Alhassanain(p) Network for Heritage and Islamic Thought

Lesson One: A Glance at the Course of Philosophical Thought: (From Its Origins to the Islamic Epoch)

The Beginning of Philosophical Thought

The history of human thought as well as the creation of man goes back beyond history. Wherever he has lived, thought has been an inseparable characteristic of man. Wherever he has placed his feet, he has taken thinking and intellection with him.

There is no certain and precise information about the unwritten thoughts of man except that which has been surmised by archaeologists on the basis of uncovered remains. However, written thought has remained behind as caravan of history has passed, since the time of written language.

Among the kinds of human thought, that which is related to the knowledge of existence and to its beginning and end, at first were mixed with religious beliefs. Therefore it may be said that one must look for the oldest philosophical thoughts among oriental religious thoughts.

Historians of philosophy believe that the most ancient collections that are purely philosophical or that are predominantly philosophical are related to the Greek sages, who lived approximately six centuries before Christ (peace be with him). Scholars of that time are mentioned who have tried to come to know existence, and the beginning and end of the cosmos. In order to interpret the appearance and changes that occur in existents, they expressed different and occasionally contradictory opinions, and at the same time, they do not hide the fact that their thoughts were influenced more or less by oriental religious beliefs and culture.

In any case, the free atmosphere for discussion and criticism in the Greece of those days prepared the ground for developing and taking pride in philosophical thought. That area was turned into a nursery for philosophy.

Naturally, the beginning thoughts were not properly organized and arranged, and the problems for research were not precisely categorized, let alone that each category should have a specific name and title and characteristic method. In sum, all ideas were called science (‘ilm ), wisdom (hikmat ) and knowledge (ma‘rifat ), and the like.

The Appearance of Sophism and Skepticism

In the fifth century B.C., scholars are mentioned who in the Greek language were called “sophists”, that is, sage and learned. But in spite of their vast information they had about the knowledge then current, they did not believe in fixed truths, and they did not consider any thing to be definitely known or certain.

As reported by historians of philosophy, they were professional teachers who taught rhetoric and debate, and they trained defense lawyers for the courts, for which there was much demand at that time. This profession required the defense lawyer to be able to establish any claim and to be able to reject all sorts of opposing claims. Dealing with this sort of teaching which was often subject to fallacy, gradually brought about a kind of thinking according to which basically there is no truth beyond human thought!

You have heard the story of a man who jokingly said that in such and such a house sweets are being given away. In their simplicity, the people hurried to crowd around the door of the mentioned house. Little by little, the speaker himself began to harbor suspicions about the matter, and so as not to lose out on the chance for free sweets, he joined the line.

It seems as if the Sophists also were victims of this same fate. By teaching fallacious methods to establish and deny claims, little by little such tendencies came to appear in their own thinking, that basically truth and falsehood depend on human thought, and in conclusion that there is no truth beyond human thought!

The expression "sophism," which meant sage and learned, due to being ascribed to such mentioned people, lost its fundamental meaning, and it came to be used as a symbol and sign for a way of thinking according to fallacious reasoning. It is this same expression that in Arabic has taken the form “sūfisṭī ” and the term “safsaṭah ” is derived from it.

The Period of the Flourishing of Philosophy

The most famous thinker who stood up against the Sophists and who criticized their ideas and views was Socrates. It was he who called himselfphilosophus , that is, a lover of wisdom. It is this same expression that in Arabic took the formfilsūf from which the termfalsafah is derived.

Historians of philosophy consider there to be two causes for the choice of this name: one is the humility of Socrates, who always was confessing his own ignorance, and the other is his objection to the Sophists who called themselves sages, that is, with the choice of this title, he wanted to make them understand: You, who for the sake of material and political aims engage in discussion and debate, teaching and learning, are not worthy of the name ‘sage’, and even I, who reject your ideas with the firmest of reasons, do not consider myself worthy of this title, and I merely call myself a lover of wisdom.

