Eternity of Man

Eternity of Man Author:
Publisher: www.alhassanain.org/english
Category: Fundamentals Of Religion

  • Start
  • Previous
  • 14 /
  • Next
  • End
  •  
  • Download HTML
  • Download Word
  • Download PDF
  • visits: 5480 / Download: 4917
Size Size Size
Eternity of Man

Eternity of Man

Author:
Publisher: www.alhassanain.org/english
English

This book is corrected and edited by Al-Hassanain (p) Institue for Islamic Heritage and Thought

Eternity of Man

Author: A Group of Researchers - Institute of Islamic Studies (London)

WWW.ALHASSANAIN.ORG/ENGLISH

Table of Contents

Foreward 3

Chapter 1: Different views regarding the meaning of Resurrection5

Chapter 2: Is Eternity of Man Possible?7

Chapter 3: Proofs for the Necessity of Eternity of Man12

Chapter 5: The Reality and the Philosophy of “Departing from the World”16

Chapter 6: Why Do We Fear Death?21

Chapter 7: The Multilateral influences of the belief in Resurrection24

Chapter 8: The Multilateral influences of the belief in Resurrection29

Chapter 9: Bibliography 38

Notes40

Foreward

The discussion regarding the resurrection of man after death is, in reality, an answer to a general and universal question. In addition, it is also the answer to an individual and social need, in the meaning that, with the proving and establishment of the life after death, one of the most important individual and social needs of man - and that is - the love for permanence (or love for eternity) shall be fulfilled. Most important of all, man, in the light of his belief in Resurrection and in an eternal life, becomes directed, motivated and purposeful in his worldly life and saves the priceless moments of his life from becoming aimless and without goal and direction. From another aspect, with the clarification and understanding of the issue of Resurrection, an important historical, philosophical, scientific and social issue, and the summary of a doctrinal and religious belief, shall find itself the object of discussion and deliberation. That faith and belief which has been the object of deep attention of all the Divine religions and amongst them - Islam, and towards which they have attached a great deal of importance. So much so that, the Holy Qur’àn has always mentioned the belief in Resurrection and life after death, after mentioning the belief in God. The importance which the Holy Qur’àn associates with this issue is such that some of the commentators of the Holy Qur’àn have said that a third of the Holy Qur’àn - directly or indirectly - deals with the issue of Resurrection.

However, it must be understood that the scope of the discussion of Resurrection is very vast and encompasses different and varied discussions within itself. However, considering the fact that this present work is only a brief discourse regarding Resurrection, it is only natural that many of the secondary aspects and some of the fundamental aspects which are related to the main discussion may not have been fully dealt with or if dealt with, may not be in an expanded and detailed manner as it ought to have been. In spite of this, particularities in the topics under discussion have been taken into consideration so as to render the reader independent of the need to refer to any other detailed work. Especially the young readers, who, by means of a short study, wish to obtain all that is necessary to know pertaining to Resurrection and gain the necessary knowledge and belief regarding it.

This book comprises of three parts, which are as follows:-

Part 1: Eternity of Man.

Part 2: Death or Another Birth.

Part 3: The Multilateral Influences of the belief in Resurrection.

In Part 1, the concept of Resurrection and the various theories and opinions regarding it have been mentioned and critically dealt with. After that, in a separate chapter, the possibility of Resurrection and the proofs for it, have been presented. Then, we have dwelt upon the need and the necessity of the Resurrection of man after death. Because of its importance, we have deliberated this part, especially the discussion of the Immateriality of the Soul, in a more detailed manner. In the last chapter, we have discussed the corporeal resurrection and have thus brought to conclusion Part 1 of the book.

In Part 2 also, the essence and the reality of death has been the focus of attention and discussion following which, the view of the Holy Qur’àn and the Islamic traditions regarding it has been the subject of debate and deliberation. In this chapter, the philosophy of death has also been focused upon. In the subsequent chapter of this Part, causes and factors of the fear of death have been propounded and deliberated. In the last chapter of this Part, we have dwelt upon the type of relation between this world and the Hereafter, and investigated it according to the Islamic and Qur’ànic outlook.

In Part 3, the concluding part of the book, a summary of some of the important effects of the belief in Resurrection has been propounded and has been the focus of investigation and deliberation.

The point to be mentioned is that the topics in this book have been discussed in a fluent and flowing manner and without any intricacies and unnecessary jargon and the deep and profound philosophical, scientific and Gnostic points have been included within other subject matters in a simple language. In other words, in spite of the fact that the entire discussion comprises of philosophical, scientific and Gnostic aspects and is useful for men of learning, at the same time, it is completely comprehensible for the adolescents and the youths also.

Chapter 1: Different views regarding the meaning of Resurrection

Before we proceed with the proofs of the possibility of the eternity of man, it is necessary that we clarify what is our view with respect to life after death and the eternity of man. Just as one's impression regarding a matter, differs from person to person, views and opinions about life after death also differ. Here, four views worthy of attention exist.

1. We find for ourselves, in the traces or the people that remain after our deaths, a living presence, and in this way attain eternity. We call this view, Eternity in Reminiscence. Industrialists, craftsmen, writers and artists leave behind traces and memories of themselves (such as their beliefs, hopes, tragedies and ideologies). They hope that whatever they have created, attain a stable value and position so that their names attain a life, which is much longer than their own. Others, due to the traces, which they leave on the pages of history, become eternal.

2. Man prolongs and continues his existence within his offspring and progeny and in this way becomes eternal. Man has got a yearning for eternity and non-acceptance of extinction, and the reproduction of offspring is a means of escape from the feeling of failure resulting from the realization of the inevitable extinction of man. We seek the extension of our lives in the lives of our children. Very many people yearn to have a male child so that their family names continue to remain. They name their children after themselves or their ancestors and pressurize their children to accept their beliefs, ideals, objectives, and to choose their profession.

3. After death, we experience union with the Ultimate Truth, which ultimately is Unity. That is, we in our worldly lives have forgotten our fundamental oneness and unity with The One Entity (God) and have erred in our thinking that we are distinct and separate to The One Entity. One day we shall realize that our separation from The One Entity was nothing but a misconception and with the freedom (from this misconception), we shall, once again, unite with Him.

4. It is possible to call the fourth view as “Individual life, after death”. According to this view, individuals after the physical death, either continues their own lives or after a period of time, start their own lives once again.

For each of these four views, especially the third and the fourth, it is possible to have different interpretations, such that, some of the interpretations can portray the Islamic concept of Resurrection to a certain extent.

However, it should be noted that the first and the second view shall not be the focus of attention, because, firstly: Our view and that of all the other Divine religions regarding Resurrection cannot be the first two views but a wider, subtler, more transcendental and more ethical than them. Secondly: With respect to the first two views, we do not have any conflict with the materialists and the deniers of resurrection, in the meaning that even they accept these two views. Thirdly: The first view does not include all the people, but is restricted to craftsmen, actors, writers and... Whereas the resurrection under consideration of Islam and the Divine religions includes all the people. On the other hand, the second view lacks the moral and spiritual aspects, which is anticipated as a result of the belief in Resurrection. In other words, belief in Resurrection is regarded to be the source of spirituality and virtues, whereas, according to the second view, this most fundamental result is conveniently forgotten.

The third view, in spite of the fact that it is, fundamentally, not incompatible with the beliefs of Islam and the Divine religions regarding resurrection, and can be accepted in general, but all the same it is not possible that the Islamic view on Resurrection be summarized as the third view, especially, considering the problems that this view is encountering. For example, according to this view, man, after death gets united with the One Entity and in that state, is unaware of his individuality or even his distinction, similar to a drop which unites with the ocean. In this assumption, the drop unites with the One Whole; however, its identity does not remain protected.

Therefore, it must be said that our discussion is restricted to the 4th view among the meanings of Resurrection - of course, by taking into consideration the explanations and particularities that shall be propounded in the course of the discussion.

Chapter 2: Is Eternity of Man Possible?

Those who do not support the theory of eternity of man and deny this reality - state that the occurrence of such an event is impossible. Of course, two explanations exist, for their claims of the impossibility of this reality,1) The basis of the first objection is doubt and uncertainty in the Power of Allàh. Such people state that Allàh does not have the Power to make man alive again after death, or to grant him a new life, once dead.

2) Bodies that have decayed and turned to earth are in such a state that they are not capable of being collected and as a result, it is not possible to bring them forth in the form of a man. The Islamic philosophers and other scholars, for the occurrence of each and everything, consider two points to be necessary:

1. Power and the will of the agent.

2. Receptivity of the recipient.

As a result, if on an occasion, the power or the will of the agent exists, but the recipient lacks the receptivity for a particular work, the work can be reckoned to be impossible.

Here too, some are of the belief that the Power of Allàh is infinite, however, collection of the decayed bodies is an act, which does not possess possibility.

The Holy Qur’àn, in response to the first objection proceeds to state and explain the Infinite Power of Allàh, and compares the re-creation of man after death to the great creation of the heavens and the earth and reminds that He who has created this entire universe also possesses the Power to give life to the dead.

أَوَلَيْسَ الَّذِي خَلَقَ السَّمَاوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضَ بِقَادِرٍ عَلَى أَنْ يَخْلُقَ مِثْلَهُمْ بَلَى وَهُوَ الْخَلاَّقُ الْعَلِيمُ

“Is not He who created the heavens and the earth able to create (again) the like of them. Yea! and He is the Creator, the All-Knowing.”[1]

It is self-evident that the creation of the heavens and the earth is Greater than the creation of man. So when Allàh is Powerful to create the entire Existence, would he not be Powerful to create man, who is just a part of the entire Existence, once again?

The Holy Qur’àn in reply to the second objection also alludes to the first creation of man and says:

فَسَيَقُولُونَ مَنْ يُعِيدُنَا قُلْ الَّذِي فَطَرَكُمْ أَوَّلَ مَرَّةٍ

“So they say Who will bring us to life? Say: He who created you the first time.”[2]

In another verse it states:

وَضَرَبَ لَنَا مَثَلًا وَنَسِيَ خَلْقَهُ قَالَ مَنْ يُحْيِ الْعِظَامَ وَهِيَ رَمِيمٌ قُلْ يُحْيِيهَا الَّذِي أَنشَأَهَا أَوَّلَ مَرَّةٍ وَهُوَ بِكُلِّ خَلْقٍ عَلِيمٌ

“And he strikes out a likeness for Us and forgets his own creation. Says he: Who will give life to the bones when they are rotten. Say: He will give life to them Who brought them into existence at first, and He is Cognizant of all creation.”[3]

The above verse alludes to a philosophical proof [4], which states that if two or more things are similar to each other, then with respect to being possible (in existence) and not being possible (in existence), they are equal. That is, if one is possible (to exist) the other will also be possible (to exist) and vice-versa, if one is impossible (to exist), the other shall also be impossible (to exist).

Thus Allàh, Who created man in the first instance would also be Powerful to create him once again, since the second creation is not only possible but, assuming that the words 'difficult' and 'simple' convey their meanings in the Holy Presence of Allàh also, the re-creation appears to be simpler. Since, in the first creation, neither was experience at work, nor did a model-plan exist, whereas in the re-creation, both experience and a model-plan exist[5] .

In any event, from the human point of view, the re-creation must be simpler than the creation of man at the first instance, although, with respect to Allàh, both are easy and similar.

The Holy Qur’àn, for the purpose of proving the Power of Allàh for bringing man to life after death, refers to the coming to life of the earth and the growth of plants, and considers the Resurrection of men similar to the coming to life of the earth which takes place every year in spring. How is it that every year man himself witnesses the leaves of trees falling off every autumn and then decay and turn to earth, but in the next spring, new leaves clothe the plants and the earth becomes fresh and green, and in spite of all this, when his coming to life after death is propounded, he considers it to be impossible and out of the ordinary and insists on denying it.

The Holy Qur’àn says :

وَاللَّهُ الَّذِي أَرْسَلَ الرِّيَاحَ فَتُثِيرُ سَحَابًا فَسُقْنَاهُ إِلَى بَلَدٍ مَيِّتٍ فَأَحْيَيْنَا بِهِ الْأَرْضَ بَعْدَ مَوْتِهَا كَذَلِكَ النُّشُورُ

“And Allàh is He Who sends the winds so they raise a cloud, then We drive it on to a dead country and therewith We give life to the earth after its death. Even so is the Resurrection.”[6]

Therefore the same Allàh, Who every year, brings to life and makes green the dead earth, would be Powerful to create man again, after death. Because, every year, Allàh, by the renewed growth of plants, in reality makes the dead earth a part of the bodies of plants and trees and converts it into living plant cells. In addition to this, if we focus our attention upon the start of the creation of life on the earth, we shall conclude that in the beginning, no living thing existed on the earth and after the start of life, these plants were the ones that appeared on the earth. In other words, for the first time, the plant life manifested itself on the earth. An appearance and manifestation, the wonderful and astonishing secrets of which remain a mystery to the scholars even today. However, this point is certain that, in any event, this plant life has appeared from this very dead earth.

