ABSTRACT
This chapter considers whether the austere fideism of the traditionalist sort poses any real challenge to the legitimacy of philosophically investigating Islamic belief. It assesses whether, from a Muslim perspective, traditionalist fideism offers the graduate students any good reasons to forego a philosophical investigation of Islam. Ibn Qudama's first and main argument against the permissibility of engaging in speculative theology consists of an appeal to the three-tiered authority of the Qur'an, Sunnah and scholarly consensus. For Ibn Qudama, the joint authority of the Qur'an, the Sunnah and scholarly consensus constitutes a decisive condemnation and refutation of the claim that engaging in speculative theology is permissible from an Islamic perspective. In his treatise, Ibn Qudama offers an argument against the speculative theologians who maintain that people require rational proof by way of ijtihad upon which to ground their religious beliefs, as opposed to simply following religious authority.