After Socrates, his student, Plato, who for years profited from his lessons, endeavored to establish the principles of philosophy, and then, his student, Aristotle, brought philosophy to the pinnacle of its flourishing, and formalized the principles of thought and reasoning in the form of the science of logic, as he formulated the pitfalls of thought in the form of a section on the fallacies.

Ever since Socrates called himself a philosopher, the expression philosophy has been used as opposed to sophistry, and it embraces all the real sciences, such as physics, chemistry, medicine, astronomy, mathematics and theology. Even today in many of the world's most renowned libraries, the books of physics and chemistry are classified underphilosophy , and only conventional disciplines, such as vocabulary, syntax and grammar, are outside the realm of philosophy.

In this way, philosophy came to be considered as a common noun for all the real sciences, and it was divided into two general groups: theoretical sciences and practical sciences. The theoretical sciences include the natural sciences, mathematics and theology, and the natural sciences in their turn include the fields of cosmogony, mineralogy, botany and zoology, and mathematics is divided into arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and music.

Theology is divided into two parts: metaphysics or general discussions of existence, and theology proper. The practical sciences are divided into three branches: morality, domestic economy and politics.

The End of Greek Philosophy

After Plato and Aristotle, for some time their students occupied themselves with the compilation, arrangement and eaboration on the works of their masters, and more or less kept the market for philosophy brisk. It did not take long, however, for this briskness to be replaced by stagnation, and that prosperity and thriving began to fail, and in Greece there came to be few customers for the commodities of science and knowledge. The masters of the arts and sciences came to dwell in Alexandria, where they engaged in research and education. This city remained the center of science and philosophy until the fourth century.

But when the Roman emperors converted to Christianity, and propagated the beliefs of the Church as official beliefs and ideas, they began to oppose the free realm of thought and science, until finally Justinian, the Eastern Roman Emperor, in the year A.D. 529, issued the edict to close the universities and schools of Athens and Alexandria, and the scholars fled for their lives, and they sought refuge in other cities and lands. In this reason the gleaming torch of science and philosophy was extinguished in the Roman Empire.

The Dawn of the Sun of Islam

Simultaneous with the above mentioned process (in the sixth century of the Christian era), in another corner of the world, the greatest event of history occurred, and the Arabian peninsula was witness to the birth, mission and migration of the eminent Prophet of Islam, may the Peace and Blessings of Allah be with him and with his progeny. He read the message of Divine guidance in the ear of the consciousness of the world. As a first step, he called upon people to acquire knowledge,[1] and he held reading, writing and learning in the highest regard. He founded the greatest civilization and most thriving culture in the world. He encouraged his followers to acquire knowledge and wisdom from the cradle to the grave

(min al-mahd ila al-laḥd ), from the nearest to the furthest points on the globe (even if to China,wa law bil-ṣīn ), and at whatever cost (wa law bi-safk al-muhaj wa khawḍ al-lujaj ).[2]

The prolific sapling of Islam planted by the powerful hand of the Messenger of God (ṣ) in the life giving radiance of Divine revelation and nourished by other cultures grew and yielded fruit. Islam absorbed the raw material of human thought according to proper Divine standards and changed them into useful elements in the forge of constructive criticism, and in a short period it spread its shade over all the cultures of the world.

In the shade of the encouragement of the Noble Messenger (ṣ ) and his impeccable successors, Muslims began to acquire various sciences, and the scientific heritages of Greece, Rome and Iran were translated into Arabic. They absorbed the useful elements and supplemented them with their own inquiries, and in most fields they were able to make important discoveries, as in algebra, trigonometry, astronomy, perspective, physics and chemistry.

Another important factor of the growth of Islamic culture was politics. The oppressive Ummayyids and Abbasids who illegitimately occupied the seat of Islamic government felt a severe need for popular approval among the Muslims, while the Household of the Prophet, theAhl al-Bayt , may the blessings of Allah be with all of them, that is, those who were the legitimate guardians ( awliyah ) of the peoples, were the source of knowledge and the treasury of the Divine revelation. The governing regime had no means to attract people except threats and bribes. Hence, they tried to make their regime prosper by encouraging scholars and gathering authorities, and by using the Greek, Roman and Iranian sciences, they tried to open a shop in opposition to the Ahl al-Bayt .

