The Murji'a: The Opposite Extreme on Faith and Works
The position that emerged opposite the Khawarij. The doctrine that iman is independent of works — that the major sinning Muslim retains full iman regardless of action. The mainstream Sunni position between these two extremes, and what it preserves about the relationship between belief and practice.
The Opposite Extreme
Yesterday's reading examined the Khawarij — the sect that held that grave sins remove a person from Islam. Today's reading examines what is in some ways the opposite extreme: the Murji'a, who held that grave sins do not affect iman at all. If the Khawarij made works necessary for iman to such a degree that any major sin destroyed iman, the Murji'a separated works from iman to such a degree that the gravest sins did not affect iman.
The two positions emerged in close historical proximity. As the Khariji position was developing in the late first and early second centuries AH, opposite responses were also developing. The Murji'a represented one of the major opposite responses. Where the Khawarij intensified the demands of iman to the point where ordinary Muslims could not meet them, the Murji'a relaxed the demands to the point where almost any external behaviour could coexist with full iman.
The mainstream Sunni position emerged between these two extremes. It is sometimes called the middle way or al-tariqah al-wusta — affirming that iman and works are connected (against the Murji'a) while denying that any specific sin removes a person from iman (against the Khawarij). The position is balanced precisely because it engages with both extremes; understanding it requires understanding the extremes it positions against.
This day's reading examines the Murji'a — what they held, why they emerged, what specific positions they articulated, and how the mainstream Sunni response addresses both their position and the Khariji position simultaneously.
The Origins of the Position
The word murji'a comes from the Arabic root raja'a, which can mean either to defer or to give hope. Both meanings are relevant to the school's name and to its position. The Murji'a deferred judgement on the eternal status of grave sinners (deferring it to Allah on the Day of Judgement rather than determining it in this life), and they gave hope to grave sinners (affirming that their iman was preserved despite their sins).
The historical context for the emergence of the Murji'a is significant. In the early period of the Umayyad caliphate, the Muslim community was deeply divided. The civil wars (fitan) between Ali and Mu'awiyah, between the supporters of various political factions, between the Khawarij and the broader community — all had produced situations where Muslims were in armed conflict with other Muslims, with both sides typically claiming Islamic legitimacy. The question of who was a Muslim in good standing — and who was not — was politically and socially urgent.
The Khawarij, as we examined yesterday, answered this question by ruling out anyone who fell short of their specific standards. The Murji'a answered it differently: they declined to make the judgement at all. They held that the question of who is a Muslim in good standing is for Allah to determine on the Day of Judgement; in this life, anyone who professes the basic creed (la ilaha illa Allah, Muhammad rasul Allah) is a believer regardless of what their actions might be.
This had specific political implications. If the believer's status before Allah is determined entirely by belief, then political conflicts between Muslims with different actions become less theologically loaded. Mu'awiyah's actions toward Ali (whatever they were) did not affect Mu'awiyah's iman; the Khawarij's actions toward Ali (which were extreme) did not affect their iman either, by Murji' analysis. The Murji'a effectively withdrew the theological dimension from political disputes, treating them as worldly matters to be resolved without theological judgement.
The political implications attracted some critics who argued that the Murji'a were primarily politically motivated — providing theological cover for the Umayyad caliphs and their supporters by affirming that their actions, however questionable, did not affect their standing as believers. This may have been a partial motivation, but the school developed substantial theological substance beyond merely political utility.
The Doctrinal Position
The core Murji' doctrine concerned the definition of iman (faith). Several specific positions developed:
The minimal definition of iman. The Murji'a typically held that iman consists of belief in the heart and verbal confession (tasdiq and iqrar), with action being separate. The standard Sunni position (which we will examine in detail below) held that iman includes belief, confession, and action — three components rather than two. The Murji' reduction to two components made iman substantially independent of action.
The non-affecting of iman by sin. Following from the minimal definition, the Murji'a held that sins do not diminish or affect iman. The believer who steals retains full iman; the believer who lies, who consumes alcohol, who fails to pray, who commits any major or minor sin retains full iman as long as the belief in the heart and the verbal confession remain. Iman is binary on this analysis — one either has it (in which case one is fully a believer) or one does not (in which case one is a kafir) — without intermediate states or degrees.