Creation of the Embryo

Another example, which the Holy Qur’àn presents, for the purpose of proving and bringing into the focus of man, the boundless Divine Powers and uses it to prove the Power of Allàh in bringing man to life again after death, is the creation of the embryo. It states if you have doubt and uncertainty in the possibility of Resurrection - reflect upon how we created you from a sperm-drop. Then we brought out this sperm-drop as an 'alaqah' (blood clot). After that we made it grow in the womb and finally in the form of a complete human, we gave him birth by means of his mother.

أَلَمْ يَكُ نُطْفَةً مِنْ مَنِيٍّ يُمْنَىثُمَّ كَانَ عَلَقَةً فَخَلَقَ فَسَوَّىفَجَعَلَ مِنْهُ الزَّوْجَيْنِ الذَّكَرَ وَالْأُنثَى أَلَيْسَ ذَلِكَ بِقَادِرٍ عَلَى أَنْ يُحْيِيَ الْمَوْتَ

“Was he not a (mere) drop of sperm emitted? Then he was a clot of blood, then He Shaped (him) and fashioned (him). Then He made of him of two kinds, the male and female. Is not he able to bring the dead to life?” [7]

The above verse and so do the other verses which deal with resurrection, consider it to be a natural phenomenon and similar to the creation of sperm-drop and the birth of a child or giving of life to the plants and making them grow and as a result regards Resurrection to be like the other Divine Acts, whereas, the deniers of Resurrection view it as a strange, new and an impossible phenomenon, the pattern of which cannot be found in Nature. As a result, it is possible to state that fundamentally, it is necessary to balance our view on Resurrection and view it through the looking glass of the Qur’ànic verses. In such a case, not only shall we not consider Resurrection to be impossible, but on the other hand comprehend it to be necessary and compulsory, upon which we shall dwell in the chapters to follow.

Transformation of the Energies

We usually imagine that energies after use get exhausted and destroyed. For e.g., we imagine the solar energy after being radiated towards the earth and the other planets gets destroyed. Whereas today, science has proved that energy does not get destroyed but simply gets transformed into another form and manifests itself in a different form of energy. In other words, the energy continues to exist in new conditions and in a new environment.

The Holy Qur’àn, in proving the possibility of Resurrection makes use of this fact also and states:

وَضَرَبَ لَنَا مَثَلًا وَنَسِيَ خَلْقَهُ قَالَ مَنْ يُحْيِ الْعِظَامَ وَهِيَ رَمِيمٌ قُلْ يُحْيِيهَا الَّذِي أَنشَأَهَا أَوَّلَ مَرَّةٍ وَهُوَ بِكُلِّ خَلْقٍ عَلِيمٌ الَّذِي جَعَلَ لَكُمْ مِنْ الشَّجَرِ الْأَخْضَرِ نَارًا فَإِذَا أَنْتُمْ مِنْهُ تُوقِدُونَ

“And he strikes out a likeness of Us and forgets his own creation. Says he: Who will give life to the bones when they are rotten? Say: He will give life to them Who brought them into existence at first, and He is Cognizant of all creation. He Who has made for you the fire (to burn) from the green tree, so that with it you kindle (fire).”[8]

The interpretation, which according to some of the commentators, is appropriate for the above verses and which has been brought to light as a result of recent scientific advancements and discoveries, is that plants and trees, during the entire span of their lives, regularly absorb the light and heat from the sun and in addition also absorb water and necessary substances from the ground by means of their roots and by the combination of these, generate cellulose, which formats the mass of the trees and the wood of the trees is thus formed.

Thus, plants, for the purpose of absorption of vital substances from the ground, must utilize the heat and light of the sun as an active energy. It is due to the utilization of this light and heat that trees grow and develop and accumulate a great deal of energy of the sun within themselves and transform it into wood. Now, observe the burning of wood, as to how the transformed energy of the sun within it, after burning once again turns into heat and light. According to the verses of the Holy Qur’àn, Resurrection of man is just this. And so, in these verses, reference is made at the onset to the first creation of man and then the Resurrection and the re-creation of energies is pointed out.

Another interesting point that exists in the verse is that, usually we consider dried wood to be more capable and more suitable for burning, whereas in the verse, reference has been made to a green tree. Perhaps, the reason for it is that the greenness of the trees and their leaves is a pre-requisite for the taking in of the heat and light of the sun. In simpler words, a living tree is one, which can transform the energy from the sun into wood and store it within itself whereas a dried tree does not have such a capability. And because of this the verse says: “That Allàh who has made for you the fire (to burn) from the green tree, has the Power to create man once again after death.”[9]

In short, one of the things to which the Holy Qur’àn has made reference to, in order to establish the possibility and the necessity of Resurrection of men is the resurrection of energy or transformation of energy under different conditions.

Motives for Denying Resurrection

As we have observed, the polytheists and the deniers of Resurrection had no philosophical proofs, experimental witnesses or convincing evidences to support their claim. Their arguments always centered on, either, the coming to life of decayed and destroyed bones being strange and peculiar, or something to that effect. And because of this, the Holy Qur’àn does not enter into answering their scientific doubts and misgivings, because fundamentally, scientific doubts and misgivings do not exist. In fact, in Surah-e-Qiyamah after mentioning the talks of the deniers, it refers to their motives. Their motives for denying Resurrection were promiscuity, libertinism and in one sentence, escape from the burden of commitment and responsibility. Now, the acceptance of Resurrection obligates the acceptance of commitment and responsibility, which some people do not approve of and instead are of the belief that as much as possible, one should be engrossed in seeking success and pleasure. This is the thing, which in the first stage denies the belief in Allàh and the Resurrection.

Regarding this, the Holy Qur’àn says:

أَيَحْسَبُ الْإِنسَانُ أَلَّنْ نَجْمَعَ عِظَامَهُ بَلَى قَادِرِينَ عَلَى أَنْ نُسَوِّيَ بَنَانَهُ بَلْ يُرِيدُ الْإِنسَانُ لِيَفْجُرَ أَمَامَهُ

“Does man think that we shall not gather his bones? Yea! We are able to make complete his very fingertips. Nay, man desires to deny what is before him.” [10]

Of course, the idolaters and the deniers of Resurrection also had and have another argument, which is nothing except idle and nonsensical talk. That is, there does not exist any rational, philosophical, logical or scientific reasoning in their argument. They would say that belief in Resurrection is only a myth of the ancestors. Now since all the Divine religions persisted in the belief in God and Resurrection and since times immemorial, these two beliefs have been present among the religious people and were considered to be among the fundamentals of religion, the idolaters and the deniers, instead of presenting evidence to prove these beliefs as incorrect, they would just claim that these beliefs are nothing except historical legends and myths.

The Holy Qur’àn mentions their talks as follows:

وَقَالَ الَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا أَئِذَا كُنَّا تُرَابًا وَآبَاؤُنَا أَئِنَّا لَمُخْرَجُونَ لَقَدْ وُعِدْنَا هَذَا نَحْنُ وَآبَاؤُنَا مِنْ قَبْلُ إِنْ هَذَا إِلاَّ أَسَاطِيرُ الْأَوَّلِينَ

“And those who disbelieve say: When we have become dust like our fathers, shall we verily be brought forth (again). Indeed we had been promised this, we and our fathers before; these are naught but fables of the ancients.”[11]

Any sensible person shall see that, such idle talk does not merit any answer or response, because the historical background of a theory does not signify its baselessness, and a realist and a just person should accept or reject a matter on the basis of proof and evidence and not on the basis of the matter being antiquated or new. And so, the Holy Qur’àn does not get itself involved in answering these arguments, but on the other hand, reasons out and presents evidence to prove Resurrection as not only possible, but also necessary and these reasoning are so strong and clarifying that should any person reflect appropriately upon them, not only would he notice that the occurrence of Resurrection is very ably proved but all the other doubts and misgivings would also appear to have been cleared.

Chapter 3: Proofs for the Necessity of Eternity of Man

In the previous chapter, the arguments of the deniers of Resurrection were, to a certain extent, propounded. After that, the verses that pointed out to the Power of Allàh in creating man and the universe and as a result, proving the Power of Allàh for granting life once again to man, were briefly studied. In short, the reasoning of the previous chapter revolved around the possibility of Resurrection. However the proofs for the need and necessity of Resurrection were not mentioned. Because of this, we shall place this matter under discussion in the third chapter. Here it is necessary we mention that the Holy Qur’àn has never based any of its religious beliefs on forced devotion or statements without proofs and evidences, but instead, the subject matter and their interpretation are always based on sound and rational reasoning. The proofs and the reasoning, which appear in the Holy Qur’àn for proving the certainty of the occurrence of Resurrection, shall be mentioned here.

1. The Ultimate aim of Motion of Objects

Each and every object in this universe, from the minute atoms to the gigantic galaxies, are perpetually in a state of motion. Generally, this motion must be for an aim or objective, because, motion without an aim does not exist. In other words, the underlying reason for every motion is to reach perfection and step from potentiality into actuality, and objects, till such a time that they do not attain their aim and objective, cannot attain tranquility. According to this, if an appointed aim itself possesses another aim and objective, it can be understood that, it was not propounded as an ultimate aim from the very onset but was just a route and a course, which we had assumed to be the aim and objective. Because, the inevitable fall-out of a real and an ultimate aim is that the mover, upon reaching the ultimate aim attains tranquility and becomes stationary. As a result, if we assume infinite aims for the motion of objects, it is equivalent to considering them aimless and without any objective, since in any event, it is necessary that the chain of aims and objectives reach a terminus, just as it is absolutely necessary that the chain of 'efficient causes' reach a cause who is the First Agent and the Inherent Origin of the entire existence, otherwise it would be as if the universe is without an Origin and an Agent.[12]

The Holy Qur’àn considers Resurrection to be the terminus of the motion of objects and believes that reaching Allàh is their ultimate aim and states:

وَأَنَّ إِلَى رَبِّكَ الْمُنْتَهَى

“And that to your Lord is the goal.”[13]

An interesting point here is that one of the attributes and names of Resurrection and the Hereafter is (دَارُ الْقَرَارِ) Dar-ul-Qarar meaning the 'final halting-place', 'place of rest', 'house of peace and tranquility'.

The Holy Qur’àn states:

يَاقَوْمِ إِنَّمَا هَذِهِ الْحَيَاةُ الدُّنْيَا مَتَاعٌ وَإِنَّ الْآخِرَةَ هِيَ دَارُ الْقَرَارِ

“ And verily, the hereafter is the abode to settle.”[14]

So, just as the origin of creation and the start of the motion of objects is from Allàh, the termination of the motion of objects is also the return towards Allàh.[15]

2. Divine Wisdom

In order to prove, the Resurrection of man being necessary by means of the 'Wisdom Proof' certain presumptions are required, which have to be previously established by other proofs and evidences. Some of these presumptions are as follows: -

1) Allàh, the Wise Creator, has created the Entire Existence.

2) This Creator, according to the exigency of being Wise, does not indulge in vain and purposeless activities.

In addition to the above mentioned two points, which should be previously proved and established in their appropriate places, another matter must also be placed under discussion here, in the form of a premise. That matter is that there is a marked difference between the 'Aim of the Agent' and the 'Aim of the Act' and that the two are not the same. According to this, Allàh in accordance with the necessity of His Inherent Needlessness, is not in need of a thing such that by performing an action He can obtain that thing, however, at the same time, the Acts of Allàh also cannot be without aim and purpose or in other words vain and purposeless.

So Allàh does not have the 'Aim of the Agent'. That is, by creating His creations, He does not wish to attain a Perfection, which He did not previously possess. But at the same time He does have the 'Aim of the Act', in the meaning that creating the creations so that the creations themselves reach perfection, is the aim and purpose which Allàh has ascertained for them. And because of this, the Holy Qur’àn regarding the 'Aim of the Act' of Allàh in creating His creations states:

وَمَا خَلَقْتُ الْجِنَّ وَالْإِنسَ إِلاَّ لِيَعْبُدُونِي

“And I have not created the jinn and men, but that they worship me.”[16] This verse, in reality, presents the 'Aim of the Act’ of Allàh, in the meaning that if the creations of Allàh did not recognize and worship Allàh, they themselves have suffered losses and have not attained their Spiritual Perfection - which has been the aim and purpose of their creation. Not in the meaning that Allàh had an aim and has not achieved it, because this meaning is incompatible with the Inherent Needlessness of Allàh. In addition to this, the Holy Qur’àn itself pronounces Allàh as not being in need of worship and says:

وَمَنْ كَفَرَ فَإِنَّ اللَّهَ غَنِيٌّ عَنْ الْعَالَمِينَ

“And whoever disbelieves, then Surely Allàh is Self-Sufficiently independent of the worlds.”[17]

So, if the recognition and the worship is not achieved, the creations have not reached their aim and purpose, that the Creator is deprived of his aim and purpose. This is because the Inherent Needlessness and the Inherent Essentiality will not have an aim and purpose different from the Infinite Essence and also will not have the ability to accept any violation, because it itself is the actual aim and purpose.

