Arabs, Philosophy of the

ARABS, Philosophy of the. - The Arabs regarded as faylasūf, that is, philosopher in the exact sense of the term, not every thinker, but only those who occupied themselves with Greek thought and therefore followed in their doctrines of logic, physics, psychology, metaphysics, etc., Greek philosophy, and precisely the philosophy of Aristotle, so that the term philosopher became synonymous with Hellenizing, Aristotelian thinker, and in part also Neoplatonic, since Plato was not entirely unknown to the Arabs, albeit in Neoplatonic guise. Since Greek thought was wholly foreign to the Arab mentality, the philosophers were always regarded as alien to the Arab spirit, introducers of novelties, almost pagans, for which reason they were also always suspect to orthodox theologians. The Arabs indeed always greatly appreciated philosophy, but Islamic orthodoxy was distrustful of the philosophers, some of whom were even persecuted for some doctrine of theirs wholly irreconcilable with the Muslim faith.

Arab philosophy did not arise among the Arabs themselves, from modest native origins, but was brought to them already almost complete, and in its development it did not always depend on the speculative needs of individual philosophers, but its course was often determined by the introduction of new Greek sources into the philosophical life of the time. The introduction of Greek philosophy into Arab culture continued throughout all four centuries of its duration, from about 800 to 1200, when it died out entirely after the disappearance of Averroes.

Greek philosophy passed to the Arabs from the Byzantine empire, in that form which Aristotelianism had assumed in the Byzantine schools, in close connection with Neoplatonism, to which not a few of the commentators of the writings of the Stagirite adhered. The Arabs knew Aristotle always through Neoplatonic commentaries, hence in Neoplatonic guise. This circumstance decisively determined Arab philosophy, giving rise to the Neoplatonic Aristotelian philosophy of the Arabs, a current to which all Arab philosophers adhered, including even Averroes, who was the most Aristotelian among them. Some Greek writings translated into Arabic reinforced the close union between Aristotelianism and Neoplatonism: the Liber de causis, held to be a genuine work of the Stagirite, contains literal extracts from the Institutio Theologica of the Neoplatonist Proclus, and was composed in Arabic by a Muslim author around the year 850; the Theology of Aristotle, composed in Greek, contains extracts from the fourth, fifth and sixth books of the Enneads of Plotinus and was translated from Greek into Arabic by a Christian scholar.

We do not know whether the Arab philosophers read in translation any of the dialogues of Aristotle, of the Aristotle of the first manner, closer to the Platonic ideas than the Stagirite of the second manner, so well known to the Arab philosophers. Through the Neoplatonic commentaries and the two writings mentioned, Neoplatonism enters the current of Arab thought, becoming an integral element of it. Arab philosophy can therefore be defined as: Aristotelianism plus certain Platonic currents in Neoplatonic guise.

The Arabs knew Aristotelian doctrines through translations into Arabic, since none of the great Arab philosophers had knowledge of the Greek language. Some writings of Plato were also translated. Of pre-Socratic philosophy the Arabs had a certain knowledge through Aristotle himself and the allusions in the Stagirite's commentaries. Atomism in particular was known to the Arabs. The translators of the Greek writings were for the most part Christian scholars of Syriac language, who translated into Arabic at first and primarily the versions previously made in Syriac from the Greek, and only at a later stage produced translations directly from the Greek texts. Such Syro-Arabic and Greco-Arabic versions embraced, besides philosophy, the other sciences and the Greek-Byzantine encyclopedia.

The era of the translations begins around the year 800 and goes until 1000. The versions are for the most part literal and not always accurate, both because of the poor preservation of the manuscripts and because of the double passage from Greek to Syriac and from Syriac to Arabic. Sometimes the translator summarizes the text; or some chapters are translated literally while others are simply summarized. Among others, mention should be made of the Syriac Christian Ḥunayn ibn Isḥāq, who together with his son and a nephew rendered himself very deserving toward Arab science with numerous versions of Greek and Syriac texts. Later, however, people were no longer content with the versions made from the Syriac text, and new translations of the same texts were made, so that Averroes could sometimes compare two versions of the same passage and thus be in a position to give a more reliable explanation of Aristotle's thought. The Syriac versions and Syriac philosophy, which have also preserved for us writings lost in the Greek original but known to the Arabs through the versions from Syriac, were therefore the intermediaries between Greek thought and that of the Arabs and promoted the diffusion of Greek philosophy in the East, which through Sicily and Spain returned again to its continent of origin; in fact not a few Arab philosophical writings were translated into Latin, either directly or indirectly through oral versions in Castilian, or through versions in the Hebrew language, made by Jews. In this way Arab philosophy exercised an important influence on Latin scholastic speculation of the Middle Ages, and the names of the major Arab philosophers, Al-Kindi, Al-Farabi, Avicenna, Al-Ghazali, Avempace, Abubacer and Averroes became familiar to Latin philosophers. It is for this reason that knowledge of Arab philosophy is always of great help for an adequate understanding of medieval philosophy.