In this way, various philosophical ideas and types of knowledge and crafts with diverse motivations by means of friends and foes, entered the Islamic environment, and the Muslims began to inquire about, adopt and criticize them, and brilliant figures began to appear in the world of science and philosophy in the Islamic environment, each of whom developed a branch of the sciences by his own constant endeavors, and Islamic culture bore fruit.

Among them, the scholars of Islamic theology and doctrine reviewed and criticized the problems of divine philosophy from different viewpoints, and however much some of them went to extremes in their criticisms, this sort of criticism and nit-picking, questioning and raising doubts caused most of the Islamic thinkers and philosophers to try harder, leading to the enrichment of intellectual and philosophical thought.

The Development of Philosophy in the Islamic Epoch

With the widening of the realm of Islamic government and the inclination of different peoples to this life giving religion, many centers of learning of the world came to be included within the realm of Islam. There was a great exchange of ideas among scholars, exchange of books among libraries and translation of these books from various languages: Hindi, Farsi, Greek, Latin, Aramaic, Hebrew, etc., into Arabic, which had become thede facto international language of the Muslims, and this accelerated the pace of the development of philosophy, the sciences and the crafts. Many books of

the philosophers of Greece and Alexandria, and other reputable centers of learning were rendered into Arabic.

In the beginning, the lack of a common language and technical terms agreed upon by the translators, and the discrepancies regarding the principles of Eastern and Western philosophy made the teaching of philosophy difficult and made research and selection among these principles even more difficult. But it was not very long before geniuses such as Abū Naṣr Fārābī and Ibn Sīnā were able to learn the entire sum of philosophical thought of that time by their constant efforts. With God given talents that flourished under the radiance of the light of revelation and the explanations of the Imams, they were then able to review and select from among the appropriate philosophical principles and to present a mature philosophical system, which in addition to including Platonic and Aristotelian ideas and Neo-Platonic thought from Alexandria, and the ideas of oriental mystics (‘urafā ) also included new thoughts and was thus able to excel over all the systems of philosophy of the East and West, although the largest portion of the new system was Aristotelian, and for this reason their philosophy had an Aristotelian and peripatetic color.

Later, this philosophical system came under the critical magnifying glass of thinkers such as Ghazālī, Abū al-Barakāt Baghdādī and Fakhr Rāzī. On the other hand, taking advantage of the works of the sages of ancient Iran, and comparing them with the works of Plato, the Stoics and the Neo-Platonists, Suhravardī founded a new school of philosophy, called Illuminationist philosophy, which had a more Platonic color. In this way, new ground was prepared for the encounter among philosophical ideas and their development and ripening.

Centuries later, great philosophers such as Khwājah Naṣīr al-Dīn Ṭūsī, Muḥaqqiq Dawānī, Sayyid Sadr al-Dīn Dashtakī, Shaykh Bahā’ī and Mīr Dāmād were able to supplement the enrichment of Islamic philosophy with their own brilliant ideas. Then came the turn of Ṣadr al-Dīn Shīrāzī who introduced a new system of philosophy with his own genius and innovation which was composed of the harmonious elements of peripatetic and Illuminationist philosophies and mystical disclosures, to which he added profound thoughts and valuable ideas, and he called ittranscendent theosophy (ḥikmat muta‘āliyyah ).

References

[1] Consider the first verses revealed to the Prophet (ṣ ), “Read! In the Name of your Lord Who created… Who taught by the Pen….” (96:1, 4).

[2] Allusion is made here to several well-known hadiths attributed to the Prophet (ṣ ).