After this premise and the clarification of the distinction between the 'Aim of the Agent' and the 'Aim of the Act', we shall state that the creation of the universe is not without aim and purpose because our assumption was that the Creator of the universe is Wise and does not indulge in vain acts.

The next point is that, the short life of this world cannot be the aim and purpose of this creation, because, in the worldly life, there always exist a chain of troublesome and worrying events like shortages, deprivations, destruction and inconveniences. In other words, this present worldly life is intermingled with troubles and disturbances and as a result cannot be considered to be the aim of creation, because aim and purpose should be such that, as a result of it, the act of creation becomes perfect and the benefits of it return back to the creatures and servants. Hence, with no other option, there must exist another world which would be the aim and purpose of man's journey towards attainment of perfection, such that man, upon reaching it, should consider the aim and wisdom of the act of creation, to be practical and completed.

For providing more explanation, it is possible to say that the present world and all that in which we are leading our lives is very large and wondrous and the Power which causes the growth of a plant and provides it the strength to slit open the surface of the earth or at times split open hard rock or even the asphalt of the roads and emerge out, and also the Power, which has brought forth the gigantic galaxies into motion with an absolutely accurate calculation, the same Power is the Boundless Intelligence, who has created man as His most superior creation.

Accordingly, if it is deemed that this most superior creation, is for a certain period a weak child and then for a certain period a worn out and tired individual, who, for most of the time, is entangled in procuring the necessities of his life - which can be summarized into eating and sleeping, and then after death, is annihilated and ceases to exist, how tyrannical and far from wisdom it would be, whereas, we, at the very onset, had considered Allàh to be Wise.

In short, if we assume, that the aim of Allàh in creating man was that the results and benefits of it would reach Him, this would not be correct because He is the Absolute Needless and possesses Inherent Needlessness. Hence, there must exist an aim whereby its benefits reach man. Under this assumption we see that the limited and material life of this world lacks the ability to be proclaimed as the aim and purpose for the creation of man and it is necessary that another world exist so that Man can achieve the aim for which he was created.[18]

The Holy Qur’àn, in mentioning this proof, quotes the words of wise and intelligent people (after reflection upon the creation of the heavens and the earth) and states:

رَبَّنَا مَا خَلَقْتَ هَذَا بَاطِلًا سُبْحَانَكَ فَقِنَا عَذَابَ النَّارِ

“O' our Lord! Thou hast not created (all) this in vain! Glory be to Thee! Save us then from the torments of the (Hell) fire.”[19]

Thomas Aquinas explains this very proof saying: “We have been created for attaining the Ultimate end (i.e. Happiness). However this Happiness cannot be achieved in the life of this world, because the individual wealth is not lasting, body and will, weak, and our knowledge, incomplete. However, God has not created us in vain, and so we must be able to reach the end and the aim for which we have been created, and this necessitates that our lives have a continuity even after death.”

But why should anyone think that we are not able to be prosperous in the life of this world? According to Aristotle, Happiness is not the transient sensation of pleasure, but Happiness is that a person, in the span of his entire life, can convert his abilities into actualities: If we keep ourselves occupied with the activities of the intellect (thinking), we shall attain Happiness, and the transient troubles shall not cause us to lose our Happiness.

However, Thomas sees Happiness in a different light. According to him, the human Happiness is related to the aim and the purpose (that is Union with God) for which we have been created. The cognition of God, which we obtain by means of belief and faith, is an Act of the Will and not of Intellect and hence, it is possible that, the present cognition of God, which is obtained by means of natural intellect, may be faulty or may not be an intuitive faith. Hence, the cognition about God, (in which is secured our Ultimate Happiness) is not attainable in this Worldly life (except in a fleeting and transient manner). So in order that we completely experience such a Happiness-creating insight, it is necessary that we continue our lives even after death.[20]

CHAP. III. THE RISE AND FALL OF RATIONALISM IN ISLAM

§ I. The Metaphysics of Rationalism - Materialism

The Persian mind, having adjusted itself to the new political environment, soon reasserts its innate freedom, and begins to retire from the field of objectivity, in order that it may come back to itself, and reflect upon the material achieved in its journey out of its own inwardness. With the study of Greek thought, the spirit which was almost lost in the concrete, begins to reflect and realise itself as the arbiter of truth. Subjectivity asserts itself, and endeavours to supplant all outward authority. Such a period, in the intellectual history of a people, must be the epoch of rationalism, scepticism, mysticism, heresy - forms in which the human mind, swayed by the growing force of subjectivity, rejects all external standards of truth. And so we find the epoch under consideration.

The period of Umayyad dominance is taken up with the process of co-mingling and adjustment to new conditions of life; but with the rise of the 'Abbāsid Dynasty and the study of Greek Philosophy, the pent-up intellectual force of Persia bursts out again, and exhibits wonderful activity in all the departments of thought and action. The fresh intellectual vigour imparted by the assimilation of Greek Philosophy which was studied with great avidity, led immediately to a critical examination of Islamic Monotheism. Theology, enlivened by religious fervour, leārned to talk the language of Philosophy earlier than cold reason began to seek a retired corner, away from the noise of controversy, in order to construct a consistent theory of things. In the first half of the 8th century we find Wāṣil Ibn 'Atā - a Persian disciple of the famous theologian Ḥasan of Basra - starting Mu'tazilaism (Rationalism) - that most interesting movement which engaged some of the subtlest minds of Persia, and finally exhausted its force in the keen metaphysical controversies of Baghdād and Basra. The famous city of Basra had become, owing to its commercial situation, the play-ground of various forces - Greek Philosophy, Scepticism, Christianity, Buddhistic ideas, Manichaeism[1] - which furnished ample spiritual food to the inquiring mind of the time, and formed the intellectual environment of Islamic Rationalism. What Spitta calls the Syrian period of Muhammadan History is not characterised with metaphysical subtleties. With the advent of the Persian Period, however, Muhammadan students of Greek Philosophy began properly to reflect on their religion; and the Mu'tazila thinkers, gradually[2] drifted into metaphysics with which alone we are concerned here. It is not our object to trace the history of the Mu'tazila Kalām; for present purposes it will be sufficient if we briefly reveal the metaphysical implications of the Mu'tazila view of Islām. The conception of God, and the theory of matter, therefore, are the only āspects of Rationalism which we propose to discuss here.

His conception of the unity of God at which the Mu'tazila eventually arrived by a subtle dialectic is one of the fundamental points in which he differs from the Orthodox Muhammadan. God's attributes, according to his view, cannot be said to inhere in him; they form the very essence of His nature. The Mu'tazila, therefore, denies the separate reality of divine attributes, and declares their absolute identity with the abstract divine Principle. “God”, says Abu'l-Hudhail, “is knowing, all-powerful, living; and his knowledge, power and life constitute His very essence (dhāt)”[3] . In order to explain the pure unity of God Joseph Al-Baṣīr[4] lays down the following five principles: -

(1). The necessary supposition of atom and accident.

(2). The necessary supposition of a creator.

(3). The necessary supposition of the conditions (Aḥwāl) of God.

(4). The rejection of those attributes which do not befit God.

(5). The unity of God in spite of the plurality of His attributes.

This conception of unity underwent further modifications; until in the hands of Mu'ammar and Abu Hāshim it became a mere abstract possibility about which nothing could be predicated. We cannot, he says, predicate knowledge of God,[5] for His knowledge must be of something in Himself. The first necessitates the identity of subject and object which is absurd; the second implicates duality in the nature of God which is equally impossible. Aḥmad and Faḍl[6] - disciples of Nazzām, however, recognised this duality in holding that the original creators are two - God - the eternal principle; and the word of God - Jesus Christ - the contingent principle. But more fully to bring out the element of truth in the second alternative suggested by Mu'ammar, was reserved, as we shall see, for later Sufī thinkers of Persia. It is, therefore, clear that some of the rationalists almost unconsciously touched the outer fringe of later pantheism for which, in a sense, they prepared the way, not only by their definition of God, but also by their common effort to internalise the rigid externality of an absolute law.

But the most important contribution of the advocates of Rationalism to purely metaphysical speculation, is their explanation of matter, which their opponents - the Ash'arite - afterwards modified to fit in with their own views of the nature of God. The interest of Nazzām chiefly consisted in the exclusion of all arbitrariness from the orderly course of nature.[7] The same interest in naturalism led Al-Jāhiz to define Will in a purely negative manner.[8] Though the Rationalist thinkers did not want to abandon the idea of a Personal Will, yet they endeavoured to find a deeper ground for the independence of individual natural phenomena. And this ground they found in matter itself. Nazzām taught the infinite divisibility of matter, and obliterated the distinction between substance and accident.[9] Existence was regarded as a quality super-imposed by God on the pre-existing material atoms which would have been incapable of perception without this quality. Muhammad Ibn 'Uthmān, one of the Mu'tazila Shaikhs, says Ibn ῌazm,[10] maintained that the non‑existent (atom in its pre-existential state) is a body in that state; only that in its pre-existential condition it is neither in motion, nor at rest, nor is it said to be created. Sub-stance, then, is a collection of qualities - taste, odour, colour - which, in themselves, are nothing more than material potentialities. The soul, too, is a finer kind of matter; and the processes of knowledge are mere mental motions. Creation is only the actualisation of pre-existing potentialities[11] (Ṭafra). The individuality of a thing which is defined as “that of which something can be predicated”[12] is not an essential factor in its notion. The collection of things we call the Universe, is externalised or perceptible reality which could, so to speak, exist independent of all perceptibility. The object of these metaphysical subtleties is purely theological. God, to the Rationalist, is an absolute unity which can, in no sense, admit of plurality, and could thus exist without the perceptible plurality - the Universe.

The activity of God, then, consists only in making the atom perceptible. The properties of the atom flow from its own nature. A stone thrown up falls down on account of its own indwelling property.[13] God, says Al-'Aṭṭār of Basra and Bishr ibn al Mu'tamir, did not create colour, length, breadth, taste or smell - all these are activities of bodies themselves.[14] Even the number of things in the Universe is not known to God[15] . Bishr ibn al-Mu'tamir further explained the properties of bodies by what he called “Tawallud” - interaction of bodies.[16] Thus it is clear that the Rationalists were philosophically materialists, and theologically deists.

To them substance and atom are identical, and they define substance as a space-filling atom which, besides the quality of filling space, has a certain direction, force and existence forming its very essence as an actuality. In shape it is squarelike; for if it is supposed to be circular, combination of different atoms would not be possible. There is, however, great difference of opinion among the exponents of atomism in regard to the nature of the atom. Some hold that atoms are all similar to each other; while Abu'l-Oāsim of Balkh regards them as similar as well as dissimilar. When we say that two things are similar to each other, we do not necssarily mean that they are similar in all their attributes. Abu'l-Oāsim further differs from Nazzān in advocating the indestructibility of the atom. He holds that the atom had a beginning in time; but that it cannot be completely annihilated. The attribute of “Baqā” (continued existence), he says, does not give to its subject a new attribute other than existence; and the continuity of existence is not an additional attribute at all. The divine activity created the atom as well as its continued existence. Abu'l-Oāsim, however, admits that some atoms may not have been created for continued existence. He denies also the existence of any intervening space between different atoms, and holds, unlike other representatives of the school, that the essence or atom (Māhiyyat) could not remain essence in a state of non-existence. To advocate the opposite is a contradiction in terms. To say that the essence (which is essence because of the attribute of existence) could remain essence in a state of non-existence, is to say that the existent could remain existent in a state of non-existence. It is obvious that Abu'l-Qāsim here approaches the Ash'arite theory of knowledge which dealt a serious blow to the Rationalist theory of matter.