Among the Arabs, philosophy was not viewed with sympathy by the most rigid orthodoxy, because of the open contrast it entailed with the fundamental concepts of the Islamic religion. Philosophy was looked upon as a product of a pagan and foreign mentality; it was reproached for diverting minds from religion and for wishing to substitute profane and ultimately atheistic science for true knowledge, which can only be religious knowledge. Some philosophers were therefore persecuted. Nevertheless a part of Greek philosophy, primarily logic, penetrated into the theological works of the Muslim doctors themselves; indeed Aristotelianism became almost the basis of the Islamic religious system. Philosophy, however, ultimately succumbed before orthodoxy, and it may therefore be said that after 1200 there was almost no longer any philosophy among the Arabs.

Yet the doctrines of one of the greatest Arab philosophers, Averroes, contributed to directing European rationalistic speculative thought in a wholly opposite direction, namely toward the doctrine that philosophy is superior to religion and absorbs it into its rational reflection. A profound and tenacious adversary of this conception and, in general, of Greek philosophical doctrines among the Arabs was Al-Ghazali, who, however, also had to make use in the last analysis of philosophy, and precisely for the purpose of attacking it from the religious point of view. Al-Ghazali was naturally combated by Averroes, who, in refutation of the theologian's Destructio philosophiae, wrote his well-known Destructio destructionis.

The originality of the Arab philosophers lies in the effort to reconcile Greek philosophical doctrines, above all those of Aristotle, with the religious and theological concepts of the Quran, always however giving primacy to philosophy and seeking to devalue religion, regarded as an inferior type of knowledge in comparison with philosophy, the only one that gives true knowledge of reality. The problem of reconciling philosophy with religion was resolved on the basis of this premise; each philosopher then resolved it according to his own mentality, knowledge and temperament. Within the sphere of this reconciliation, the speculative faculty of the philosophers is exercised, whereas in the other fields of philosophy the variations are of lesser importance and are due more to the external contribution of new doctrines than to an intimate spiritual travail. One can therefore affirm that Arab philosophy does not represent an epoch of original spiritual fervor.

The Arab philosophers were almost all systematic and encyclopedic. Following especially in the footsteps of Aristotle, they attempted grandiose philosophical systems, embracing all fields of learning. In this aspect of their philosophy, however, they did not know the genuine Aristotle, but only that of the commentators. They also underwent the influence of the encyclopedic and systematic philosopher and commentator John Philoponus, known to the Arabs through several of his writings and through his numerous and voluminous commentaries. The encyclopedic character of Arab culture contributed to the rise within its sphere of personalities famous also in other branches of knowledge: Avicenna was a famous physician, well known also to Western medicine.

Not all the Aristotelian doctrines of the Arab philosophers can be traced back to the writings of the Stagirite. This is due to the fact that they always drew upon the Greek commentaries on Aristotle and therefore often accept doctrines deduced by the commentators from the Aristotelian text and from works of the Greek philosopher now lost, especially from those of his earlier manner. The problem of universals, for example, which also exercised the minds of the Arab philosophers beyond that of Latin scholasticism, they drew from the Greek commentators.

Some Christian and Jewish philosophers also wrote in Arabic; Alfarabi was of Turkish nationality, and Avicenna was certainly of Persian origin; Avempace was probably not of Arab origin.

The language that these philosophers used to give expression to their thought is a very suitable instrument for expressing the abstract concepts of Aristotelian and Neoplatonic philosophies. With the Arabic language any philosophical concept can be rendered with ease. Its facility in forming abstract nouns, derived even from particles, and the richness of its roots make it a precious instrument for speculative thought. Arab philosophical terminology enriched the vocabulary of Latin scholasticism, since not a few of its terms penetrated, through the medium of Latin translations, into medieval philosophy and from this then into modern speculation. Some terms, on the other hand, underwent such deformations as to render them unrecognizable.

The two most illustrious representatives of Arab philosophy are Avicenna (v.) and Averroes (v.), belonging to the two extreme wings of the area of expansion of Arab literature and civilization. Averroes is the pure Aristotelian, who seeks to discover the true doctrine of the Greek master and to explain it, whereas Avicenna is the type of the encyclopedic philosopher, who relives the philosophy of Aristotelianism and Neoplatonism and created a grandiose philosophical system of a type entirely different from the philosophical literary activity of Averroes, very well known to Latin scholasticism, primarily for his numerous commentaries on the works of the Stagirite.

Arab philosophy was able to exert a great influence on Latin speculation of the Middle Ages through the numerous translations that were made of the philosophical writings of the Arabs by Christian and Jewish writers. Translations from Arabic in the field of philosophy were made both in Spain and in Italy. Some of these translations were carried out on the commission of Frederick II of Swabia. Aristotelianism appeared in the fullness of its doctrines on the threshold of the Western world at first under Avicennian and Averroistic guise. Averroism (v.) penetrated into Europe through Spain and Sicily and had various centers of elaboration and diffusion, the most important of which were Paris and Padua. The last Italian Averroist was Giacomo Zabarella (v.), who was a professor at the University of Padua: Arab philosophy thus came to an end in Italy.

Giuseppe Furlani