Lesson Two: A Glance at the Course of Philosophical Thought (from the Middle Ages to the Eighteenth Century)

Scholastic Philosophy

After the spread of Christianity in Europe and the combination of the power of the Church with that of the Roman Empire, the centers of learning came under the influence of the apparatus of government to such an extent that by the sixth century (as was indicated previously) the universities and schools of Athens and Alexandria were closed. This period, which lasted for about one thousand years, is called the Middle Ages, and is characterized by the domination of the Church over the centers of learning and the programs of the schools and universities.

Among the prominent personalities of this era is St. Augustine, who tried to use philosophical principles, especially the views of Plato and the Neo-Platonists to explain the dogmas of Christianity. After him, a number of philosophical discussions were included in the programs of the schools. However, the attitude toward Aristotelian thought was unfavorable for it was considered to be opposed to religious beliefs, and its teaching was prohibited. With the dominion of the Muslims in al-Andalus (Spain) and the penetration of Islamic thought in Western Europe, the ideas of Islamic philosophers such as Ibn Sīnā (Avicenna) and Ibn Rushd (Averroes) were more or less discussed, and the Christian scholars also became acquainted with Aristotelian views by means of the books of these philosophers.

Little by little members of the Church could not resist this wave of philosophical thought, and finally St. Thomas Aquinas accepted most of Aristotle’s philosophical views which are reflected in his own books, and gradually, opposition to Aristotle’s philosophy decreased, and even came to dominate some centers of learning.

In any case, in the Middle Ages philosophy not only developed in Western lands, but also went through a course of decline, and contrary to the world of Islam, in which the sciences and learning continually flourished and became increasingly enriched, in Europe the only discussions taught in the Church affiliated schools, and which came to be called scholastic philosophy, were those which could justify the dogmas of Christianity, dogmas which were not without deviation themselves. It goes without saying that such philosophy could have no destiny but death and extinction.

In scholastic philosophy, besides logic, theology, ethics, politics, and some natural philosophy and astronomy which were accepted by the Church, grammar and rhetoric were also incorporated into the curricula, and in this way, the philosophy of this period was considered more broadly [than at present].

The Renaissance and the Comprehensive Change in Thinking

From the fourteenth century the ground was being prepared for a comprehensive change by means of various factors. One factor was the flourishing of nominalism (the fundamentality of naming) and the denial of the existence of universals in England and France. This philosophical

tendency played an effective role in undermining the foundations of philosophy. Another factor was that the natural philosophy of Aristotle became a matter of controversy at the University of Paris. Another factor was the murmurings of the incompatibility of philosophy with Christian dogma, and in other words, the incompatibility of reason and religion. Another factor was the manifestation of disagreements between the temporal rulers and the authorities of the Church, and among the Christian authorities themselves there were also disputes which led to the emergence of Protestantism. Yet another factor was the cresting of humanism and the tendency to deal with the problems of human life while disregarding metaphysical problems. Finally, in the middle of the fifteenth century, the Byzantine Empire collapsed, and a complete change (political, philosophical, literary and religious) appeared throughout Europe, and the institutions of the papacy were attacked from every side.

In this course, the weak scholastic philosophy reached its final destiny.

In the sixteenth century, interest in the natural and empirical sciences became intense, and the discoveries of Copernicus, Kepler and Galileo shook the foundations of Ptolemaic astronomy and Aristotelian natural philosophy. In a word, in Europe all aspects of human affairs were subjected to disturbance and instability.

The papal institutions were able to withstand these roaring waves for quite some time, and scientists were brought before the Inquisition with the excuse of their opposition to religious dogmas, that is, for their views on natural philosophy and cosmology which were accepted by the Church for the exegesis of the Bible and religious doctrines. Many were burnt in the fires of blind fanaticism and selfishness of the authorities of the Church. However, eventually the Church and papal institution were forced to withdraw in shame.

The ruthless fanatical behavior of the Catholic Church had no effect but to give the people a negative attitude toward the authorities of the Church, and in general toward religion, and likewise the downfall of scholastic philosophy, that is, the only current philosophy of that period, brought about an intellectual and philosophical vacuum, and finally the appearance of modern skepticism. During this process, the only thing that made progress was humanism, and a desire for natural and empirical science in the cultural arena, and a tendency toward liberalism and democracy in the field of politics.