§ II. Contemporary Movements of Thought

Side by side with the development of Mu'tazilaism we see, as is natural in a period of great intellectual activity, many other tendencies of thought manifesting themselves in the philosophical and religious circles of Islam. Let us notice them briefly: -

I. Scepticism. The tendency towards scepticism was the natural consequence of the purely dialectic method of Rationalism. Men such as Ibn AShras and Al-Jāhiz who apparently belonged to the Rationalist camp, were really sceptics. The standpoint of Al-Jāhiz who inclined to deistic naturalism,[18] is that of a cultured man of the time, and not of a professional theologian. In him is noticeable also a reation against the metaphysical hairsplitting of his predecessors, and a desire to widen the pale of theology for the sake of the illiterate who are incapable of reflecting on articles of faith.

2. Ṣūfīism - an appeal to a higher source of knowledge which was first systematised by Dhu'l-Nūn, and became more and more deepened and antischolastic in contrast to the dry intellectualism of the Ash’arite. We shall consider this interesting movement in the following chapter.

3. The revival of authority - Isma'īlianisma movement characteristically Persian which, instead of repudiating freethought, endeavours to come to an understanding with it. Though this movement seems to have no connection with the theological controversies of the time, yet its connection with freethought is fundamental. The similarity between the methods practised by the Isma'īlian missionaries and those of the partisans of the association called Ikhwan al-Safa - Brethren of Purity - suggests some sort of secret relation between the two institutions. Whatever may be the motive of those who started this movement, its significance as an intellectual phenomenon should not be lost sight of. The multiplicity of philosophical and religious views - a necessary consequence of speculative activity - is apt to invoke forces which operate against this, religiously speaking, dangerous multiplicity. In the 18th century history of European thought we see Fichte, starting with a sceptical inquiry concerning the nature of matter, and finding its last word in Pantheism. Schleiermacher appeals to Faith as opposed to Reason, Jacobi points to a source of knowledge higher than reason, while Comte abandons all metaphysical inquiry, and limits all knowledge to sensuous perception. De Maistre and Schlegel, on the other hand, find a resting place in the authority of an absolutely infallible Pope. The advocates of the doctrine of Imāmat think in the same strain as De Maistre; but it is curious that the Isma īliams, while making this doctrine the basis of their Church, permitted free play to all sorts of thinking.

The Ismailia movement then is one aspect of the persistent battle[19] which the intellectually

independent Persian waged against the religious and political ideals of Islam. Originally a branch of the Shiite religion, the Ismaīlia sect assumed quite a cosmopolitan character with 'Abdulla ibn Maimūn - the probable progenitor of the Fātimid Caliphs of Egypt - who died about the same time when Al-ASh'arī, the great opponent of Freethought, was born. This curious man imagined a vast scheme in which he weaved together innumerable threads of various hues, resulting in a cleverly constructed equivocation, charming to the Persian mind for its mysterious character and misty Pythagorean Philosophy. Like the Association of the Brethren of Purity, he made an attempt, under the pious cloak of the doctrine of Imāmat (Authority), to synthesise all the dominating ideas of the time. Greek Philosophy, Christianity, Rationalism, Sūfīism, Manichaeism, Persian heresies, and above all the idea of reincarnation, all came forward to contribute their respective shares to the boldly conceived Ismā'īlian whole, the various aspects of which were to be gradually revealed to the initiated, by the “Leader” - the ever Incarnating Universal Reason - according to the intellectual development of the age in which he incarnated himself. In the Ismā'īlian movement, Freethought, apprehending the collapse of its ever widening structure, seeks to rest upon a stable basis, and, by a strange irony of fate, is led to find it in the very idea which is revolting to its whole being. Barren authority, though still apt to reassert herself at times, adopts this unclaimed child, and thus permits herself to assimilate all knowledge past, present and future.

The unfortunate connection, however, of this movement with the politics of the time, has misled many a scholar. They see in it (Macdonald, for instance) nothing more than a powerful conspiracy to uproot the political power of the Arab from Persia. They have denounced the Ismā'īlian Church which counted among its followers some of the best heads and sincerest hearts, as a mere clique of dark murderers who were ever watching for a possible victim. We must always remember, while estimating the character of these people, the most barbarous persecutions which drove them to pay red-handed fanaticism in the same coin. Assassinations for religious purposes were considered unobjectionable, and even perhaps lawful, among the whole Semite race. As late as the latter half of the 16th century, the Pope of Rome could approve such a dreadful slaughter as the massacre of St. Bartholomew. That assassination, even though actuated by religious zeal, is still a crime, is a purely modern idea; and justice demands that we should not judge older generations with our own standards of right and wrong. A great religious movement which shook to its very foundations the structure of a vast empire, and, having successfully passed through the varied ordeals of moral reproach, calumny and persecution, stood up for centuries as a champion of Science and Philosophy, could not have entirely rested on the frail basis of a political conspiracy of a mere local and temporary character. Ismā'īlianism, in spite of its almost entire loss of original vitality, still dominates the ethical ideal of not an insignificant number in India, Persia, Central Asia, Syria and Africa; while the last expression of Persian thought - Bābism - is essentially Ismā'īlian in its character.

To return, however, to the Philosophy of the sect. From the later Rationalists they borrowed their conception of Divinity. God, or the ultimate principle of existence, they teach, has no attribute. His nature admits of no predication. When we predicate the attribute of power to him, we only mean that He is the giver of power; when we predicate eternity, we indicate the eternity of what the Qur'ān calls “Amt.” (word of God) as distinguished from the “Khalq” (creation of God) which is contingent. In His nature all contradictions melt away, and from Him flow all opposites. Thus they consided themselves to have solved the problem which had troubled the mind of Zoroaster and his followers.

In order to find an answer to the question, “What is plurality?” the Ismaīlia refer to what they consider a netaphysical axiom - “that from one only one can proceed”. But the one which proceeds, is not something completely different from which it proceeds. It is really the Primal one transformed. The Primal Unity, therefore, transformed itself into the First Intellect (Universal Reason); and then, by means of this transformation of itself, created the Universal soul which, impelled by its nature to perfectly identify itself with the original source, felt the necessity of motion, and consequently of a body possessing the power of motion. In order to achieve its end, the soul created the heavens moving in circular motion according to its direction. It also created the elements which mixed together, and formed the visible Universe - the scene of plurality through which it endeavours to pass with a view to come back to the original source. The individual soul is an epitome of the whole Universe which exists only for its progressive education. The Universal Reason incarnates itself from time to time, in the personality of the “Leader” who illuminates the soul in pro-portion to its experience and understanding, and gradually guides it through the scene of plurality to the world of eternal unity. When the Universal soul reaches its goal, or rather returns to its own deep being, the process of disintegration ensues. “Particles constituting the Universe fall off from each other - those of goodness go to truth (God) which symbolises unity; those of evil go to untruth (Devil) which symbolises diversity”[20] . This is but briefly the Ism Līlian Philosophy - a mixture, as Sharastānī remarks,. of Philosophical and Manichaean ideas - which. by gradually arousing the slumbering spirit of scepticism, they administered, as it were, in doses to the initiated, and finally brought them to that stage of spiritual emancipation where solemn ritual drops off, and dogmatic religion appears to be nothing more than a systematic arrangement of useful falsehoods.

The Ismā'īlian doctrine is the first attempt to amalgamate contemporary Philosophy with a really Persian view of the Universe, and to restate Islam, in reference to this synthesis, by allegorical interpretation of the Qur'ān - a method which was afterwards adopted by Sūfīism. With them the Zoroastrian Ahriman (Devil) is not the malignant creator of evil things but it is a principle which violates the eternal unity, and breaks it up into visible diversity. The idea that some principle of difference in the nature of the ultimate existence must be postulated in order to account for empirical diversity, underwent further modifications; until in the ῌurūfī sect (an offshoot of the Ismā'īlia), in the fourteenth century, it touched contemporary Ṣūfīism on the one hand, and Christian Trinity on the other. The “Be”, maintained the Hurūfīs, is the eternal word of God, which, itself uncreated, leads to further creation - the word externalised. “But for the ‘word' the recognition of the essence of Divinity would have been impossible; since Divinity is beyond the reach of sense - perception”[21] . The ‘word', therefore, became flesh in the womb of Mary[22] in order to manifest the Father. The whole Universe is the manifestation of God's ‘word', in which He is immanent.[23] Every sound in the Universe is within God; every atom is singing the song of eternity;[24] all is life. Those who want to

discover the ultimate reality of things, let them seek “the named” through the Name,[25] which at once conceals and reveals its subject.

§ III. Reaction against Rationalism - The Ash'arīte

Patronised by the early Caliphs of the House of 'Abbās, Rationalism continued to flourish in the intellectual centres of the Islamic world; until, in the first half of the 9th century, it met the powerful orthodox reaction which found a very energetic leader in Al-Ash’arī (b. 873 A.D.) who studied under Rationalist teachers only to demolish, by their own methods, the edifice they had so laboriously built. He was a pupil of Al-Jubbā'ī[26] - the representative of the younger school of Mu’tazilaism in Basra - with whom he had many controversies[27] which eventually terminated their friendly relations, and led the pupil to bid farewell to the Mu'tazila camp. “The fact”. says Spitta, “that Al-Ash'arī was so thoroughly a child of his time with the successive currents of which he let himself go, makes him, in another relation, an important figure to us. In him, as in any other, are clearly reflected the various tendencies of this politically as well as religiously interesting period; and we seldom find ourselves in a position to weigh the power of the orthodox confession and the Mu'tazilite speculation, the child-like helpless manner of the one, the immaturity and imperfection of the other, so completely as in the life of this man who was orthodox as a boy and a Mu'tazila as a young man”.[28] The Mu'tazila speculation (e.g. Al-Jāḥiz) tended to be absolutely unfettered, and in some cases led to a merely negative attitude of thought. The movement initiated by Al-Ash'arī was an attempt not only to purge Islām of all non-Islamic elements which had quietly crept into it, but also to harmonize the religious consciousness with the religious thought of Islam. Rationalism was an attempt to measure reality by reason alone; it implied the identity of the spheres of religion and philosophy, and strove to express faith in the form of concepts or terms of pure thought. It ignored the facts of human nature, and tended to disintegrate the solidarity of the Islamic Church. Hence the reaction.

The orthodox reaction led by the Ash'arite then was, in reality, nothing more than the transfer of dialectic method to the defence of the authority of Divine Revelation. In opposition to the Rationalists, they maintained the doctrine of the Attributes of God; and, as regards the Free Will controversy, they adopted a course lying midway between the extreme fatalism of the old school, and the extreme libertarianism of the Rationalists. They teach that the power of choice as well as all human actions are created by God; and that man has been given the power of acquiring[29] the different modes of activity. But Fakhral-Dīn Rāzī, who in his violent attack on philosophy was strenuously opposed by Tūsī and Qutbal-Dīn, does away with the idea of “acquisition”, and openly maintains the doctrine of necessity in his commentary on the Qur'ān. The Mātarīdiyya - another school of anti-rationalist theology, founded by Abu Manṣūr Mātarīdī a native of Mātarīd in the environs of Samarqand - went back to the old rationalist position, and taught in opposition to the Ash'arite, that man has absolute control over his activity; and that his power affects the very nature of his actions. Al-Ash'arīs interest was purely theological; but it was impossible to harmonise reason and revelation without making reference to the ultimate nature of reality. Bāqilānī[30] therefore, made use of some purely metaphysical propositions (that substance is an individual unity; that quality cannot exist in quality; that perfect vacuum is possible.) in his Theo-logical investigation, and thus gave the school a metaphysical foundation which it is our main object to bring out. We shall not, therefore, dwell upon their defence of orthodox beliefs (e.g. that the Qur'ān is uncreated; that the visibility of God is possible etc.); but we shall endeavour to pick up the elements of metaphysical thought in their theological controversies. In order to meet contemporary philosophers on their own ground, they could not dispense with plilosophising; hence willingly or unwillingly they had to develop a theory of knowledge peculiar to themselves.

God, according to the Ash'arite, is the ultimate necessary existence which “carries its attributes in its own being”;[31] and whose existence (wujūd) and essence (Māhiyyat) are identical. Besides the argument from the contingent character of motion they used the following arguments to prove the existence of this ultimate principle: -

(I). All bodies, they argue, are one in so far as the phenomenal fact of their existence is concerned. But in spite of this unity, their qualities are different and even opposed to each other. We are, therefore, driven to postulate an ultimate cause in order to account for their empirical divergence.

