How can I verify what Wikipedia's Ash'arism article used to say?

Each snapshot on this page links the Wikipedia revision it came from, so you can open their own history and compare. We also keep our own copy of the text, which stays readable if the article changes again.

How Wikipedia rewrote the Ash'arism article

Q: How has Wikipedia's Ash'arism article changed?

In 2005 Wikipedia's first sentence called it "instrumental in drastically changing the direction of islamic philosophy". Today it says "regarded as the single most important school of islamic theology in the history of islam". We saved the article's opening at 6 moments between 2005 and 2025, and every claim links the exact revision.

The opening as it read in 2005

The Asharite school of early Muslim philosophy were instrumental in drastically changing the direction of Islamic philosophy , separating its development drastically from that of philosophy in the Christian world. It was founded by the theologian Abu l'Hasan al-Ashari (d. 945 ) who gave it its name. In contrast to the Mutazilite school of Greek-inspired philosophers, the Asharite view was that comprehension of unique nature and characteristics of God were beyond human capability. And that, while man had free will , he had no power to create anything. It was an ignorance-based view which did not assume that human reason could discern morality. Despite being named for Ashari, the most influential thinker of this school's thought was " The Incoherence of the Philosophers ", by the Muslim polymath Al-Ghazali (d. 1111 ). He laid the groundwork to "shut the door of ijtihad " centuries later in the Ottoman Empire . This is one of the most influential works ever produced. Ibn Rushd , a rationalist, famously responded that "to say that philosophers are incoherent is itself to make an incoherent statement." and even wrote a book "The Incoherence of the Incoherence" to refute Al-Ghazali's views, though the work was not well received in the Muslim community. His The Revival of the Religious Sciences in Islam was the cornerstone of the school's thinking, and combined theology , skepticism , mysticism , Islam and other conceptions, discussed in depth in the article on Islamic philosophy . His mode of thought was the standard in the Ottoman Empire . When Ataturk sought to separate Turkey from dominance of religious thought in 1922 he changed the script used in the Turkic language from Arab calligraphy to the Latin script, and forbade translations of some works, including Al-Ghazali's. Such was the power of his thinking over eight centuries later. Even today, with a moderate Islamic party in power in Turkey, challenging some of Ataturk's doctrine, taking positions on international affairs based on foundations of thought laid by Al-Ghazili, he influences. Two other philosophers influential in the rise of the Asharite school were: Fakhr al-Din Razi (d. 1209 ) was a Persian mathematician, physicist, physician, philosopher, and a master of Kalam - the school of early Muslim philosophy that focused on the application of ijtihad and questioning to develop fiqh or jurisprudence. He wrote an encyclopedia of science, which was influential, and a later referent for such modern efforts as the Islamization of knowledge , which have similar intention. Ibn Khaldun (d. 1406 ) was an historian, pedagogue, philosopher particularly interested in history and sociology. The Muqadimmah is still referenced today in these fields. Other works of universal history from al-Tabri , al-Masudi , al-Athir , and Khaldun himself, were quite influential in what we now call archaeology and ethnology . Other than Khaldun, these were not Asharites, but worked in a relatively modern style that historians of the present would recognize. At the time, 13th century , the Christian world was simply not authoring honest histories, and the investigation of other cultures was a Muslim monopoly. As Muhammad himself had put it: "Seek knowledge, even as far as China ." The Asharites took this instruction literally. A critical spirit of inquiry was far from absent in the Asharite school. Rather, what they lacked, was a trust in reason itself, separate from a moral code , to decide what experiments or what knowledge to pursue. The modern sociology of knowledge could reasonably be said to be based firmly on Asharite views, as illustrated by modern experiences of science without ethics. The influence of the Asharites is still hotly debate today. Most agree that the Asharites put an end to philosophy as such in the Muslim world, but permitted these methods to continue to be applied to science and technology. The 12th-to-14th century marked the peak of innovation in Muslim civilization. During this period many remarkable achievements of engineering and social organization were made, and the ulema began to generate a fiqh based on taqlid ("blind imitation") rather than on the old ijtihad. Eventually, however, modern historians think that lack of improvements in basic processes and confusion with theology and law degraded methods: Ironically, the rigorous means by which the Asharites had reached their conclusions were largely forgotten by Muslims before The Renaissance , due in large part to the success of their effort to subordinate inquiry to a prior ethics - and assume ignorance was the norm for humankind. Modern commentators blame or laud Asharites for curtailing much of the Arab world's innovation in sciences and technology, then ( 12th century to 14th century ) leading the world. This innovation was not in general revived in the West until The Renaissance , and emergence of scientific method - which ironically was based on traditional Islamic methods of ijtihad (open inquiry) and isnah (backing or scientific citation ). The Asharites did not reject these, amongst the ulema or learned, but they stifled these in the mosque and discouraged their application by the lay public. It was a drastic shift in historical initiative, foreshadowing later loss of Muslim Spain and the discovery of the Western Hemisphere - both in 1492 . But the decisive influence was most likely that of the new Ottoman Empire , which found the Asharite views politically useful, and were to a degree taking the advantages of Islamic technologies, sciences, and openness for granted. Which, for some centuries after as the Ottomans pushed forth into Europe, they were able to do - losing those advantages gradually up until The Enlightenment when European innovation simply overwhelmed that of the Muslims. The Asharites may have succeeded in laying the groundwork for a stable empire, and for subordinating philosophy as a process to fixed notions of ethics derived directly from Islam - perhaps this even improved the quality of life of average citizens. But it seems the historical impact was to yield the initiative of Western civilization to Christians in Europe. See also : Mutazilite , kalam , Early Muslim philosophy , Islamic philosophy , Islamization of knowledge¹