The certainty of paradise for any believer. A specific consequence of these positions was that any believer is, by Murji' analysis, certain to enter Paradise eventually. The grave sinner may face punishment for their sins, but they are still a believer; they will eventually enter Paradise after whatever punishment is required. The threat of eternal Hell applies only to kuffar, not to Muslims who have committed sins.
The independence of iman from action. The most extreme Murji' positions held that iman and action are entirely independent — that sins simply do not affect iman in any way. Less extreme Murji' positions allowed that sins might be displeasing to Allah without affecting the underlying iman. The variation across Murji' sub-groups was significant; some were close to mainstream Sunni positions, while others held the more extreme positions described above.
The doctrine of "iman al-fasiq" (the faith of the major sinner). This phrase captures the distinctive Murji' position — the major sinner has faith. The Khariji rejection of this position (claiming the major sinner does not have faith) and the Murji' affirmation of it (claiming the major sinner has full faith) form opposite poles. The mainstream Sunni position, as we will see, occupies the middle ground.
The Sub-Groups Within the Murji'a
The Murji'a were not a unified group; the position was held with various levels of intensity by different sub-groups, and the application of the underlying principles varied substantially.
The extreme Murji'a (al-Murji'a al-Ghulah). The most extreme Murji'a held that no actions at all affect iman; that the heart's faith is completely independent of any external behaviour; that even open disbelief (in action and word, while privately believing) might not affect the underlying iman. This extreme position effectively eliminated any practical content from the religion — what one believes is everything, what one does is nothing.
The moderate Murji'a. The moderate Murji'a held the basic position (that grave sin does not remove iman) without taking it to the extreme conclusion. They affirmed that actions matter — that some actions are required, that some are forbidden, that the believer should pursue obedience and avoid sin — while still holding that iman itself was independent of action in the foundational sense.
The Murji'at al-Fuqaha (the Murji'a of the Jurists). This was a specific sub-group, sometimes associated with Imam Abu Hanifa and his immediate followers, that held a moderated form of Murji' position. They held that iman consists of belief and confession (the Murji' minimal definition) but that works are required separately. The major sinner is a deficient believer who has failed in works while retaining basic iman. This position is closer to mainstream Sunni than the more extreme Murji' positions.
The position of Abu Hanifa specifically has been a matter of substantial classical discussion. He clearly distanced himself from the more extreme Murji' positions — affirming that grave sin is dangerous, that the believer should avoid it, that obedience is required. But he also distanced himself from the Khariji position, holding that the grave sinner remains a Muslim. His specific position, as preserved in his writings (particularly al-Fiqh al-Akbar), occupies a middle ground that some classical scholars have considered close to mainstream Sunni Islam and others have considered to fall within a moderate Murji' framework. The terminology has been disputed; the substance is closer to mainstream Sunni than to extreme Murji'.
Later non-extreme Murji'a. Various later figures, while not formally identified as Murji'a, have held positions on iman that have been described as having Murji' tendencies. The pattern of separating iman from action, treating iman as independent of behaviour, and minimising the religious significance of sin has appeared periodically across Islamic history.
The Mainstream Sunni Response
The mainstream Sunni position emerged across the second and third centuries AH as a response to both the Khariji and Murji' extremes. The position has several specific features.
Iman includes action. The mainstream Sunni position, articulated by figures including Imam Ahmad and the broader ahl al-hadith tradition, held that iman consists of three components: belief in the heart (tasdiq al-qalb), confession with the tongue (iqrar al-lisan), and action with the limbs (amal al-jawarih). This three-part definition stands against the Murji' two-part definition; it integrates action into iman itself rather than treating it as separate.
The classical evidence for this position drew extensively on Quranic verses that connect iman directly with action: "Indeed, those who believe and do righteous deeds..." (the formula appears repeatedly in the Quran), "Has not the time come for those who have believed that their hearts should be humbly submissive..." (57:16), and many others. The pattern in the Quran consistently links iman with specific actions; treating them as separate distorts the Quranic teaching.