(2). Every contingent being needs a cause to account for its existence. The Universe is contingent; therefore it must have a cause; and that cause is God. That the Universe is contingent, they proved in the following manner. All that exists in the Universe, is either sub-stance or quality. The contingence of quality is evident, and the contingence of substance follows from the fact that no substance could exist apart from qualities. The contingence of quality necessitates the contingence of substance; otherwise the eternity of substance would necessitate the eternity of quality. In order fully to appreciate the value of this argument, it is necessary to understand the Ash'arite theory of knowledge. To answer the question, “What is a thing?” they subjected to a searching criticism the Aristotelian categories of thought, and arrived at the conclusion that bodies have no properties in themselves.[32] They made no distinction of secondary and primary qualities of a body, and reduced all of them to purely subjective relations. Quality too became with them a mere accident without which the sub-stance could not exist. They used the word substance or atom with a vague implication of externality; but their criticism, actuated by a pious desire to defend the idea of divine creation, reduced the Universe to a mere show of ordered subjectivities which, as they maintained like Berkeley, found their ultimate explanation in the Will of God. In his examination of human knowledge regarded as a product and not merely a process, Kant stopped at the idea of “Ding an sich”, but the Ash'arite endeavoured to penetrate further, and maintained, against the contemporary Agnostic-Realism, that the so called underlying essence existed only in so far as it was brought in relation to the knowing subject. Their atomism, therefore, approaches that of Lotze[33] who, in spite of his desire to save external reality, ended in its complete reduction to ideality. But like Lotze they could not believe their atoms to be the inner working of the Infinite Primal Being. The interest of pure monotheism was too strong for them. The necessary consequence of their analysis of matter is a thorough going idealism like that of Berkeley; but perhaps their instinctive realism combined with the force of atomistic tradition, still compels them to use the word “atom” by which they endeavour to give something like a realistic coloring to their idealism. The interest of dogmatic theology drove them to maintain towards pure Philosophy an attitude of criticism which taught her unwilling advocates how to philosophise and build a metaphysics of their own.

But a more important and philosophically more significant aspect of the Ash'arite Meta-physics, is their attitude towards the Law of Causation.[34] Just as they repudiated all the principles of optics[35] in order to show, in opposition to the Rationalists, that God could be visible in spite of His being unextended, so with a view to defend the possibility of miracles, they rejected the idea of causation altogether. The orthodox believed in miracles as well as in the Universal Law of Causation; but they maintained that, at the time of manifesting a miracle, God suspended the operation of this law. The Ash'arite, however, starting with the supposition that cause and effect must be similar, could not share the orthodox view, and taught that the idea of power is meaningless, and that we know nothing but floating impressions, the phenomenal order of which is deter-mined by God.

Any account of the Ash'arite metaphysics would be incomplete without a notice of the work of AI-Ghazālī (d. IIII A.D.) who though misunderstood by many orthodox theologians, will always be looked upon as one of the greatest personalities of Islam. This sceptic of powerful ability anticipated Descartes[36] in his philosophical method; and, “seven hundred years before Hume cut the bond of causality with the edge of his dialectic”[37] he was the first to write a systematic refutation of philosophy, and completely to annihilate that dread of intellectualism which had characterised the orthodox. It was chiefly his influence that made men study dogma and metaphysics together, and eventually led to a system of education which produced such men as Shahrastānī, 'Al-Rāzī and Al-Ishrāqī. The following passage indicates his attitude as a thinker: -

“From my childhood I was inclined to think out things for myself. The result of this attitude was that I revolted against authority; and all the beliefs that had fixed themselves in my mind from childhood lost their original importance. I thought that such beliefs based on mere authority were equally entertained by Jews, Christians, and followers of other religions. Real knowledge must eradicate all doubt. For instance, it is self-evident that ten is greater than three. If a person, however, endeavours to prove the contrary by an appeal to his power of turning a stick into a snake, the performance would indeed be wonderful, though it cannot touch the certainty of the proposition in question”[38] . He examined afterwards, all the various claimants of “Certain Knowledge” and finally found it in Ṣūfīism.

With their view of the nature of substance, the Ash’arite, rigid monotheists as they were, could not safely discuss the nature of the human soul. Al-Ghazālī alone seriously took up the problem, and to this day it is difficult to define, with accuracy, his view of the nature of God. In him, like Borger and Solger in Germany, Sufī pantheism and the Ash'arite dogma of personality appear to harmonise together, a reconciliation which makes it difficult to say whether he was a Pantheist, or a Personal Pantheist of the type of Lotze. The soul, according to Al-Al-Ghazālī, perceives things. But perception as an attribute can exist only in a substance or essence which is absolutely free from all the attributes of body. In his Al-Madnūn,[39] he explains why the prophet declined to reveal the nature of the soul. There are, he says, two kinds of men; ordinary men and thinkers. The former who look upon materiality as a condition of existence, cannot conceive an immaterial substance. The latter are led, by their logic, to a conception of the soul which sweeps away all difference between God and the individual soul. Al-Ghāzalī, there-fore, realised the Pantheistic drift of his own inquiry, and preferred silence as to the ultimate nature of the soul.

He is generally included among the Ash'arite. But strictly speaking he is not an Ash'ārite; though he admitted that the Ash'arite mode of thought was excellent for the masses. “He held”, says Shiblī ('Ilmal-Kalām, p. 66.), “that the secret of faith could not be revealed; for this reason he encouraged exposition of the Ash'arite theology, and took good care in persuading his immediate disciples not to publish the results of his private reflection”. Such an attitude towards the Ash'arite theology, combined with his constant use of philosophical language, could not but lead to suspicion. Ibn Jauzī, Qāḍī'Iyāḍ, and other famous theologians of the orthodox school, publicly denounced him as one of the “misguided”; and 'Iyāḍ went even so far as to order the destruction of all his philosophical and theological writings that existed in Spain.

It is, therefore, clear that while the dialectic of Rationalism destroyed the personality of God, and reduced divinity to a bare indefinable universality, the antirationalist movement, though it preserved the dogma of personality, destroyed the external reality of nature. In spite of Nazzām's theory of “Atomic objectification”,[40] the atom of the Rationalist possesses an independent objective reality; that of the Ash'arite is a fleeting moment of Divine Will. The one saves nature, and tends to do away with the God of Theology; the other sacrifices nature to save God as conceived by the orthodox. The God-intoxicated Ṣūfī who stands aloof from the Theological controversies of the age, saves and spiritualises both the aspects of existence, and looks upon the whole Universe as the self-revelation of God - a higher notion which synthesises the opposite extremes of his predecessors. “Wooden-legged” Rationalism, as the Ṣūfī called it, speaks its last word in the sceptic Al-Ghazāli, whose restless soul, after long and hopeless wanderings in the desolate sands of dry intellectualism, found its final halting place in the still deep of human emotion. His scepticism is directed more to substantiate the necessity of a higher source of knowledge than merely to defend the dogma of Islamic Theology, and, therefore, marks the quiet victory of Sufīism over all the rival speculative tendencies of the time.

Al-Ghazalī's positive contribution to the Philosophy of his country, however, is found in his little book - Mishkātal-Anwār where he starts with the Ouranic verse, “God is the light of heavens and earth”, and instinctively returns to the Iranian idea, which was soon to find a vigorous expounder in Al-Ishrāqī. Light, he teaches in this book, is the only real existence; and there is no darkness greater than non-existence. But the essence of Light is manifestation: “it is attributed to manifestation which is a relation”[41] . The Universe was created out of

darkness on which God sprinkled[42] his own light, and made its different parts more or less visible according as they received more or less light. As bodies differ from one another in being dark, obscure, illuminated or illuminating, so men are differentiated from one another. There are some who illuminate other human beings; and, for this reason, the Prophet is named “The Burning Lamp” in the Qur'ān.

The physical eye sees only the external manifestation of the Absolute or Real Light. There is an internal eye in the heart of man which, unlike the physical eye, sees itself as other things, an eye which goes beyond the finite, and pierces the veil of manifestation. These thoughts are merely germs, which developed and fructified in Al-Ishrāgī's “Philosophy of Illumination” - Hikmatal-Ishrāq.

Such is the Ash'arite philosophy.

One great theological result of this reaction was that it checked the growth of freethought which tended to dissolve the solidarity of the Church. We are, however, concerned more with the purely intellectual results of the Ash'arite mode of thought, and these are mainly two: -

(I). It led to an independent criticism of Greek philosophy as we shall see presently.

(2). In the beginning of the loth century when the Ash'arite had almost completely demolished the stronghold of Rationalism, we see a tendency towards what may be called Persian Positivism. Al-Birūnī[43] (d. 1048) and Ibn Haitham[44] (d. 1038) who anticipated modern empirical Psychology in recognising what is called reaction-time, gave up all inquiry concerning the nature of the supersensual, and maintained a prudent silence about religious matters. Such a state of things could have existed, but could not have been logically justified before Al-Ash'arī.

NOTES AND REFERENCES

[1] During the 'Abbāsid Period there were many who secretly held Manichaeism opinions, See Fihrist, Leipsig 1871, p. 338; See also Al-Mu'tazila, ed. by T. W. Arnold, Leipsig 1902, p. 27, where the author speaks of a controversy between Abu'l-Hudhail and Ṣālih, the Dualist. See also Macdonald's Muslim Theology, p. 133

[2] The Muctazilas belonged to various nationalities, and many of them were Persians either by descent or domicile. Wāṣil Ibn 'Atā - the reported founder of the sect - was a Persian (Browne, Lit. His., Vol. I, p. 281). Von Kremer, however, traces their origin to the theological controversies of the Umayyad period. Mu'tazilaism was not an essentially Persian movement; but it is true, as Prof. Browne observes (Lit. His., Vol. I, p. 283) that Shiite and Qādarī tenets, indeed, often went together, and the Shiite doctrine current in Persia at the present day is in many respects Mu'tazilite, while ῌasan Al-Ash'arī, the great opponent of the Mu'tazilite, is by the Shiites held in horror. It may also be added that some of the greater representatives of the Mu'tazila opinion were Shi'as by religion, e. g. Abu 'l-Hudhan (Al-Mu'tazila, ed. by T. W. Arnold, p. 28). On the other hand many of the followers of Al-Ash'ari were Persians (See extracts from Ibn 'Asākir ed. Mehren), so that it does not seem o be quite justifiable to describe the Ath'arite mode of thought as a purely semitic movement.

[3] Shahrastānī: Cureton's ed., p. 34.

[4] Dr. Frankl: Ein Mu'tazilitischer Kalām - Wien 1872, p. 13.

[5] Shahrastānī: Cureton's ed., p. 48. See also Steiner - Die Mutaziliten, p.59.

[6] Ibn ῌazm (Cairo, ed. I) Vol. IV, p. 197. See also Shahrāstānī:

Cureton's ed., p. 42.

[7] Steiner: Die Mu'taziliten; Leipzig, 1865, p.57.

[8] Ibid. P.59.

[9] Shahrastānī: Cureton's ed., p.38.

[10] Ibn ῌazm (ed. Cairo):Vol-V, 42.

[11] Shahrastānī: Cureton's ed., p. 38.

[12] Steiner: Die Mu'taziliten, p.80.

13] Shahrastānī: Cureton's ed., p. 38.

[14] Ibn ῌazm (ed. Cairo): Vol. IV, pp. 194, 197.

[15] Ibid. Vol. IV, p. 194.

[16] Shahrastānī: Cureton's ed., p. 44.

[17] In my treatment of the atomism of Islamic Rationalists, I am indebted to Arthur Biram's publication: “Kitābul Masā'il fil khilāf beyn al-Baṣriyyīn wal Baghdādiyyīn”.

[18] Macdonald's Muslim Theology, p. 161.

[19] Ibn Ham in his Kitāb al-Milal, looks upon the heretical sects of Persia as a continuous struggle against the Arab power which the cunning Persian attempted to shake off by these peaceful means. See Von Kremer's Geschichte der herrschenden Ideen des Islams, pp. 10 where this learned Arab historian of Cordova is quoted at length.

[20] Sharastānī: Cureton's ed: p. 149.

[21] Jāwidān Kabfr, fol. 149a.

[22] Ibid. fol. 280a.

[23] Ibid. fol. 366b

[24] Ibid. fol. 155b.

[25] Ibid. fol. 382a.

[26] Extracts from Ibn ‘Asākir (Mehren) - Travaux de la troisieme session du Congres International des Orientalistes - p. 261.

[27] Spitta: Zur Geschichte Abul-Hasan Al-Ash'arl, pp. 42, 43. See also Ibn Khallikān (Gottingen 1839) - Al-Jubba'l, where the story of their controversy is given.

[28] Spitta: Vorwort, p. VII.

[29] Shahrastānī - ed. Cureton, p. 69.

[30] Martin Schreiner: Zur Geschichte des Ash'aritenthums. (Huitiéme Congres International des Orientalistes 1889, p. 82)

[31] Martin Schreiner: Zur Geschichte des As'aritenthums. (Huitième Congrès International des Orientalistes IIme Partie 1893, p. 113).

[32] See Macdonald's admirable account of The Ash'arite Meta-physics: Muslim Theology p. 201 sq. See also Maulānā Shiblī, 'Ilmal Kalām pp. 60, 72.