This is Wikipedia's own text, saved in our repository. Their copy of it is revision 16065159.

The opening as it stood in 2010 39 passages from the previous snapshot no longer appear

The Ashʿari theology ( Arabic الأشاعرة al-asha`irah ) is a school of early Muslim speculative theology founded by the theologian Abu al-Hasan al-Ash'ari (d. 324 AH / 936 AD). The disciples of the school are known as Ash'arites , and the school is also referred to as Ash'arite school . It was instrumental in drastically changing the direction of Islamic theology , separating its development radically from that of theology in the Christian world.

Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 370891054.

The opening as it stood in 2015 2 passages from the previous snapshot no longer appear

Ash'arism or Ashʿari theology ( / æ ʃ ə ˈ r iː / ; al-Asha`riyya or الأشاعرة al-Ashā`irah ) is an early theological school of Islam ( Sunni in particular) founded by Imam Abu al-Hasan al-Ash'ari (d. 324 AH / 936 AD). The disciples of the school are known as Ash'arites , and the school is also referred to as the Ash'arite school . Some people mistakenly relate Ash'arism to Sufism ; the two refer to different things. The school arose mainly as a response to the Mu'tazila school of thought and some of their beliefs which to some Muslims seemed strange and against previously held opinions. On the other hand, this new movement made a big shift for Islam. This new school became a base in educating Islam as a religion, as it depends on rationalism in understanding Islam from Quran and Hadith . Ash'arites state that Islamic faith is based on the usage of the mind. With the prevalence of present-day globalization it became noticed that Ash'arism is refuted and attacked by some Salafi extremists as they reject the concept of depending on the mind as a basic way for understanding the Quran. Tabyin Kadhib al-Muftari fima Nussiba ila al-Imam al-Ash`ari ( Ibn 'Asakir )

Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 669322696.

The opening as it stood in 2020 8 passages from the previous snapshot no longer appear

Ash'arism or Ashʿari theology ( / æ ʃ ə ˈ r iː / ; al-ʾAšʿarīyah or ٱلْأَشَاعِرَة al-ʾAšāʿirah ) is the foremost theological school of Sunni Islam which established an orthodox dogmatic guideline based on clerical authority, founded by the Arab theologian Abu al-Hasan al-Ashʿari (d. 936 / AH 324). The disciples of the school are known as Ashʿarites , and the school is also referred to as the Ashʿarite school , which became the dominant theological school within Sunni Islam. It is considered one of the orthodox schools of theology in Sunni Islam, alongside the Maturidi school and Athari school of theology. Amongst the most famous Ashʿarites are Al-Ghazali , Izz al-Din ibn 'Abd al-Salam , Al-Suyuti , Ibn 'Asakir , and Al-Subki . Lebanese Salafis Between the Gulf and Europe . Theology and Creed in Sunni Islam .

Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 959452796.

The opening as it stood on October 6, 2023 4 passages from the previous snapshot no longer appear