The Second Phase of Skepticism

For centuries, the Church had spread the views and ideas of some philosophers as religious beliefs, and Christians had accepted them as certain and sacred, including Aristotelian and Ptolemaic views of cosmology which were upset by Copernicus, and other unbiased scholars also realized their invalidity. We have already mentioned that the dogmatic resistance of the Church and the ruthless behavior of the authorities of the Church with respect to the scientists brought about adverse reaction.

This change in thoughts and beliefs and the toppling of the intellectual and philosophical foundations [of the Middle Ages] brought about a psychological crises in many of the scholars, and raised doubts in their

minds such as: how can we be sure that other beliefs we hold are not invalid, and that one day their invalidity will not become evident? How can we know that newly discovered scientific theories will not also be invalidated someday? Finally, a great scholar named Montaigne denied the value of science and knowledge and he explicitly wrote, how can we be sure that the theory of Copernicus will not be invalidated in the future? He once more expressed the doubts of the skeptics and sophists in a new way, and defended skepticism, and thus another phase of skepticism appeared.

The Peril of Skepticism

The attitude of doubt, in addition to being a painful psychological plague, also involves great spiritual and material perils for society. With the denial of the value of knowledge, there can be no hope for the advancement of the sciences and learning, likewise no room remains for moral values and their magnificent role in human life, as religion also loses its intellectual basis. Rather, the greatest blows are directed toward religious dogmas, beliefs unrelated to material and sensible affairs. When the flood of doubt flows through the hearts of the people, naturally, the beliefs about the super natural are the most vulnerable.

Therefore, skepticism is an extremely dangerous plague that threatens all aspects of human life with destruction, and with its spread no ethical, legal, political or religious system can remain stable, and it provides an excuse for all sorts of crimes, injustice and oppression.

For this very reason, the struggle against skepticism is a duty of all scholars and philosophers, and it is also a responsibility for religious leaders, and it is also a matter about which counselors, politicians and social reformers must be diligent.

In the seventeenth century various activities were undertaken to shore up the ruins of the Renaissance, including struggle against the perils of skepticism. The Church tended to cut off the dependence of Christianity on reason and science, and fortified religious doctrines through the heart and faith. However, philosophers and scholars sought a firm and unshakable basis for knowledge and value, so that intellectual fluctuations and social upheavals would not destroy them.

Modern Philosophy

The most important effort of this period for salvation from skepticism and the revitalization of philosophy was that of Rene Descartes, the French philosopher who is called “the father of modern philosophy”. After much research and meditation, he devised a plan by which to bolster the footings of philosophical thought; his principle may be summarized in his famous proposition: “I doubt, therefore I am,” or “I think, therefore I am”, that is, if one follows the way of doubt regarding the existence of everything, one will nonetheless never be able to doubt one’s own existence. Since doubt is meaningless without one who doubts, the human existence of doubters and thinkers is also indubitable. Then he tried to formulate specific laws of thought similar to mathematical laws and to solve the problems of philosophy on their basis.

In that period of intellectual tumult, the thought and views of Descartes were a source of reassurance for many scholars; and other great thinkers, such as Leibniz, Spinoza and Malebranch, also sought to reinforce the groundwork of modern philosophy. Nevertheless, these efforts were unable to bring about a harmonious philosophical system having certain and consolidated foundations. On the other hand, the attention of the majority of scholars had turned toward the empirical sciences, many of whom displayed no interest in research in philosophical and metaphysical problems. Because of this, a strong, firm and well-supported philosophical system did not come into existence in Europe, and although collections of philosophical views and ideas occasionally were proposed in the form of specific schools of philosophical thought which within certain limits were able to win more or less of a following, still none of them was able to become permanently established, as remains the case.