[33] “Lotze is an atomist, but he does not conceive the atoms themselves as material; for extension, like all other sensuous qualities is explained through the reciprocal action of atoms; they themselves, therefore, cannot possess this quality. Like life and like all empirical qualities, the sensuous fact of extension is due to the cooperation of points of force, which, in time, must be conceived as starting points of the inner working of the Infinite Primal Being”. Höffding Vol. II, p. 516.

[34] Shiblī 'Ilmal-Kalām pp. 64, 72.

[35] Shahrastānī, ed. Cureton, p. 82.

[36] “It (Al-Ghazālī's work on the Revivication of the sciences of religion) has so remarkable a resemblance to the Discourse sue la methode of Descartes, that had any translation of it existed in in the days of Descartes everyone would have cried against the plagiarism”. (Lewes's History of Philosophy: Vol. II. p. 50).

[37] Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 20, p. 103.

[38] Al-Munqidh p. 3.

[39] See Sir Sayyid Al}mad's criticism of A1-Ghazālf's view of the soul, Al-Nazrufī ba'di Masāili-1 Imāmi-1 humām Abu Hāmid A1-GhazālI; No. 4, p. 3 sq. (ed. Agra).

[40] Ibn ῌazm, Vol. V. p. 63, 64. where the author states and criticises this theory.

[41] Mishkātal-Anwar, fol. 3a.

[42] In support of this view Al-Ghazalt quotes a tradition of the prophet. Ibid. fol. 10a.

[43] He (Al-Birūnī) quotes with approval the following, as the teaching of the adherents of Aryabhatta: It is enough for us to know that which is lighted up by the sun's rays. Whatever lies beyond, though it should be of immeasurable extent, we cannot make use of; for what the sunbeam does not reach, the senses do not perceive, and what the senses do not perceive we cannot know. From this we gather what Al-Birūnī's Philosophy was: only sense-perceptions, knit together by a logical intelligence, yield sure knowledge. (Boer's Philosophy in Islam, p. 146).

[44] “Moreover truth for him (Ibn Haitham) was only that which was presented as material for the faculties of sense-perception; and which received it from the understanding, being thus the logically elaborated perception”. (Boer's Philosophy in Islām, p. 15o).

CHAP. III. THE RISE AND FALL OF RATIONALISM IN ISLAM

§ I. The Metaphysics of Rationalism - Materialism

The Persian mind, having adjusted itself to the new political environment, soon reasserts its innate freedom, and begins to retire from the field of objectivity, in order that it may come back to itself, and reflect upon the material achieved in its journey out of its own inwardness. With the study of Greek thought, the spirit which was almost lost in the concrete, begins to reflect and realise itself as the arbiter of truth. Subjectivity asserts itself, and endeavours to supplant all outward authority. Such a period, in the intellectual history of a people, must be the epoch of rationalism, scepticism, mysticism, heresy - forms in which the human mind, swayed by the growing force of subjectivity, rejects all external standards of truth. And so we find the epoch under consideration.

The period of Umayyad dominance is taken up with the process of co-mingling and adjustment to new conditions of life; but with the rise of the 'Abbāsid Dynasty and the study of Greek Philosophy, the pent-up intellectual force of Persia bursts out again, and exhibits wonderful activity in all the departments of thought and action. The fresh intellectual vigour imparted by the assimilation of Greek Philosophy which was studied with great avidity, led immediately to a critical examination of Islamic Monotheism. Theology, enlivened by religious fervour, leārned to talk the language of Philosophy earlier than cold reason began to seek a retired corner, away from the noise of controversy, in order to construct a consistent theory of things. In the first half of the 8th century we find Wāṣil Ibn 'Atā - a Persian disciple of the famous theologian Ḥasan of Basra - starting Mu'tazilaism (Rationalism) - that most interesting movement which engaged some of the subtlest minds of Persia, and finally exhausted its force in the keen metaphysical controversies of Baghdād and Basra. The famous city of Basra had become, owing to its commercial situation, the play-ground of various forces - Greek Philosophy, Scepticism, Christianity, Buddhistic ideas, Manichaeism[1] - which furnished ample spiritual food to the inquiring mind of the time, and formed the intellectual environment of Islamic Rationalism. What Spitta calls the Syrian period of Muhammadan History is not characterised with metaphysical subtleties. With the advent of the Persian Period, however, Muhammadan students of Greek Philosophy began properly to reflect on their religion; and the Mu'tazila thinkers, gradually[2] drifted into metaphysics with which alone we are concerned here. It is not our object to trace the history of the Mu'tazila Kalām; for present purposes it will be sufficient if we briefly reveal the metaphysical implications of the Mu'tazila view of Islām. The conception of God, and the theory of matter, therefore, are the only āspects of Rationalism which we propose to discuss here.

His conception of the unity of God at which the Mu'tazila eventually arrived by a subtle dialectic is one of the fundamental points in which he differs from the Orthodox Muhammadan. God's attributes, according to his view, cannot be said to inhere in him; they form the very essence of His nature. The Mu'tazila, therefore, denies the separate reality of divine attributes, and declares their absolute identity with the abstract divine Principle. “God”, says Abu'l-Hudhail, “is knowing, all-powerful, living; and his knowledge, power and life constitute His very essence (dhāt)”[3] . In order to explain the pure unity of God Joseph Al-Baṣīr[4] lays down the following five principles: -

(1). The necessary supposition of atom and accident.

(2). The necessary supposition of a creator.

(3). The necessary supposition of the conditions (Aḥwāl) of God.

(4). The rejection of those attributes which do not befit God.

(5). The unity of God in spite of the plurality of His attributes.

This conception of unity underwent further modifications; until in the hands of Mu'ammar and Abu Hāshim it became a mere abstract possibility about which nothing could be predicated. We cannot, he says, predicate knowledge of God,[5] for His knowledge must be of something in Himself. The first necessitates the identity of subject and object which is absurd; the second implicates duality in the nature of God which is equally impossible. Aḥmad and Faḍl[6] - disciples of Nazzām, however, recognised this duality in holding that the original creators are two - God - the eternal principle; and the word of God - Jesus Christ - the contingent principle. But more fully to bring out the element of truth in the second alternative suggested by Mu'ammar, was reserved, as we shall see, for later Sufī thinkers of Persia. It is, therefore, clear that some of the rationalists almost unconsciously touched the outer fringe of later pantheism for which, in a sense, they prepared the way, not only by their definition of God, but also by their common effort to internalise the rigid externality of an absolute law.

But the most important contribution of the advocates of Rationalism to purely metaphysical speculation, is their explanation of matter, which their opponents - the Ash'arite - afterwards modified to fit in with their own views of the nature of God. The interest of Nazzām chiefly consisted in the exclusion of all arbitrariness from the orderly course of nature.[7] The same interest in naturalism led Al-Jāhiz to define Will in a purely negative manner.[8] Though the Rationalist thinkers did not want to abandon the idea of a Personal Will, yet they endeavoured to find a deeper ground for the independence of individual natural phenomena. And this ground they found in matter itself. Nazzām taught the infinite divisibility of matter, and obliterated the distinction between substance and accident.[9] Existence was regarded as a quality super-imposed by God on the pre-existing material atoms which would have been incapable of perception without this quality. Muhammad Ibn 'Uthmān, one of the Mu'tazila Shaikhs, says Ibn ῌazm,[10] maintained that the non‑existent (atom in its pre-existential state) is a body in that state; only that in its pre-existential condition it is neither in motion, nor at rest, nor is it said to be created. Sub-stance, then, is a collection of qualities - taste, odour, colour - which, in themselves, are nothing more than material potentialities. The soul, too, is a finer kind of matter; and the processes of knowledge are mere mental motions. Creation is only the actualisation of pre-existing potentialities[11] (Ṭafra). The individuality of a thing which is defined as “that of which something can be predicated”[12] is not an essential factor in its notion. The collection of things we call the Universe, is externalised or perceptible reality which could, so to speak, exist independent of all perceptibility. The object of these metaphysical subtleties is purely theological. God, to the Rationalist, is an absolute unity which can, in no sense, admit of plurality, and could thus exist without the perceptible plurality - the Universe.

The activity of God, then, consists only in making the atom perceptible. The properties of the atom flow from its own nature. A stone thrown up falls down on account of its own indwelling property.[13] God, says Al-'Aṭṭār of Basra and Bishr ibn al Mu'tamir, did not create colour, length, breadth, taste or smell - all these are activities of bodies themselves.[14] Even the number of things in the Universe is not known to God[15] . Bishr ibn al-Mu'tamir further explained the properties of bodies by what he called “Tawallud” - interaction of bodies.[16] Thus it is clear that the Rationalists were philosophically materialists, and theologically deists.

To them substance and atom are identical, and they define substance as a space-filling atom which, besides the quality of filling space, has a certain direction, force and existence forming its very essence as an actuality. In shape it is squarelike; for if it is supposed to be circular, combination of different atoms would not be possible. There is, however, great difference of opinion among the exponents of atomism in regard to the nature of the atom. Some hold that atoms are all similar to each other; while Abu'l-Oāsim of Balkh regards them as similar as well as dissimilar. When we say that two things are similar to each other, we do not necssarily mean that they are similar in all their attributes. Abu'l-Oāsim further differs from Nazzān in advocating the indestructibility of the atom. He holds that the atom had a beginning in time; but that it cannot be completely annihilated. The attribute of “Baqā” (continued existence), he says, does not give to its subject a new attribute other than existence; and the continuity of existence is not an additional attribute at all. The divine activity created the atom as well as its continued existence. Abu'l-Oāsim, however, admits that some atoms may not have been created for continued existence. He denies also the existence of any intervening space between different atoms, and holds, unlike other representatives of the school, that the essence or atom (Māhiyyat) could not remain essence in a state of non-existence. To advocate the opposite is a contradiction in terms. To say that the essence (which is essence because of the attribute of existence) could remain essence in a state of non-existence, is to say that the existent could remain existent in a state of non-existence. It is obvious that Abu'l-Qāsim here approaches the Ash'arite theory of knowledge which dealt a serious blow to the Rationalist theory of matter.

§ II. Contemporary Movements of Thought

Side by side with the development of Mu'tazilaism we see, as is natural in a period of great intellectual activity, many other tendencies of thought manifesting themselves in the philosophical and religious circles of Islam. Let us notice them briefly: -

I. Scepticism. The tendency towards scepticism was the natural consequence of the purely dialectic method of Rationalism. Men such as Ibn AShras and Al-Jāhiz who apparently belonged to the Rationalist camp, were really sceptics. The standpoint of Al-Jāhiz who inclined to deistic naturalism,[18] is that of a cultured man of the time, and not of a professional theologian. In him is noticeable also a reation against the metaphysical hairsplitting of his predecessors, and a desire to widen the pale of theology for the sake of the illiterate who are incapable of reflecting on articles of faith.

2. Ṣūfīism - an appeal to a higher source of knowledge which was first systematised by Dhu'l-Nūn, and became more and more deepened and antischolastic in contrast to the dry intellectualism of the Ash’arite. We shall consider this interesting movement in the following chapter.

3. The revival of authority - Isma'īlianisma movement characteristically Persian which, instead of repudiating freethought, endeavours to come to an understanding with it. Though this movement seems to have no connection with the theological controversies of the time, yet its connection with freethought is fundamental. The similarity between the methods practised by the Isma'īlian missionaries and those of the partisans of the association called Ikhwan al-Safa - Brethren of Purity - suggests some sort of secret relation between the two institutions. Whatever may be the motive of those who started this movement, its significance as an intellectual phenomenon should not be lost sight of. The multiplicity of philosophical and religious views - a necessary consequence of speculative activity - is apt to invoke forces which operate against this, religiously speaking, dangerous multiplicity. In the 18th century history of European thought we see Fichte, starting with a sceptical inquiry concerning the nature of matter, and finding its last word in Pantheism. Schleiermacher appeals to Faith as opposed to Reason, Jacobi points to a source of knowledge higher than reason, while Comte abandons all metaphysical inquiry, and limits all knowledge to sensuous perception. De Maistre and Schlegel, on the other hand, find a resting place in the authority of an absolutely infallible Pope. The advocates of the doctrine of Imāmat think in the same strain as De Maistre; but it is curious that the Isma īliams, while making this doctrine the basis of their Church, permitted free play to all sorts of thinking.

