II. (102-106 A.H.) favoured their views. On the other side were the _Jabarites_ (_jabr_, “compulsion”) who preached strict determinism and were founded by the Persian _Jahm b. Safwan_ (d. circ. 130). It is baseless to argue that either free will or determinism were necessarily due to Persian pre-Islamic beliefs, it is evident that the logical deduction of doctrinal theology in either direction was done by Persians; they were, indeed, the theologians of early Islam. It must be noted that the full development of fatalism was not reached until a full century after the foundation of Islam and that its first exponent was put to death as a heretic.