The hadith literature also supports the integrated definition. The Prophet ﷺ said: "Iman is more than seventy branches; the highest is la ilaha illa Allah, and the lowest is removing harm from the road." The hadith presents iman as having multiple branches — including specific actions like removing harm from the road — rather than as belief alone with actions as separate matters.
Iman increases and decreases. Following from the three-part definition, the mainstream Sunni position holds that iman increases through obedience and decreases through sin. The Quran supports this: "That they may add faith to their faith" (48:4), "And when His verses are recited to them, it increases them in faith" (8:2), and others. The Prophet ﷺ also indicated this in various hadiths describing how specific actions strengthen or weaken iman.
This is a crucial point against the Murji' position. Iman is not binary; it varies in degree based on belief, confession, and action together. The Muslim with strong belief, sound confession, and consistent action has stronger iman than the Muslim with weak belief, perfunctory confession, and inconsistent action. Both are Muslims; their iman is at different levels.
Grave sin reduces iman without removing it. This is the position that distinguishes mainstream Sunni from both the Khawarij and the Murji'a. Against the Khawarij: grave sin does not remove iman; the major sinning Muslim is still a Muslim. Against the Murji'a: grave sin does affect iman; the major sinning Muslim has deficient iman, not full iman.
The mainstream position holds that the grave sinner is in a specific spiritual state — they remain a Muslim, are entitled to the rights of Muslims, are included in the community of believers — but their iman is deficient and they are in a state of spiritual danger. They face possible punishment for the sin (in this life through repentance and consequence, or in the next life through the punishment of the Fire). They face possible forgiveness through repentance, through Allah's mercy, through intercession on the Day of Judgement, or through the punishment fulfilling its purpose. Their ultimate fate is not eternal Hell (because they are Muslim), but they are subject to whatever punishment Allah determines short of eternal Hell.
The believer should fear and hope simultaneously. A specific feature of the mainstream Sunni position is that it produces appropriate fear and hope simultaneously. The Khariji extreme produced fear without hope (the believer who has any major sin is doomed); the Murji' extreme produced hope without fear (the believer is fine regardless of action). The mainstream position produces both. The believer fears Allah's punishment for their sins (because sins really do produce real consequences) while hoping for Allah's mercy and forgiveness (because the sin does not destroy their underlying iman).
This balanced fear-and-hope orientation is what we examined on Day 75 — the integrated raja and khawf that the Quran consistently presents as the appropriate believer's orientation. Its theoretical grounding is the mainstream Sunni position on iman and works that we are examining today.
The Significance for Practice
The mainstream Sunni position has specific practical significance for how Muslims should engage with their own religious lives and with other Muslims.
For one's own religious life. The believer should take their sins seriously. They are not theological irrelevances that do not affect anything; they are real failures that produce real spiritual consequences. The believer should pursue avoidance of major sin, repent quickly when they fall, and recognise that their iman is being affected by their actions. At the same time, they should not despair — their sins, however serious, do not put them outside Islam, and they retain access to Allah's mercy through repentance.
For engagement with other Muslims. The believer should avoid both extremes. They should not declare other Muslims to be disbelievers based on their sins (the Khariji error). They should also not affirm that other Muslims' sins are theologically irrelevant (the Murji' error). They should recognise that fellow Muslims are Muslims, even when sinning; that the sin is real and should be addressed; that the proper response is typically educational and supportive rather than excommunicatory; and that the ultimate accounting belongs to Allah.
For one's expectations of community. The Muslim community will always include people at different levels of iman and practice. Some will be exemplary; some will be struggling; some will be falling into serious sin. The mainstream position holds that this is the actual situation of the ummah — not the pure community of saints that the Khawarij imagined, not the community where all are equivalently saved that the Murji'a implied. The ummah is a community of believers in various states of practice, all included in the community while being at varying levels of religious health.
What This Teaches
Several lessons emerge.