The Ismailia movement then is one aspect of the persistent battle[19] which the intellectually

independent Persian waged against the religious and political ideals of Islam. Originally a branch of the Shiite religion, the Ismaīlia sect assumed quite a cosmopolitan character with 'Abdulla ibn Maimūn - the probable progenitor of the Fātimid Caliphs of Egypt - who died about the same time when Al-ASh'arī, the great opponent of Freethought, was born. This curious man imagined a vast scheme in which he weaved together innumerable threads of various hues, resulting in a cleverly constructed equivocation, charming to the Persian mind for its mysterious character and misty Pythagorean Philosophy. Like the Association of the Brethren of Purity, he made an attempt, under the pious cloak of the doctrine of Imāmat (Authority), to synthesise all the dominating ideas of the time. Greek Philosophy, Christianity, Rationalism, Sūfīism, Manichaeism, Persian heresies, and above all the idea of reincarnation, all came forward to contribute their respective shares to the boldly conceived Ismā'īlian whole, the various aspects of which were to be gradually revealed to the initiated, by the “Leader” - the ever Incarnating Universal Reason - according to the intellectual development of the age in which he incarnated himself. In the Ismā'īlian movement, Freethought, apprehending the collapse of its ever widening structure, seeks to rest upon a stable basis, and, by a strange irony of fate, is led to find it in the very idea which is revolting to its whole being. Barren authority, though still apt to reassert herself at times, adopts this unclaimed child, and thus permits herself to assimilate all knowledge past, present and future.

The unfortunate connection, however, of this movement with the politics of the time, has misled many a scholar. They see in it (Macdonald, for instance) nothing more than a powerful conspiracy to uproot the political power of the Arab from Persia. They have denounced the Ismā'īlian Church which counted among its followers some of the best heads and sincerest hearts, as a mere clique of dark murderers who were ever watching for a possible victim. We must always remember, while estimating the character of these people, the most barbarous persecutions which drove them to pay red-handed fanaticism in the same coin. Assassinations for religious purposes were considered unobjectionable, and even perhaps lawful, among the whole Semite race. As late as the latter half of the 16th century, the Pope of Rome could approve such a dreadful slaughter as the massacre of St. Bartholomew. That assassination, even though actuated by religious zeal, is still a crime, is a purely modern idea; and justice demands that we should not judge older generations with our own standards of right and wrong. A great religious movement which shook to its very foundations the structure of a vast empire, and, having successfully passed through the varied ordeals of moral reproach, calumny and persecution, stood up for centuries as a champion of Science and Philosophy, could not have entirely rested on the frail basis of a political conspiracy of a mere local and temporary character. Ismā'īlianism, in spite of its almost entire loss of original vitality, still dominates the ethical ideal of not an insignificant number in India, Persia, Central Asia, Syria and Africa; while the last expression of Persian thought - Bābism - is essentially Ismā'īlian in its character.

To return, however, to the Philosophy of the sect. From the later Rationalists they borrowed their conception of Divinity. God, or the ultimate principle of existence, they teach, has no attribute. His nature admits of no predication. When we predicate the attribute of power to him, we only mean that He is the giver of power; when we predicate eternity, we indicate the eternity of what the Qur'ān calls “Amt.” (word of God) as distinguished from the “Khalq” (creation of God) which is contingent. In His nature all contradictions melt away, and from Him flow all opposites. Thus they consided themselves to have solved the problem which had troubled the mind of Zoroaster and his followers.

In order to find an answer to the question, “What is plurality?” the Ismaīlia refer to what they consider a netaphysical axiom - “that from one only one can proceed”. But the one which proceeds, is not something completely different from which it proceeds. It is really the Primal one transformed. The Primal Unity, therefore, transformed itself into the First Intellect (Universal Reason); and then, by means of this transformation of itself, created the Universal soul which, impelled by its nature to perfectly identify itself with the original source, felt the necessity of motion, and consequently of a body possessing the power of motion. In order to achieve its end, the soul created the heavens moving in circular motion according to its direction. It also created the elements which mixed together, and formed the visible Universe - the scene of plurality through which it endeavours to pass with a view to come back to the original source. The individual soul is an epitome of the whole Universe which exists only for its progressive education. The Universal Reason incarnates itself from time to time, in the personality of the “Leader” who illuminates the soul in pro-portion to its experience and understanding, and gradually guides it through the scene of plurality to the world of eternal unity. When the Universal soul reaches its goal, or rather returns to its own deep being, the process of disintegration ensues. “Particles constituting the Universe fall off from each other - those of goodness go to truth (God) which symbolises unity; those of evil go to untruth (Devil) which symbolises diversity”[20] . This is but briefly the Ism Līlian Philosophy - a mixture, as Sharastānī remarks,. of Philosophical and Manichaean ideas - which. by gradually arousing the slumbering spirit of scepticism, they administered, as it were, in doses to the initiated, and finally brought them to that stage of spiritual emancipation where solemn ritual drops off, and dogmatic religion appears to be nothing more than a systematic arrangement of useful falsehoods.

The Ismā'īlian doctrine is the first attempt to amalgamate contemporary Philosophy with a really Persian view of the Universe, and to restate Islam, in reference to this synthesis, by allegorical interpretation of the Qur'ān - a method which was afterwards adopted by Sūfīism. With them the Zoroastrian Ahriman (Devil) is not the malignant creator of evil things but it is a principle which violates the eternal unity, and breaks it up into visible diversity. The idea that some principle of difference in the nature of the ultimate existence must be postulated in order to account for empirical diversity, underwent further modifications; until in the ῌurūfī sect (an offshoot of the Ismā'īlia), in the fourteenth century, it touched contemporary Ṣūfīism on the one hand, and Christian Trinity on the other. The “Be”, maintained the Hurūfīs, is the eternal word of God, which, itself uncreated, leads to further creation - the word externalised. “But for the ‘word' the recognition of the essence of Divinity would have been impossible; since Divinity is beyond the reach of sense - perception”[21] . The ‘word', therefore, became flesh in the womb of Mary[22] in order to manifest the Father. The whole Universe is the manifestation of God's ‘word', in which He is immanent.[23] Every sound in the Universe is within God; every atom is singing the song of eternity;[24] all is life. Those who want to

discover the ultimate reality of things, let them seek “the named” through the Name,[25] which at once conceals and reveals its subject.

§ III. Reaction against Rationalism - The Ash'arīte

Patronised by the early Caliphs of the House of 'Abbās, Rationalism continued to flourish in the intellectual centres of the Islamic world; until, in the first half of the 9th century, it met the powerful orthodox reaction which found a very energetic leader in Al-Ash’arī (b. 873 A.D.) who studied under Rationalist teachers only to demolish, by their own methods, the edifice they had so laboriously built. He was a pupil of Al-Jubbā'ī[26] - the representative of the younger school of Mu’tazilaism in Basra - with whom he had many controversies[27] which eventually terminated their friendly relations, and led the pupil to bid farewell to the Mu'tazila camp. “The fact”. says Spitta, “that Al-Ash'arī was so thoroughly a child of his time with the successive currents of which he let himself go, makes him, in another relation, an important figure to us. In him, as in any other, are clearly reflected the various tendencies of this politically as well as religiously interesting period; and we seldom find ourselves in a position to weigh the power of the orthodox confession and the Mu'tazilite speculation, the child-like helpless manner of the one, the immaturity and imperfection of the other, so completely as in the life of this man who was orthodox as a boy and a Mu'tazila as a young man”.[28] The Mu'tazila speculation (e.g. Al-Jāḥiz) tended to be absolutely unfettered, and in some cases led to a merely negative attitude of thought. The movement initiated by Al-Ash'arī was an attempt not only to purge Islām of all non-Islamic elements which had quietly crept into it, but also to harmonize the religious consciousness with the religious thought of Islam. Rationalism was an attempt to measure reality by reason alone; it implied the identity of the spheres of religion and philosophy, and strove to express faith in the form of concepts or terms of pure thought. It ignored the facts of human nature, and tended to disintegrate the solidarity of the Islamic Church. Hence the reaction.

The orthodox reaction led by the Ash'arite then was, in reality, nothing more than the transfer of dialectic method to the defence of the authority of Divine Revelation. In opposition to the Rationalists, they maintained the doctrine of the Attributes of God; and, as regards the Free Will controversy, they adopted a course lying midway between the extreme fatalism of the old school, and the extreme libertarianism of the Rationalists. They teach that the power of choice as well as all human actions are created by God; and that man has been given the power of acquiring[29] the different modes of activity. But Fakhral-Dīn Rāzī, who in his violent attack on philosophy was strenuously opposed by Tūsī and Qutbal-Dīn, does away with the idea of “acquisition”, and openly maintains the doctrine of necessity in his commentary on the Qur'ān. The Mātarīdiyya - another school of anti-rationalist theology, founded by Abu Manṣūr Mātarīdī a native of Mātarīd in the environs of Samarqand - went back to the old rationalist position, and taught in opposition to the Ash'arite, that man has absolute control over his activity; and that his power affects the very nature of his actions. Al-Ash'arīs interest was purely theological; but it was impossible to harmonise reason and revelation without making reference to the ultimate nature of reality. Bāqilānī[30] therefore, made use of some purely metaphysical propositions (that substance is an individual unity; that quality cannot exist in quality; that perfect vacuum is possible.) in his Theo-logical investigation, and thus gave the school a metaphysical foundation which it is our main object to bring out. We shall not, therefore, dwell upon their defence of orthodox beliefs (e.g. that the Qur'ān is uncreated; that the visibility of God is possible etc.); but we shall endeavour to pick up the elements of metaphysical thought in their theological controversies. In order to meet contemporary philosophers on their own ground, they could not dispense with plilosophising; hence willingly or unwillingly they had to develop a theory of knowledge peculiar to themselves.

God, according to the Ash'arite, is the ultimate necessary existence which “carries its attributes in its own being”;[31] and whose existence (wujūd) and essence (Māhiyyat) are identical. Besides the argument from the contingent character of motion they used the following arguments to prove the existence of this ultimate principle: -

(I). All bodies, they argue, are one in so far as the phenomenal fact of their existence is concerned. But in spite of this unity, their qualities are different and even opposed to each other. We are, therefore, driven to postulate an ultimate cause in order to account for their empirical divergence.

(2). Every contingent being needs a cause to account for its existence. The Universe is contingent; therefore it must have a cause; and that cause is God. That the Universe is contingent, they proved in the following manner. All that exists in the Universe, is either sub-stance or quality. The contingence of quality is evident, and the contingence of substance follows from the fact that no substance could exist apart from qualities. The contingence of quality necessitates the contingence of substance; otherwise the eternity of substance would necessitate the eternity of quality. In order fully to appreciate the value of this argument, it is necessary to understand the Ash'arite theory of knowledge. To answer the question, “What is a thing?” they subjected to a searching criticism the Aristotelian categories of thought, and arrived at the conclusion that bodies have no properties in themselves.[32] They made no distinction of secondary and primary qualities of a body, and reduced all of them to purely subjective relations. Quality too became with them a mere accident without which the sub-stance could not exist. They used the word substance or atom with a vague implication of externality; but their criticism, actuated by a pious desire to defend the idea of divine creation, reduced the Universe to a mere show of ordered subjectivities which, as they maintained like Berkeley, found their ultimate explanation in the Will of God. In his examination of human knowledge regarded as a product and not merely a process, Kant stopped at the idea of “Ding an sich”, but the Ash'arite endeavoured to penetrate further, and maintained, against the contemporary Agnostic-Realism, that the so called underlying essence existed only in so far as it was brought in relation to the knowing subject. Their atomism, therefore, approaches that of Lotze[33] who, in spite of his desire to save external reality, ended in its complete reduction to ideality. But like Lotze they could not believe their atoms to be the inner working of the Infinite Primal Being. The interest of pure monotheism was too strong for them. The necessary consequence of their analysis of matter is a thorough going idealism like that of Berkeley; but perhaps their instinctive realism combined with the force of atomistic tradition, still compels them to use the word “atom” by which they endeavour to give something like a realistic coloring to their idealism. The interest of dogmatic theology drove them to maintain towards pure Philosophy an attitude of criticism which taught her unwilling advocates how to philosophise and build a metaphysics of their own.

But a more important and philosophically more significant aspect of the Ash'arite Meta-physics, is their attitude towards the Law of Causation.[34] Just as they repudiated all the principles of optics[35] in order to show, in opposition to the Rationalists, that God could be visible in spite of His being unextended, so with a view to defend the possibility of miracles, they rejected the idea of causation altogether. The orthodox believed in miracles as well as in the Universal Law of Causation; but they maintained that, at the time of manifesting a miracle, God suspended the operation of this law. The Ash'arite, however, starting with the supposition that cause and effect must be similar, could not share the orthodox view, and taught that the idea of power is meaningless, and that we know nothing but floating impressions, the phenomenal order of which is deter-mined by God.

