ABSTRACT
Abu Qurrah is named as the adversary against whom the Muctazilite theologian, Isa ibn Sabih al-Murdar, wrote a refutation. In his Treatise on the Existence of God and the True Religion, Abu Qurrah evokes the image of a simple mountaineer who is forced by necessity to come down from his wild haunts to the civilization of the cities of the plain. Abu Qurrah, Abu Ra’itah, and Ammar each defend the credibility of the Christian religion by comparing it with the other contemporary religions and highlighting what they consider to be the superior qualities of Christianity. In this manner they hope to demonstrate that Christianity alone has an unimpeachable, naturally intelligible claim on human religious allegiance. The working out of this apologetic argument is built on the philosophical premise that human reason can discover the existence of the creator God, and then conclude that mankind is the highest expression of created values.