The Fundamentality of Experience and Modern Skepticism

While rational philosophy was being revived on the continent of Europe, and reason was about to find its own place in the understanding of truth, another tendency was making progress in England, which was based on the fundamentality of sense and experience, called empiricism.

The beginnings of this tendency go back to the end of the Middle Ages and to William of Ockham, an English philosopher who was a proponent of the fundamentality of naming, and was also actually a denier of the fundamentality of reason. In the sixteenth century, Francis Bacon, and in the seventeenth century, Hobbes, who were also English, both relied upon the fundamentality of sense and experience, but those who are known as empiricists are another three English philosophers: John Locke, George Berkeley and David Hume, who discussed the problems of knowledge from the end of the seventeenth century until about one century later, and while criticizing the views of Descartes regarding “innate knowledge”, they considered the source of all knowledge to be sense and experience.

Among them, John Locke was the most moderate and nearest to the rationalists. Berkeley was an avowed proponent of the fundamentality of naming, i.e., a nominalist, but (perhaps unconsciously) he resorted to the principle of causation, which is a rational principle, and likewise he had other views that were incompatible with the fundamentality of sense and experience. But Hume remained completely loyal to the fundamentality of sense and experience, and to its implications and he bound himself to skepticism regarding the metaphysical, and to an acceptance of the reality of natural phenomena. In this way, the third phase of skepticism in the history of Western philosophy took shape.

Kant’s Critical Philosophy

Hume’s thoughts are among those which formed the groundwork for the philosophical ideas of Kant, and in his own words, “It is Hume who awakened me from my dogmatic slumber,” and Kant especially found agreeable Hume’s explanation of the principle of causality, which was based on the idea that experience cannot establish a necessary relation between cause and effect.

For many long years Kant thought about the problems of philosophy, and wrote many essays and books. He offered a specific philosophical view which in comparison to similar sorts of views was more durable and acceptable. But he finally arrived at the conclusion that theoretical reason does not have the ability to solve the problems of metaphysics and that the rational principles in this field lack scientific value.

He explicitly declared that problems such as the existence of God, the eternity of the soul and free will could not be established by rational proofs, but that belief and faith in them is implied by the acceptance of an ethical system, in other words, it is an accepted principle of the precepts of practical reason, and that it is ethics which calls us to faith in the resurrection, not the reverse. For this reason, Kant must be considered as a reviver of ethical values, which after the Renaissance were subject to instability and were in danger of fading and being obliterated. On the other hand, he must be considered to be one of the destroyers of the foundations of metaphysical philosophy.

Lesson Three: A Glance at the Course of Philosophical Thought (in the last two centuries)

Objective Idealism

As was indicated earlier, after the Renaissance, no stable philosophical system came into existence, but rather different philosophical schools and views constantly have been and are being born and dying. The number and variety of schools and “-isms” has increased since the nineteenth century. In this brief overview there is no occasion to mention all of them, and we shall merely provide a brief mention of some of them:

After Kant (from the end of the eighteenth century to the middle of the nineteenth century) a number of German philosophers became famous, whose ideas more or less found their source in the thought of Kant. They sought to compensate for the weak points in his philosophy by using mystical sources, and although there were differences among their views, what they had in common was that they began from an individual viewpoint and paid heed to the explanation of being and the appearance of multiplicity from unity in a poetic way, and they were called “Romantic philosophers”.

Among them, Fichte, who personally was a student of Kant, was extremely interested in free will, and among the views of Kant, he emphasized the fundamentality of morals and practical reason. He said, “Theoretical reason observes the system of nature as necessary, but within ourselves we find freedom and a desire for voluntary actions, and the our consciences design a system that we must attempt to realize. Hence we must consider nature to be subordinate to the ego, and not independent and unrelated to it.”

It is this tendency towards freedom which drove him and other romantics such as Schelling to accept a kind of idealism and the fundamentality of the spirit (a characteristic of which was considered to be freedom). This school of thought was further developed by Hegel, and it took the form of a relatively coherent system of philosophy, and was called objective idealism.