Sunni school of Islamic theology "Ash'ari" redirects here. Ashʿarism or Ashʿarī theology ( / æ ʃ ə ˈ r iː / ; : al-ʾAshʿarīyah ) is one of the main Sunnī schools of Islamic theology , founded by the Arab Muslim scholar , Shāfiʿī jurist , reformer ( mujaddid ), and scholastic theologian Abū al-Ḥasan al-Ashʿarī in the 9th–10th century. It established an orthodox guideline based on scriptural authority , rationality , and theological rationalism . Al-Ashʿarī established a middle way between the doctrines of the Atharī and Muʿtazila schools of Islamic theology, based both on reliance on the sacred scriptures of Islam and theological rationalism concerning the agency and attributes of God . Ashʿarism eventually became the predominant school of theological thought within Sunnī Islam, and is regarded as the single most important school of Islamic theology in the history of Islam . The disciples of the Ashʿarī school are known as Ashʿarites , and the school is also referred to as the Ashʿarite school , which became one of the dominant theological schools within Sunnī Islam. Ashʿarī theology is considered one of the orthodox creeds of Sunnī Islam, alongside the Atharī and Māturīdī . Amongst the most famous Ashʿarite theologians are Imam Nawawi , Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani , Ibn al-Jawzi , al-Ghazali , al-Suyuti , Izz al-Din ibn 'Abd al-Salam , Fakhr al-Din al-Razi , Ibn 'Asakir , al-Subki , al-Taftazani , al-Baqillani and al-Bayhaqi . Scholars and scientists who were affiliated with the Ashari school included Al-Biruni , Ibn al-Haytham , Ibn al-Nafis , Ibn Battuta and Ibn Khaldun . In Madelung, Wilferd; Daftary, Farhad (eds.). "Part I: Islamic Theologies during the Formative and the Early Middle period – Between Cordoba and Nīsābūr: The Emergence and Consolidation of Ashʿarism (Fourth–Fifth/Tenth–Eleventh Century)" . In Schmidtke, Sabine (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Theology . Journal of the American Oriental Society . 109 (1). The New Encyclopedia of Islam (3rd Revised ed.). In Frank, Richard M.; Gutas, Dimitri (eds.). Early Islamic Theology: The Muʿtazilites and al-Ashʿarī . "Early Mamlūk Ashʿarism against Ibn Taymiyya on the Nonliteral Reinterpretation ( taʾwīl ) of God's Attributes" . In Shihadeh, Ayman; Thiele, Jan (eds.). "Theology and Law in Islam." (1976): 304-306. Ethical theories in Islam. Lebanese Salafis Between the Gulf and Europe . Ibn Khaldun on Philosophy: After clarifying what was meant precisely by philosophy in the Islamic tradition, namely the various schools of peripatetic philosophy represented either by Ibn Rushd or Ibn Sina, it should be clear why Ibn Khaldun was opposed to them.

Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 1174874490.

The opening as it stood in 2025 1 passage from the previous snapshot no longer appear

Sunni school of Islamic theology "Ash'ari" redirects here. Calligraphy of al-Ash'ari's name Ash'arism ( / æ ʃ ə ˈ r iː / ; Arabic : الأشعرية , romanized : al-Ashʿariyya ) is a school of theology in Sunni Islam named after Abu al-Hasan al-Ash'ari , a Sunni jurist , reformer ( mujaddid ), and scholastic theologian , in the 9th–10th century. It established an orthodox guideline, based on scriptural authority , rationality , and theological rationalism . It is one of the three main schools alongside Maturidism and Atharism . Al-Ash'aris Knowledge was based both on reliance on the sacred scriptures of Islam and theological rationalism concerning the agency and attributes of God . Ashʿarism eventually became the predominant school of theological thought within Sunnī Islam, and is regarded as the single most important school of Islamic theology in the history of Islam . The disciples of the Ash'ari school are known as Ashʿarites , and the school is also referred to as the Ashʿarite school , which became one of the dominant theological schools within Sunnī Islam. Ash'ari theology is considered one of the orthodox creeds of Sunnī Islam, alongside the Atharī and Māturīdī . Amongst the most famous Ashʿarite theologians are al-Nawawi , Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani , Ibn al-Jawzi , al-Ghazali , al-Suyuti , Izz al-Din ibn 'Abd al-Salam , Fakhr al-Din al-Razi , Ibn 'Asakir , al-Subki , al-Taftazani , al-Baqillani , and al-Bayhaqi . Scholars and scientists who were affiliated with the Ash'ari school included al-Biruni , Ibn al-Haytham , Ibn al-Nafis , Ibn Battuta , and Ibn Khaldun . An Islamic philosopher who was particularly attacked by the Ashʿari school is Avicenna , on various accounts, notably his philosophical theology, his logic and his physics. In Madelung, Wilferd; Daftary, Farhad (eds.). "Part I: Islamic Theologies during the Formative and the Early Middle period – Between Cordoba and Nīsābūr: The Emergence and Consolidation of Ashʿarism (Fourth–Fifth/Tenth–Eleventh Century)" . In Schmidtke, Sabine (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Theology . Journal of the American Oriental Society . 109 (1). The New Encyclopedia of Islam (3rd Revised ed.). In Frank, Richard M.; Gutas, Dimitri (eds.). Early Islamic Theology: The Muʿtazilites and al-Ashʿarī . "Early Mamlūk Ashʿarism against Ibn Taymiyya on the Nonliteral Reinterpretation ( taʾwīl ) of God's Attributes" . In Shihadeh, Ayman; Thiele, Jan (eds.). "Theology and Law in Islam." (1976): 304-306. Ethical theories in Islam. Lebanese Salafis Between the Gulf and Europe . Ibn Khaldun on Philosophy: After clarifying what was meant precisely by philosophy in the Islamic tradition, namely the various schools of peripatetic philosophy represented either by Ibn Rushd or Ibn Sina, it should be clear why Ibn Khaldun was opposed to them. "Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī’s Platonist Account of the Essence of Time" In: Ayman Shihadeh and Jan Thiele (eds.) Philosophical Theology in Islam. Later Ashʿarism East and West .

Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 1298185527. This is our newest snapshot; the live article may have moved again since.

What Wikipedia says this is