AL-GHAZALI
Al-Ghazali (c.1055–1111) was one of the most prominent and influential
philosophers, theologians, jurists, and mystics of Sunni Islam. He was active at
a time when Sunni theology had just passed through its consolidation and entered
a period of intense challenges from Shiite theology and the Arabic
tradition of Aristotelian philosophy (falsafa). Al-Ghazâlî understood the
importance of falsafa and developed a complex response that rejected and
condemned some of its teachings, while it also allowed him to accept and apply
others. Al-Ghazali's critique of twenty positions of falsafa in his Incoherence
of the Philosophers is a significant landmark in the
history of philosophy as it advances the nominalist critique of Aristotelian
science developed later in 14th century Europe. On the Arabic and Muslim side al-Ghazali's
acceptance of demonstration (apodeixis) led to a much more refined and precise
discourse on epistemology and a flowering of Aristotelian logics and metaphysics.
With al-Ghazâlî begins the successful introduction of Aristotelianism or rather
Avicennism into Muslim theology. After a period of appropriation of the Greek
sciences in the translation movement from Greek into Arabic and the writings of
the falâsifa up to Avicenna (, c.980–1037), philosophy and the Greek
sciences were “naturalized” into the discourse of kalâm and Muslim theology (Sabra
1987). Al-Ghazâlî's approach to resolving apparent contradictions between reason
and revelation was accepted by almost all later Muslim theologians and had, via
the works of Averroes (Ibn Rushd) and Jewish authors a significant
influence on Latin medieval thinking.
Al-Ghazali (c.1055–1111) was one of the most prominent and influential
philosophers, theologians, jurists, and mystics of Sunni Islam. He was active at
a time when Sunni theology had just passed through its consolidation and entered
a period of intense challenges from Shiite theology and the Arabic
tradition of Aristotelian philosophy (falsafa). Al-Ghazâlî understood the
importance of falsafa and developed a complex response that rejected and
condemned some of its teachings, while it also allowed him to accept and apply
others. Al-Ghazali's critique of twenty positions of falsafa in his Incoherence
of the Philosophers is a significant landmark in the
history of philosophy as it advances the nominalist critique of Aristotelian
science developed later in 14th century Europe. On the Arabic and Muslim side al-Ghazali's
acceptance of demonstration (apodeixis) led to a much more refined and precise
discourse on epistemology and a flowering of Aristotelian logics and metaphysics.
With al-Ghazâlî begins the successful introduction of Aristotelianism or rather
Avicennism into Muslim theology. After a period of appropriation of the Greek
sciences in the translation movement from Greek into Arabic and the writings of
the falâsifa up to Avicenna (, c.980–1037), philosophy and the Greek
sciences were “naturalized” into the discourse of kalâm and Muslim theology (Sabra
1987). Al-Ghazâlî's approach to resolving apparent contradictions between reason
and revelation was accepted by almost all later Muslim theologians and had, via
the works of Averroes (Ibn Rushd) and Jewish authors a significant
influence on Latin medieval thinking.