The Islamic World

Background: The Islamic World

• Islam as a religion inherited a number of key ideas from earlier Abrahamic religions:

  • One God, all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-good

  • Each individual possesses a unique, immortal soul

  • God-given laws that provide certain guidance as to what is ethical and what is not ethical

• Like Christian philosophers, Muslim scholars absorbed much of the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle

Al-Farabi: Religion and Philosophy

• The philosopher Al-Farabi, like Augustine, saw the purpose of philosophy in part to consist in reconciling faith and reason

• For Al-Farabi, religion and philosophy serve as means to the same end

• There cannot be any contradiction between them

• However, Al-Farabi argues, religion should be seen as subordinate to philosophy

• Unlike philosophy, religion fails to provide certainty for the truths it conveys

• Al-Farabi defines “virtuous religion” as religion that promotes the ultimate happiness of its members

• In order to be effective, virtuous religion must be imposed by a ruler

  • Islam’s “first ruler” was Mohammed, and since Mohammed was a good man who desires the best for his followers, Islam is a virtuous religion

  • Its rulers since the time of Mohammed are the caliphs and other religious authorities

• There are two sides to virtuous religion: theory and law

  • Theory concerns doctrinal truths: the existence of God and spiritual beings, of an afterlife and a judgment after death, etc.

  • Law concerns how one should live one’s life, what rules to follow, how to properly worship God and respect other humans

• Philosophy is oriented toward knowledge and wisdom

• Philosophical truths don’t need to be imposed by a ruler, because they are certainly known by all who study them carefully

• because they are certain, philosophical truths do not require faith or trust on the part of those who hold them

• This makes philosophical truth superior to the truths of religion, as the truths of religion are not known with certainty but must be imposed or taken on trust

• Religion is useful and necessary as a means of convincing those who are too busy or uneducated to understand philosophical truth.

  • Without religion, the non-philosophers would have no means to gain understanding of truths important for their ultimate welfare (e.g., truths about living a life worthy of heaven)

Avicenna on existence

• Building off of Aristotle’s metaphysics, Avicenna analyzes substance as being made up of form and matter

• Matter individuates particular objects: what makes something exist as a particular human being is the fact that it has matter

  • hence why unicorns don’t exist: there is no material that substantiates anything of the form “unicorn”

• In another sense, forms exist (or fail to exist) because of their properties

  • There is no existing form “four-sided triangle,” because no such thing could exist

• Avicenna distinguishes between a thing’s essence and its existence

  • We can think of the essence of “four sided triangle” or “unicorn” whil still acknowledging their non-existence

Avicenna: necessary vs. possible existence

• A unicorn is a possibly existing form, that in actuality does not exist

• A four-sided triangle is a form that cannot possibly exist

• There is a third kind of existence besides possible and impossible: necessary. This is a form that must exist, that does not depend on anything else for its existence

• If a necessary form exists, then it must exist in a non-material manner

  • If it were material, then it would need matter to exist

  • If it needed matter to exist, then it would depend on matter for existence

  • If it depends on matter for existence, then clearly, it could not exist necessarily

Avicenna: the existence of God as a necessary being

• Avicenna defines God as “a necessary being that created the world”

• He presents an argument for the existence of such a being:

  • Defenition: The world is defined as the set of all possible things

  • P1: the set of all merely possible things is itself a merely possible collection, because it is possible for the whole collection not to exist

  • P2: If something exists only possibly, then it can’t cause its own existence

    • therefore, the world has to be caused by something outself itself

  • P3: If the thing that causes the world were itslefmerely possible, then it would be included in the set of all possible things

    • But this would mean that the set of merely possible things causes itslef, which is impossible

  • Therefore, that which creates the world is a necessary being, as this is the only reasonable option