Work Classification Layer
Compare Works
Pick two or more works to set their attribute fingerprints, dimension-by-dimension passages, and shared school embodiments side by side. Especially useful for author-stage comparisons (Wittgenstein early vs late) and for setting a single tradition's foundational texts against each other.
Letter on Qadar
God does not compel sin — the earliest Islamic argument for human moral freedom against fatalism
Attribute Fingerprint
Rows where works disagree are highlighted in gold. The full ontology grid is shown.
| Attribute | Letter on Qadar |
|---|---|
| Time · Extent | Both |
| Time · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Time · Grain | Continuous |
| Time · Freedom | Non-Deterministic |
| Time · Traversability | Linear |
| Time · Dimensionality | One |
| Time · Direction | Uni-directional |
| Space · Extent | Finite |
| Space · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Space · Curvature | not engaged |
| Space · Dimensionality | Three |
| Space · Locality | not engaged |
| Matter · Extent | Finite |
| Matter · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Matter · Conservation | Conserved |
| Matter · Dimensionality | Three |
| Matter · Locality | not engaged |
| Observer · Time Instance | Single |
| Observer · Space Instance | Single |
| Observer · Knowledge Extent | Mediate |
| Observer · Knowledge Retainment | Total |
| Observer · Physicality | Embodied |
| Observer · Agency | Active |
| Observer · Number | Plural |
| Observer · Metaphysical Agency | Personal |
| Observer · Moral Authority | Revelation |
| Observer · Theological Method | — |
| Energy · Extent | Finite |
| Energy · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Energy · Conservation | Conserved |
| Energy · Dispersibility | Irreversible |
| Information · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Information · Cosmic Conservation | Conserved |
| Information · Personal Conservation | Conserved |
| Information · Granularity | not engaged |
Dimension-by-Dimension Evidence
What each work's passages reveal about its stance on each of the six dimensions.
Time
Letter on Qadar
Both — God is eternal; created time moves toward the Day of Judgement. The Letter's central argument is that time is non-deterministic: human actions are genuinely free and not predetermined by God. This is the earliest Islamic theological statement of libertarian free will.
Space
Letter on Qadar
Not independently discussed. Conventional Islamic cosmology: finite created world under divine sovereignty.
Matter
Letter on Qadar
Not independently discussed. The Letter focuses on the metaphysics of action, not of physical substance. Conventional Islamic creationism is presupposed.
Observer
Letter on Qadar
Human beings are free moral agents — this is the Letter's central thesis. God creates the capacity for action; the human being chooses its direction. Embodied, active, plural, and personally responsible before a personal God.
Energy
Letter on Qadar
Not discussed. The Letter is focused on theological ethics, not physics.
Information
Letter on Qadar
God's knowledge encompasses all things, including human choices — but divine foreknowledge does not constitute compulsion. The Quran is the authoritative information source; the Letter argues from Quranic evidence.
Internal Tensions
Where each work's argument pulls against itself.
The Letter's argument for free will creates a tension with divine omnipotence and omniscience: if God does not determine human actions, in what sense is He all-powerful? And if He foreknows what humans will freely choose, is the freedom real? These are precisely the questions that the Mu'tazila, Ash'ariyya, and Maturidiyya would debate for centuries. The Letter opens the problem without resolving it.