The Middle Way Is Substantive
The mainstream Sunni position is not a vague split-the-difference compromise. It is a specific theological substance that affirms what each extreme denies. Against the Khawarij: iman is not destroyed by sin. Against the Murji'a: iman is affected by action. The middle position has more substance than either extreme.
Faith and Action Are Connected
The Murji' separation of iman from action distorts the Quranic teaching. Across the Quran, iman and action are consistently connected — the believer is the one who believes and acts on belief. Treating them as separate produces theological distortion that has practical consequences (encouraging laxity in action while preserving theoretical iman).
Sin Is Serious But Not Decisive
The mainstream position takes sin seriously without making it decisive. Grave sin is dangerous; it should be feared and avoided; it has real spiritual consequences. But it does not destroy the believer's underlying iman or remove them from the community. This balance — taking sin seriously without making any specific sin determinative — is what produces both healthy fear and healthy hope.
Avoiding Extremes Requires Substance
Avoiding both the Khariji and Murji' extremes is not a matter of vague centrism. It requires specific positive content — the three-part definition of iman, the doctrine of iman as varying in degree, the specific position on grave sinners. Without this positive content, attempts to avoid extremes can drift into either extreme; the positive content provides the substance that holds the middle.
The Modern Murji' Tendency
A specific feature of contemporary Muslim discourse worth noting is what might be called the Murji' tendency — patterns that, while not formally identified as Murji'a, exhibit specific features that classical analysis would recognise as Murji' in character.
The "as long as the heart is good" pattern. A common contemporary expression — "as long as the heart is good" — is sometimes used to dismiss the religious significance of specific failures in practice. The Muslim who fails to pray, who consumes alcohol, who engages in riba, may be defended (by themselves or others) on the grounds that "their heart is good" and therefore the failures don't really matter. This is a contemporary version of the Murji' separation of belief from practice. The mainstream Sunni position rejects it: a heart that is genuinely good would not produce the actions that are being defended; the actions are themselves evidence about the state of the heart.
The "judging belongs to Allah" pattern. Another common pattern uses the truth that ultimate judgement belongs to Allah to dismiss any contemporary engagement with religious failures. The truth is real — Allah is the ultimate Judge, and the believer should not assume specific knowledge about the eternal status of others. But the mainstream tradition has not held that this truth means contemporary believers should be silent about religious failures or that the religious significance of sin should be minimised in this life. The Quran and sunnah are full of guidance about what is right and wrong, what should be encouraged and what should be discouraged. Treating "Allah will judge" as a comprehensive answer that prevents engagement with religious failures is a Murji'-style position.
The "we don't know what's in their heart" pattern. Similarly, the truth that humans cannot know what is in another person's heart is sometimes used to suggest that observable failures don't really tell us anything about a person's religious state. The Quran addresses this directly: failures in observable practice are themselves evidence about the underlying state. While we don't have access to the heart directly, the actions we observe are not irrelevant — they are precisely the kind of evidence the Prophet ﷺ taught us to attend to.
The "saved sect" complacency pattern. The famous hadith about the Muslim community dividing into 73 sects, with all but one in the Fire, has been understood by mainstream Sunni scholarship as indicating that maintaining sound iman and proper practice is a serious matter requiring active engagement. A Murji'-tendency reading sometimes treats the same hadith complacently — we are the saved sect, therefore we don't need to worry too much about specific failures. The mainstream reading is the opposite: the saved sect is identified specifically by maintaining what the Prophet ﷺ and his Companions held to, which requires sustained active engagement, not passive complacency.
These contemporary patterns are not always identified as Murji'-tendencies by those who hold them; they often arise organically from contemporary cultural pressures (the desire to avoid being judgmental, the discomfort with traditional religious accountability, the influence of broader secular frameworks on religious thinking). But the patterns share specific features with classical Murji' positions and produce similar practical consequences — separating belief from practice, treating religious failures as theologically inconsequential, minimising the urgency of religious obedience.
For modern Muslims, recognising these patterns is corrective. The mainstream Sunni position takes sin seriously while not treating any specific sin as determinative. The patterns identified above slide too far toward not taking sin seriously; the corrective is the substantive mainstream position that affirms both the seriousness of sin and the preservation of iman through it.