Hegel, who was a contemporary of Schelling, imagined the world to be the thoughts and ideas of the absolute spirit, and that between them [the spirit and its thoughts and ideas] there are logical relations rather than causal relations, as held by other philosophers.

According to Hegel, the course of the appearance of ideas is from unity to multiplicity, from the general to the specific. At the first level, the most general idea, the idea of being, is posited, from within which the opposite, i.e., the idea of nothingness, emerges. Then they become mixed and take the form of the idea of “becoming”. Becoming, which is the synthesis of being (thesis) and nothingness (antithesis), in its turn is posited as a thesis, and its opposite appears from within it, and from the mixture of them a new synthesis occurs. This process continues until it reaches the most specific of concepts.

Hegel called this threefold (triadic) process “dialectic”, and he fancied that this was a universal law for the appearance of all mental and objective phenomena.

Positivism

In the beginning of the nineteenth century, the Frenchman Auguste Compte, who is called the father of sociology, founded an extreme form of empiricism called positivism, whose basis was limited to that which is given directly by the senses, and from one perspective it was considered the opposite of idealism.1

Compte even considered the abstract concepts of science that were not obtained from direct observation to be metaphysical and unscientific. He even went so far as to consider metaphysical propositions to be basically absurd and meaningless words.

Auguste Compte held that there were three stages of human thought: first, the divine and religious stage, which relates events to supernatural causes. Second is the philosophical stage, which seeks the cause of events in invisible substances and natures of things. Third is the scientific stage, which instead of looking for the reason why phenomena occur, deals with the question of how they occur and their interrelationships, and this is the stage of positive science.

It is strange that he at last confessed that religion is necessary for man, but he set humanity as its object of worship. He considered himself to be the messenger of this creed, and he set up rituals for individual and group worship.

The creed of the worship of man, which is a perfect example of humanism, found some followers in France, England, Sweden and in North and South America, who formally converted to this creed and established temples for the worship of man. It influenced others indirectly in ways that cannot be mentioned here.

Rationalism and Empiricism

Western philosophical schools are divided into two general groups: rationalist and empiricist. An obvious example of the first group in the nineteenth century is the idealism of Hegel, which even found followers in Britain; and the obvious example of the second group is positivism, which is still current today. Wittgenstein, Carnap and Russell may be considered supporters of this school of thought.

Most of the divine philosophers have been rationalists, and most of the atheists are empiricists. Among the minor philosophers was McTaggert, who was a British Hegelian and an atheist.

The proportionate relationship between empiricism and the denial or at least skepticism regarding metaphysics is clear, and it was such that the progress of positivist philosophies was followed by materialist and atheistic inclinations. The lack of strong competitors on the side of the rationalists prepared the ground for the prevalence of such inclinations.

As was mentioned, the most famous of the rationalist schools of thought during the nineteenth century was the Idealism of Hegel. Despite its attraction which was a result of its relatively coherent system, its breadth, and its capacity for looking at problems from different perspectives, it lacked a strong logic and firm reasoning, and it was not long before it became the subject of criticism even by its own adherents. Among them

there were two kinds of simultaneous but different reactions in opposition to it, one of which was led by SØren Kierkegaard, a Danish cleric, the founder of existentialism, and another was led by Karl Marx, a Jewish born German, the founder of dialectical materialism.

Romanticism, which appeared to justify human freedom, finally took the form of an inclusive philosophical system in Hegelian Idealism, and it introduced history as a great fundamental process that advances and progresses on the basis of dialectical principles.

In this way it deviated from the basic course, for on this view, the individual will looses its fundamental role. Hence, it became subject to much criticism.

One of those who severely criticized the logic and history of Hegel was Kierkegaard, who emphasized individual responsibility and the free will of man in his own self-construction. He considered the humanity of man to be due to an awareness of individual responsibilities, especially responsibilities toward God, and he said that it is closeness, nearness and relation to God which makes a man human.

