Quranic createdness

In Islamic theology, Quranic createdness is the doctrinal position that the Quran was created, rather than having always existed and thus being "uncreated". In the Muslim world, the opposite point of view — that the Quran is uncreated — is the accepted stance among the majority Muslims. Shia Muslims, on the other hand, argue for the createdness of the Quran.

The dispute over which was true became a significant point of contention in early Islam. The Islamic rationalist philosophical school known as the Muʿtazila held that if the Quran is God's word, logically God "must have preceded his own speech". The Muʿtazilites and the Jahmites negated all attributes of God, thus believed that God could not speak, hence the Quran was not the literal word of God, but instead a complete metaphor of his will.