We read and hear about the people of Kalam and the philosophers from many scholars. Who are these people, and what is the Kalam attributed to them?

The questioner : The questioner, M. K. J., says: May the Shaykh be respected, we read and hear about the people of Kalam and the philosophers from many scholars. Who are these people, and what is the Kalam attributed to them? I ask for your guidance in this matter. May Allah reward you with good.

The Shaykh : The guidance in this matter is that the people of Kalam are those who relied on reason in establishing the creed. They said that whatever reason necessitates establishing regarding the attributes of Allah (Mighty and Majestic) and the creed is established, and whatever reason does not necessitate establishing is not established. They follow one of two paths in this. If they can attack this evidence, meaning the establishment of this evidence, they attack it. So if there is a hadith indicating one of the attributes of Allah that they do not affirm, they try to attack the hadith so that they can say it is not authentic and cannot be relied upon, as one does not rely on anything other than what is authentic.
The second path is that if the evidence is sound in terms of its establishment, they try to deny it in terms of interpretation. They interpret it with various types of cold interpretations that do not benefit the truth in any way. For example, there are innovators who do not affirm that Allah the Exalted is described with mercy. It is known that the Qur'an is full of this attribute for Allah (Mighty and Majestic), such as His saying: and His saying: . There are many verses in this regard. They say that Allah the Exalted does not have mercy, and it is not permissible to describe Him with mercy. They mean by the mercy of Allah the Exalted only His doing good to creation. They interpret this attribute by its effects, without attributing it to Allah the Exalted. Or they say that the meaning of mercy is the will to do good to creation. It is known that the will to do good is a fruit of mercy. These people cannot deny His mercy in terms of its establishment, but they denied it in terms of interpretation and said that its meaning is such and such.
Similarly, they said regarding His saying: . They said the meaning is "the command of Allah has come," because Allah the Exalted cannot come. They cannot refute this evidence in terms of its establishment because it is in the Qur'an, but they tried to refute it in terms of interpretation and said: , meaning the command of your Lord has come. There is no doubt that interpretation without evidence is called distortion. This is the most fitting term for it, because it diverts the speech of Allah and His Messenger to something other than what Allah and His Messenger intended. Thus, it becomes a distortion of the speech from its place, or a distortion of the speech from its places. The people of Kalam are those who established their beliefs regarding Allah the Exalted and matters of the unseen by reason, not by transmitted texts. As for the philosophers, they are those who adopted the religion of philosophy inherited from the Greeks, the Persians, and others. This is also far from the truth, but whatever of it agrees with the truth is truth. It should not be attributed to the opinions of these philosophers, but rather to the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of His Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him), because Allah the Exalted sent His Messenger with guidance and the religion of truth. And whatever of it is false, there is no good in it. Yes.