This tendency which was supported by the phenomenology of Edmund Husserl, and led to the appearance of existentialism. Thinkers such as Heidegger and Jaspers in Germany, and Marcel and Jean-Paul Sartre in France adhered to this sort of philosophy from different perspectives, theistic and atheistic.

Dialectical Materialism

After the Renaissance, when philosophy and religion in Europe went through a crisis, atheism and materialism more or less came into vogue, and in the nineteenth century, some biologists and physicians such as Vogt, Buchner, and Ernst Haeckel emphasized the fundamentality of matter and the denial of metaphysics, but the most important materialist school of philosophy was that founded by Marx and Engels. Marx took dialectical logic and the fundamentality of history from Hegel, and materialism from Feuerbach, and he considered the economic factor to be fundamental to social and historical changes, which he supposed to take shape according to dialectical principles, especially on the basis of opposition and contradiction. He introduced the economic factor as the cornerstone of all aspects of human life, and he considered all other aspects of culture and society to be subordinate to it.

He held that the history of man has various stages, which begin with the first level of primitive communism then passes through the stages of slavery, feudalism and capitalism until it reaches socialism and the government of the workers, and at last leads to communism, that is, the stage in which ownership is completely abolished and there will be no need for any state or government.

Pragmatism

At the conclusion of this brief review, let us take a glance at the only philosophical school of thought brought about by American thinkers, at the threshold of the twentieth century, the most famous of whom is William James the renowned psychologist and philosopher.

This school, which is called pragmatism (i.e., the fundamentality of action) considers a proposition to be true which possesses practical use. In other words, truth is a meaning constructed by the mind in order to obtain more and better practical consequences. This point has not been explicitly proclaimed by any other philosophical school, although its origins may be found in the words of Hume, according to which reason is considered the servant of human passions, and limits the value of knowledge to its practical aspect.

The fundamentality of action in the mentioned sense was first presented by the American Charles Peirce, and then was developed into a philosophical propensity by William James, a propensity which found adherents in America and Europe.

James, who called his way radical empiricism, differed with other empiricists about how to determine the realm of experience. In addition to outward sensory experience, he included psychological and religious experience. He considered religious beliefs, especially the belief in the power and mercy of God, to be useful for mental health, and for this very reason, true. He himself suffered a mental breakdown at the age of twenty-nine, was cured due to his attention to God, and His Mercy and Power to change man’s destiny. For this reason, he emphasized prayer and supplication, but he did not consider God to be absolutely perfect and infinite, but rather, he imagined that there was also progress for God, and that basically, the lack of progress is equal to stagnation and is a sign of imperfection!

The root of this extreme and aggressive progressivism can be found in some of the words of Hegel, including his introduction toThe Phenomenology of Mind , but more than any, Bergson and Whitehead recently emphasized it.

William James emphasized free will and its creative role, and in this respect he was of like mind with the existentialists.

A Brief Comparison

With this brief glance at the course of man’s philosophical thought, in addition to becoming acquainted with a short history of philosophy, it has also become clear how after the Renaissance Western philosophy has gone through ups and downs, and how tortuous has been its course, and at the present time it is shaking with contradictions. Although from time to time subtle discoveries are made by some of the philosophers of those lands, and very precise problems are posed, especially regarding knowledge, and likewise, although enlightening flashes shine from some intellects and hearts, no stable and powerful philosophical system has been brought about. Illuminating intellectual points have not been able to design a well-founded straight line for thinkers, but rather disorders and disturbances have always and continue to govern over the philosophical atmosphere of the West.

This is different from the state that has governed Islamic philosophy. For Islamic philosophy has always followed a straight and thriving way, and with the existence of tendencies which from time to time have appeared, it has never deviated from its main course, and various subordinate tendencies

are like the branches of a tree which grow in different directions and have added to its growth and flourishing.

It is hoped that this progressive course with the efforts of religious thinkers will continue in this way so that the other dark environs may be enlightened by the illuminating rays of its light to release lives from aimless wanderings.

Reference

1Earlier this sort of philosophy was proposed by Saint Simon, and the roots of this thinking may be found in Kant.