Key term
OCR A-Level Religious Studies H573
Philosophy of Religion
Topic overviewPlato: the Forms and the analogy of the caveAristotle: the four causes and the Prime MoverSoul, mind and bodyThe teleological argumentThe cosmological argumentAnselm and the ontological argumentKant's criticisms of the ontological argumentReligious experienceThe problem of evilOmnipotence, omniscience and benevolenceEternity, foreknowledge and free willReligious language: via negativa, analogy and symbolVerification and falsificationLanguage games and non-cognitive approaches
Religion and Ethics
Topic overviewAquinas and the precepts of natural lawApplying and evaluating natural lawFletcher's propositions and working principlesApplying and evaluating situation ethicsThe categorical imperativeDuty, the summum bonum and evaluationUtilitarianismEuthanasiaBusiness ethicsEthical language and meta-ethicsConscienceSexual ethics
Developments in Christian ThoughtReligion
Topic overviewAugustine on human natureDeath and the afterlifeKnowledge of God's existenceThe person of Jesus ChristChristian moral principlesChristian moral action: Dietrich BonhoefferReligious pluralism and theologyReligious pluralism and societyGender and societyGender and theology: Ruether and DalyThe challenge of secularismLiberation theology and Marx
Developments in Islamic ThoughtReligion
Topic overviewProphecy and revelation in IslamHadith, Sira and the formation of Sunni and Shi'a IslamThe oneness of God (tawhid)Human destiny, the afterlife and divine willThe Shari'a and Islamic law in practiceSufism and Islamic spiritualityIslam, science and philosophyGender in Islam: equality, law and feminismTolerance, religious freedom and apostasyJustice, jihad and liberationIslam and the stateIslam in Europe
Developments in Jewish ThoughtReligion
Topic overviewJewish oral and written lawCovenant in the TorahMaimonides and the Thirteen PrinciplesDebate over the Principles and Jewish beliefSuffering and messianic hopeKashrut and the dietary lawsBusiness ethics and sexual ethics in halakhahConversion to JudaismThe Haskalah and Jewish emancipationZionismThe land of Israel and the modern stateJewish feminism: Plaskow and AdlerResponses to the HolocaustThe Holocaust and the problem of evilChagall: art as resistance
Developments in Buddhist ThoughtReligion
Topic overviewThe Buddha: Siddhartha's life and intellectual contextTaking refuge: the Three JewelsSamsara, kamma and rebirthThe three marks of existenceThe Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold PathBuddhist meditationThe development of Mahayana BuddhismMadhyamaka and the perfection of wisdomZen and Pure Land BuddhismBuddhism in the WestEngaged Buddhism and social activismBuddhism and gender
Developments in Hindu ThoughtReligion
Topic overviewOrigins and diversity in HinduismHindu scriptures and holy personsBrahman, atman and mokshaSamsara, karma and liberationDharma and adharmaVarnashramadharma and Hindu virtuesVedanta and its schoolsIs Hinduism a single religion?Hinduism and IndiaHinduism and the WestCaste, gender and discriminationHindu social reform movements
Developments in Islamic Thought
The oneness of God (tawhid)
- 1 thing to know
- Component 3
Overview
Recall questions on tawhid, the Qur'an on God's unity and incomparability, the kalam cosmological argument, the Qur'anic arguments from design and against more than one God, the Mu'tazilite, Ash'arite and Hanbali approaches to anthropomorphic descriptions of God, and why speculative theology has been distrusted.
What you need to know
Answer each one before you reveal it.
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Questions from this subtopic
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- 1
What do Muslims mean by tawhid?
Model answer
Tawhid is the affirmation that God is one, in a strong sense: one in being, with no partner, no offspring and no rival; one in lordship, so that nothing else creates or sustains; and one in worship, so that nothing else may be worshipped. Muslims also hold that God is one in a way that admits no internal division or parts. Tawhid is the first and organising doctrine of Islam, and its denial, shirk, the association of anything with God, is treated as the gravest sin.
- 2
What does the short chapter of the Qur'an on divine unity establish about God?
Model answer
It makes four compressed claims: that God is one; that He is self-sufficient and the one to whom everything else turns in need; that He neither fathers nor is fathered; and that nothing whatever is equivalent to Him. Muslims treat it as a summary of the whole doctrine of God, and it is recited constantly in prayer. Its denial of begetting is also read as ruling out the Christian claim that Jesus is God's son.
- 3
How does the Qur'an combine the claim that God is beyond comparison with the claim that He hears and sees?
Model answer
One much-cited passage denies in the same breath that anything resembles God and affirms that He is hearing and seeing. Muslim theologians read this as setting the terms of the whole debate about God: the attributes revealed in scripture are real and must be affirmed, yet none of them may be understood as they are in creatures. The passage is therefore used both by those insisting on God's transcendence and by those insisting that His attributes are genuine.
- 4
What is the kalam cosmological argument as Muslim theologians developed it?
Model answer
It argues that whatever begins to exist must have a cause; that the universe began to exist, since an actually infinite series of past events is impossible; and that the universe therefore has a cause, which must be an uncaused, eternal being with will, since only a chooser could bring a temporal world out of an eternal state of affairs. Its scriptural anchor is the Qur'an's repeated appeal to the making of the heavens and the earth and the turning of night into day as signs for people who think. Al-Ghazali is among its best-known exponents.
- 5
How does the Qur'an present an argument from design, and what example does it use?
Model answer
The Qur'an invites attention to ordered processes in nature as evidence of a purposeful maker. The best-known instance describes the stages by which a human being is formed, from an origin in clay through a series of transformations in the womb, concluding with praise of God as the finest of creators. The argument is that a sequence this orderly and productive of something so complex points to deliberate design rather than accident. Muslims also note that the passage encourages the study of nature rather than discouraging it.
- 6
Explain the Qur'anic argument against there being more than one God.
Model answer
A Qur'anic passage argues that if the heavens and the earth contained gods other than God, both would collapse into ruin. Muslim theologians unpacked this as the argument from mutual obstruction: two beings each of whom is genuinely omnipotent could will incompatible states of affairs, and then either one is thwarted, in which case he is not omnipotent, or neither can act. Since the universe in fact exhibits a single consistent order, there is one will behind it. Omnipotence, on this view, cannot be shared.
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