The Heritage of Islamic Philosophy

Abstract

Muslim intellectuals have been bound to the dictates of their religion, more than medizeval Christians. In the formative period of philosophy in the Islamic world – that is, up to the 12^th century or so – "philosophy" was strongly associated with Greek culture. For this reason "philosophy" was considered to be outside the Islamic scinces, and was not grouded – in scriptural authority. So that Islamic concerns did play some role the writings of philosophers, and in the Islamic world philosophy developed as an ecumenical enterprise, with Muslims, Christians and Jews meeting on the common ground of philosophy. That means philosophical disciplines are across – cultural in other respects too. Philosophy is not bound to and any place, people or language. In the Islamic world many thinkers and other people were doing philosophy despite refusing the labl of "faylasuf" and many of the thinkers in this question were not Muslims, so it's froper to say "Philosophy in Islamic world" reather than "Islamic philosophy". One might argure that the rejection of "taqlid", and the spirit of rational inquiry that this implies, was the common thread that bound together all philosophically inclined intellectuals of the Islamic world. Philosophy is an exercise of unbound reason, a search for understanding on the basis of discernment rather than revelation or faith. Throw this concern we can find that al-Ghazali's and Ibn Rushd's theories of causality are closely related to their epistemologies. The difference between the two thinkers can be summed up by saying that for Ibn Rushe the paradigm of ruman knowledge is demonstrative science. Whereas includes, revelation, he holds that philosophy is not the highest paradigm of human knowledge, his goal is rather to show. That philosophy must be subsumed within an intellectual enterprise which includes revelation, it must be regarded as the most subsumed within an intellectual enterprise which include revelation, it must be regarded as the most superior king of knowledge