Reimagining Theology: ‘Abd al-Jabbar al-Rifā'ī and Neokalam Discourse

In recent times, the renewal of Islamic thought has attracted the attention of a large number of Muslim intellectuals. It started mainly from the 19th century and continues to grow until now. The decline of the Muslim community has created awareness of the importance of renewal in the aspects of theology. Accordingly Neokalam has finally become one of the prevailing debates in modern discourse. 'Abd al-Jabbār al-Rifā'ī is one of the figures who has great concern for Neokalam through his various works and intellectual activities. However, efforts to reform the Science of Kalam have not yet obtained clear formulations and concepts as a collective agreement. In this regard, this thesis examines the impact of Neokalam 'Abd al-Jabbār al-Rifā'ī's ideas on issues of contemporary Islamic thought. This study is a qualitative study. Methods of data collection were carried out using library data which were then analyzed using historical, inductive, deductive and comparative methods. After the study was carried out, it was found that the idea of ​​Neokalam 'Abd al-Jabbār al-Rifā'ī first developed as a paradigm shift. al-Rifā'ī's Neokalam project in attempt to deconstruct Islamic thought through a modern social science approach. This effort began by going through the framework of the formation of classical Kalam both ontologically, epistemologically and axiologically. However, his efforts earned great criticism from a number of contemporary Islamic scholars because it is seen as having a negative impact on the development of Islamic thought.