Ontology of Divine Attributes from Perspective of Kalam Scholars of the Baghdad School

In kalam discussions, discussing ontology of attributes especially relation of divine essence and attributes is a very important and controversial subject. In this essay we have examined viewpoint of scholars of Imāmiyya in the Baghdad school- because of their serious effect in kalam of Imāmiyya and the interatction of kalam of Imāmiyya and Muʿtazila in this period- on this subject. All kalam scholars of Imāmiyya in the Baghdad school like Muʿtazila denied excessive attributes on essence; nonetheless, there was discord among them regarding the acceptance of the theory of aḥwāl which Abū Hāshim al-Jubbāʾī had put forward. Although al-Shaykh al-Mufīd explicitly opposed Abū Hāshim’s theory of aḥwāl on this subject, al-Sayyid al-Murtaḍā alignedly with Muʿtazilīs following Abū Hāshim, like Qāḍī Abd al-Jabbār, accepted the theory of aḥwāl. Other kalam scholars of the Baghdad school like al-Shaykh al-Ṭūsī and al-Karājukī took a stance with uncertainty on this subject.