The Hadith of the Seventy-Three Sects
A specific hadith deserves separate attention because of its relevance to this entire week's content. The Prophet ﷺ said, in a hadith preserved through multiple chains: "The Jews split into seventy-one sects, and the Christians split into seventy-two sects, and my community will split into seventy-three sects, all of them in the Fire except one." In a variant transmission, when asked which one is saved, the Prophet ﷺ said: "That which is upon what I and my Companions are upon today."
The hadith has been the subject of substantial classical commentary. Several specific features are worth noting.
The number is approximate, not precise. The classical commentators have generally held that the specific number (73) is not meant as a precise count but as an indication of substantial division. Counting the actual sects in Islamic history produces different totals depending on how one counts; the hadith does not require a specific census.
The criterion for the saved sect. The criterion the Prophet ﷺ provided — "that which is upon what I and my Companions are upon today" — is methodological. The saved sect is identified by adherence to what the Prophet ﷺ and his Companions held. This becomes the test: does a specific group's positions match what the Prophet ﷺ and the Companions held? The classical Sunni argument is that the mainstream Sunni positions are precisely those that align with the prophetic and companion positions; departures from these are departures from the saved sect.
The relationship to specific sects. Classical scholars have applied this hadith to the historical sects we are examining this week. The Khawarij, the various extreme Murji'a, the extreme Mu'tazila, and others were typically classified by mainstream Sunni scholarship as among the "seventy-two" — groups that had departed in some way from what the Prophet ﷺ and the Companions held. The Sunni mainstream identified itself with the saved sect.
The seriousness of doctrinal correctness. The hadith establishes that doctrinal correctness matters. The believer cannot be casual about which positions they hold; getting it wrong has consequences. This is corrective for both the Khariji and Murji' tendencies — both treat doctrinal positions as if they had absolute weight (the Khawarij about action; the Murji'a about belief alone) while neglecting other dimensions. The mainstream position takes the integrated whole seriously — both correct belief and correct practice — because both are part of what the Prophet ﷺ and the Companions held.
The mercy in the warning. The hadith is not despair-inducing if read properly. It is a warning that calls the believer to specific orientation — to stay close to what the Prophet ﷺ and the Companions held, which is precisely what the mainstream Sunni tradition preserves. The believer who attaches themselves seriously to this tradition has substantial protection against the divisions the hadith describes.
For modern Muslims, this hadith provides framing for the entire pattern of the week's content. Each of the early controversies represented a divergence from what the Prophet ﷺ and the Companions held; the mainstream Sunni response was to identify and articulate what they held. The result is the orthodox tradition that we have inherited — not as arbitrary positions but as the specific articulation of prophetic and companion teaching against various early divergences.
A Closing Reflection
The Murji'a represented one extreme response to the Khariji position. Both extremes were rejected by the broader Sunni community, but the rejection was not symmetrical. The Murji' separation of iman from action has had perhaps more pervasive influence than the Khariji extreme; while few Muslims today identify as Khawarij, many hold positions that have Murji' tendencies — separating belief from practice, treating sin as theologically inconsequential, assuming that profession of belief is sufficient regardless of action.
For modern Muslims, the proper position requires both rejection of both extremes and substantive engagement with the mainstream Sunni position. The believer who treats their faith and practice as integrated, who recognises that sin really does affect their spiritual state, who maintains both fear and hope, is operating in the framework that the mainstream Sunni tradition has consistently affirmed. The believer who separates belief from practice, who treats sin as not really affecting their standing, who emphasises hope without sufficient fear, is drifting toward the Murji' position even if they do not identify with it explicitly.
May Allah preserve us from both extremes — the Khariji extreme that destroys the bonds of the ummah through inappropriate takfir, and the Murji' extreme that empties practice of its religious significance. May He grant us the integrated understanding of iman that the mainstream tradition has preserved — affirming the unity of belief and action, recognising sin as real and consequential without making any specific sin determinative, holding fear and hope in balanced relationship. Amin.