Any account of the Ash'arite metaphysics would be incomplete without a notice of the work of AI-Ghazālī (d. IIII A.D.) who though misunderstood by many orthodox theologians, will always be looked upon as one of the greatest personalities of Islam. This sceptic of powerful ability anticipated Descartes[36] in his philosophical method; and, “seven hundred years before Hume cut the bond of causality with the edge of his dialectic”[37] he was the first to write a systematic refutation of philosophy, and completely to annihilate that dread of intellectualism which had characterised the orthodox. It was chiefly his influence that made men study dogma and metaphysics together, and eventually led to a system of education which produced such men as Shahrastānī, 'Al-Rāzī and Al-Ishrāqī. The following passage indicates his attitude as a thinker: -

“From my childhood I was inclined to think out things for myself. The result of this attitude was that I revolted against authority; and all the beliefs that had fixed themselves in my mind from childhood lost their original importance. I thought that such beliefs based on mere authority were equally entertained by Jews, Christians, and followers of other religions. Real knowledge must eradicate all doubt. For instance, it is self-evident that ten is greater than three. If a person, however, endeavours to prove the contrary by an appeal to his power of turning a stick into a snake, the performance would indeed be wonderful, though it cannot touch the certainty of the proposition in question”[38] . He examined afterwards, all the various claimants of “Certain Knowledge” and finally found it in Ṣūfīism.

With their view of the nature of substance, the Ash’arite, rigid monotheists as they were, could not safely discuss the nature of the human soul. Al-Ghazālī alone seriously took up the problem, and to this day it is difficult to define, with accuracy, his view of the nature of God. In him, like Borger and Solger in Germany, Sufī pantheism and the Ash'arite dogma of personality appear to harmonise together, a reconciliation which makes it difficult to say whether he was a Pantheist, or a Personal Pantheist of the type of Lotze. The soul, according to Al-Al-Ghazālī, perceives things. But perception as an attribute can exist only in a substance or essence which is absolutely free from all the attributes of body. In his Al-Madnūn,[39] he explains why the prophet declined to reveal the nature of the soul. There are, he says, two kinds of men; ordinary men and thinkers. The former who look upon materiality as a condition of existence, cannot conceive an immaterial substance. The latter are led, by their logic, to a conception of the soul which sweeps away all difference between God and the individual soul. Al-Ghāzalī, there-fore, realised the Pantheistic drift of his own inquiry, and preferred silence as to the ultimate nature of the soul.

He is generally included among the Ash'arite. But strictly speaking he is not an Ash'ārite; though he admitted that the Ash'arite mode of thought was excellent for the masses. “He held”, says Shiblī ('Ilmal-Kalām, p. 66.), “that the secret of faith could not be revealed; for this reason he encouraged exposition of the Ash'arite theology, and took good care in persuading his immediate disciples not to publish the results of his private reflection”. Such an attitude towards the Ash'arite theology, combined with his constant use of philosophical language, could not but lead to suspicion. Ibn Jauzī, Qāḍī'Iyāḍ, and other famous theologians of the orthodox school, publicly denounced him as one of the “misguided”; and 'Iyāḍ went even so far as to order the destruction of all his philosophical and theological writings that existed in Spain.

It is, therefore, clear that while the dialectic of Rationalism destroyed the personality of God, and reduced divinity to a bare indefinable universality, the antirationalist movement, though it preserved the dogma of personality, destroyed the external reality of nature. In spite of Nazzām's theory of “Atomic objectification”,[40] the atom of the Rationalist possesses an independent objective reality; that of the Ash'arite is a fleeting moment of Divine Will. The one saves nature, and tends to do away with the God of Theology; the other sacrifices nature to save God as conceived by the orthodox. The God-intoxicated Ṣūfī who stands aloof from the Theological controversies of the age, saves and spiritualises both the aspects of existence, and looks upon the whole Universe as the self-revelation of God - a higher notion which synthesises the opposite extremes of his predecessors. “Wooden-legged” Rationalism, as the Ṣūfī called it, speaks its last word in the sceptic Al-Ghazāli, whose restless soul, after long and hopeless wanderings in the desolate sands of dry intellectualism, found its final halting place in the still deep of human emotion. His scepticism is directed more to substantiate the necessity of a higher source of knowledge than merely to defend the dogma of Islamic Theology, and, therefore, marks the quiet victory of Sufīism over all the rival speculative tendencies of the time.

Al-Ghazalī's positive contribution to the Philosophy of his country, however, is found in his little book - Mishkātal-Anwār where he starts with the Ouranic verse, “God is the light of heavens and earth”, and instinctively returns to the Iranian idea, which was soon to find a vigorous expounder in Al-Ishrāqī. Light, he teaches in this book, is the only real existence; and there is no darkness greater than non-existence. But the essence of Light is manifestation: “it is attributed to manifestation which is a relation”[41] . The Universe was created out of

darkness on which God sprinkled[42] his own light, and made its different parts more or less visible according as they received more or less light. As bodies differ from one another in being dark, obscure, illuminated or illuminating, so men are differentiated from one another. There are some who illuminate other human beings; and, for this reason, the Prophet is named “The Burning Lamp” in the Qur'ān.

The physical eye sees only the external manifestation of the Absolute or Real Light. There is an internal eye in the heart of man which, unlike the physical eye, sees itself as other things, an eye which goes beyond the finite, and pierces the veil of manifestation. These thoughts are merely germs, which developed and fructified in Al-Ishrāgī's “Philosophy of Illumination” - Hikmatal-Ishrāq.

Such is the Ash'arite philosophy.

One great theological result of this reaction was that it checked the growth of freethought which tended to dissolve the solidarity of the Church. We are, however, concerned more with the purely intellectual results of the Ash'arite mode of thought, and these are mainly two: -

(I). It led to an independent criticism of Greek philosophy as we shall see presently.

(2). In the beginning of the loth century when the Ash'arite had almost completely demolished the stronghold of Rationalism, we see a tendency towards what may be called Persian Positivism. Al-Birūnī[43] (d. 1048) and Ibn Haitham[44] (d. 1038) who anticipated modern empirical Psychology in recognising what is called reaction-time, gave up all inquiry concerning the nature of the supersensual, and maintained a prudent silence about religious matters. Such a state of things could have existed, but could not have been logically justified before Al-Ash'arī.

NOTES AND REFERENCES

[1] During the 'Abbāsid Period there were many who secretly held Manichaeism opinions, See Fihrist, Leipsig 1871, p. 338; See also Al-Mu'tazila, ed. by T. W. Arnold, Leipsig 1902, p. 27, where the author speaks of a controversy between Abu'l-Hudhail and Ṣālih, the Dualist. See also Macdonald's Muslim Theology, p. 133

[2] The Muctazilas belonged to various nationalities, and many of them were Persians either by descent or domicile. Wāṣil Ibn 'Atā - the reported founder of the sect - was a Persian (Browne, Lit. His., Vol. I, p. 281). Von Kremer, however, traces their origin to the theological controversies of the Umayyad period. Mu'tazilaism was not an essentially Persian movement; but it is true, as Prof. Browne observes (Lit. His., Vol. I, p. 283) that Shiite and Qādarī tenets, indeed, often went together, and the Shiite doctrine current in Persia at the present day is in many respects Mu'tazilite, while ῌasan Al-Ash'arī, the great opponent of the Mu'tazilite, is by the Shiites held in horror. It may also be added that some of the greater representatives of the Mu'tazila opinion were Shi'as by religion, e. g. Abu 'l-Hudhan (Al-Mu'tazila, ed. by T. W. Arnold, p. 28). On the other hand many of the followers of Al-Ash'ari were Persians (See extracts from Ibn 'Asākir ed. Mehren), so that it does not seem o be quite justifiable to describe the Ath'arite mode of thought as a purely semitic movement.

[3] Shahrastānī: Cureton's ed., p. 34.

[4] Dr. Frankl: Ein Mu'tazilitischer Kalām - Wien 1872, p. 13.

[5] Shahrastānī: Cureton's ed., p. 48. See also Steiner - Die Mutaziliten, p.59.

[6] Ibn ῌazm (Cairo, ed. I) Vol. IV, p. 197. See also Shahrāstānī:

Cureton's ed., p. 42.

[7] Steiner: Die Mu'taziliten; Leipzig, 1865, p.57.

[8] Ibid. P.59.

[9] Shahrastānī: Cureton's ed., p.38.

[10] Ibn ῌazm (ed. Cairo):Vol-V, 42.

[11] Shahrastānī: Cureton's ed., p. 38.

[12] Steiner: Die Mu'taziliten, p.80.

13] Shahrastānī: Cureton's ed., p. 38.

[14] Ibn ῌazm (ed. Cairo): Vol. IV, pp. 194, 197.

[15] Ibid. Vol. IV, p. 194.

[16] Shahrastānī: Cureton's ed., p. 44.

[17] In my treatment of the atomism of Islamic Rationalists, I am indebted to Arthur Biram's publication: “Kitābul Masā'il fil khilāf beyn al-Baṣriyyīn wal Baghdādiyyīn”.

[18] Macdonald's Muslim Theology, p. 161.

[19] Ibn Ham in his Kitāb al-Milal, looks upon the heretical sects of Persia as a continuous struggle against the Arab power which the cunning Persian attempted to shake off by these peaceful means. See Von Kremer's Geschichte der herrschenden Ideen des Islams, pp. 10 where this learned Arab historian of Cordova is quoted at length.

[20] Sharastānī: Cureton's ed: p. 149.

[21] Jāwidān Kabfr, fol. 149a.

[22] Ibid. fol. 280a.

[23] Ibid. fol. 366b

[24] Ibid. fol. 155b.

[25] Ibid. fol. 382a.

[26] Extracts from Ibn ‘Asākir (Mehren) - Travaux de la troisieme session du Congres International des Orientalistes - p. 261.

[27] Spitta: Zur Geschichte Abul-Hasan Al-Ash'arl, pp. 42, 43. See also Ibn Khallikān (Gottingen 1839) - Al-Jubba'l, where the story of their controversy is given.

[28] Spitta: Vorwort, p. VII.

[29] Shahrastānī - ed. Cureton, p. 69.

[30] Martin Schreiner: Zur Geschichte des Ash'aritenthums. (Huitiéme Congres International des Orientalistes 1889, p. 82)

[31] Martin Schreiner: Zur Geschichte des As'aritenthums. (Huitième Congrès International des Orientalistes IIme Partie 1893, p. 113).

[32] See Macdonald's admirable account of The Ash'arite Meta-physics: Muslim Theology p. 201 sq. See also Maulānā Shiblī, 'Ilmal Kalām pp. 60, 72.

[33] “Lotze is an atomist, but he does not conceive the atoms themselves as material; for extension, like all other sensuous qualities is explained through the reciprocal action of atoms; they themselves, therefore, cannot possess this quality. Like life and like all empirical qualities, the sensuous fact of extension is due to the cooperation of points of force, which, in time, must be conceived as starting points of the inner working of the Infinite Primal Being”. Höffding Vol. II, p. 516.

[34] Shiblī 'Ilmal-Kalām pp. 64, 72.

[35] Shahrastānī, ed. Cureton, p. 82.

[36] “It (Al-Ghazālī's work on the Revivication of the sciences of religion) has so remarkable a resemblance to the Discourse sue la methode of Descartes, that had any translation of it existed in in the days of Descartes everyone would have cried against the plagiarism”. (Lewes's History of Philosophy: Vol. II. p. 50).

[37] Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 20, p. 103.

[38] Al-Munqidh p. 3.

[39] See Sir Sayyid Al}mad's criticism of A1-Ghazālf's view of the soul, Al-Nazrufī ba'di Masāili-1 Imāmi-1 humām Abu Hāmid A1-GhazālI; No. 4, p. 3 sq. (ed. Agra).

[40] Ibn ῌazm, Vol. V. p. 63, 64. where the author states and criticises this theory.

[41] Mishkātal-Anwar, fol. 3a.

[42] In support of this view Al-Ghazalt quotes a tradition of the prophet. Ibid. fol. 10a.

[43] He (Al-Birūnī) quotes with approval the following, as the teaching of the adherents of Aryabhatta: It is enough for us to know that which is lighted up by the sun's rays. Whatever lies beyond, though it should be of immeasurable extent, we cannot make use of; for what the sunbeam does not reach, the senses do not perceive, and what the senses do not perceive we cannot know. From this we gather what Al-Birūnī's Philosophy was: only sense-perceptions, knit together by a logical intelligence, yield sure knowledge. (Boer's Philosophy in Islam, p. 146).

[44] “Moreover truth for him (Ibn Haitham) was only that which was presented as material for the faculties of sense-perception; and which received it from the understanding, being thus the logically elaborated perception”. (Boer's Philosophy in Islām, p. 15o).