[lit-ideas] Re: The 'Near-Eastern' influences on the Greek philosophy, sc...

  • From: Robert.Paul@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Robert Paul)
  • To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: 11 Apr 2004 22:15:42 PDT

Omar writes:

There are resonances of both Plato
and Aristotle [in 'Avicenna']. Then you have Al-Ghazali (Alghazal) 
and Ibn-Rushd (Averroes) whose work is primarily or
largely philosophical - yes, Al-Ghazali was a
theologian, but one deeply steeped in philosophy,
which he did not always sufficiently credit - and who
certainly have something to say to us today. 

The first Arab scholars to do philosophy in a recognizably Western sense were
apparently Neoplatonists: they were later led to Aristotle via a study of Galen.
Avicenna (a Persian) may have been one of the many thinkers of his time who
attempted to bring about a 'reconciliation' of Plato and Aristotle. This was
never a good idea, if you stop to think about it, but faced with two such
formidable presences, it's not surprising that so many tried. The practice of
trying to understand Aristotle through Platonic eyes persisted here and there
throughout the ins and outs of Scholasticism. Averroes, about whom I once knew
as much as I did about F. H. Bradley, e.g., was a brilliant commentator on
Aristotle, and his commentaries surely had great influence early on. The
Scholastics trusted Averroes more than they did Avicenna (whom they rightly
viewed as a pantheist), but eventually most Arab commentaries and
interpretations fell out of favor not because of their lack of merit but because
of their potential for ideological subversion: a commentary on Aristotle might
mislead, for extra-Aristotelian reasons. The history of philosophy like all
histories is written by the winners.  One way to look at the influence of
various philosophers on the course of Western thought is to try to trace the
history of logic, but I don't know of any contemporary appeals to the great Arab
logicians and commentators, and discussions of them are usually absent from all
but the most specialized accounts of the traditional formal logic.

There's what seems to be a good survey (names and dates) of the 'Arabian School
of Philosophy' in the Catholic Encyclopedia.
<http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01674c.htm> I think it would be useful no
matter what one's views on the value and influence of the works in question.
Ultimately, the problem of who owes what to whom in the history of ideas is
impossible to settle absent sworn testimony.

Robert Paul
Reed College
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