Early Islamic philosophy

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Early Islamic philosophy or classical Islamic philosophy is a period of intense philosophical development beginning in the 2nd century AH of the Islamic calendar (early 9th century CE) and lasting until the 6th century AH (late 12th century CE). The period is known as the Islamic Golden Age, and the achievements of this period had a crucial influence in the development of modern philosophy and science. For Renaissance Europe, "Muslim maritime, agricultural, and technological innovations, as well as much East Asian technology via the Muslim world, made their way to western Europe in one of the largest technology transfers in world history."[1] This period starts with al-Kindi in the 9th century and ends with Averroes (Ibn Rushd) at the end of 12th century. The death of Averroes effectively marks the end of a particular discipline of Islamic philosophy usually called the Peripatetic Arabic School, and philosophical activity declined significantly in Western Islamic countries, namely in Islamic Spain and North Africa, though it persisted for much longer in the Eastern countries, in particular Persia and India where several schools of philosophy continued to flourish: Avicennism, Illuminationist philosophy, Mystical philosophy, and Transcendent theosophy.

Intellectual innovations, achievements, and advancements of this period included, within jurisprudence, the development of ijtihad, a method or methodological approach to legal reasoning, interpretation, and argument based on independent inquiry and analogical deduction;[2] within science and the philosophy of science, the development of empirical research methods emphasizing controlled experimentation, observational evidence, and reproducibility, as well as early formulations of empiricist epistemologies;[3][4][5][6] commentaries and developments in Aristotelian logic, as well as innovations in non-Aristotelian temporal modal logic and inductive logic;[7][8] and developments in research practice and methodology, including, within medicine, the first documented peer review process[9] and within jurisprudence and theology, a strict science of citation, the isnad or "backing".[10][11]

The translation of Arabic works from this period into Hebrew and Latin in the Middle Ages had a significant impact upon Jewish philosophy as well as almost all philosophical disciplines in the medieval Latin Western world. The works of al-Fārābī, Avicenna, and Averroes were particularly influential in the fields of natural philosophy, psychology, metaphysics, logic, and ethics, directly and indirectly influencing the work of thinkers such as Thomas Aquinas, Roger Bacon, Maimonedes, William of Ockham, and Duns Scotus.[12]

Early Islamic philosophy can be divided into clear sets of influences, branches, schools, and fields, as described below.

  1. ^ History of Europe - Middle Ages - Reform and renewal - Christianity, Judaism, and Islam Archived 2015-05-03 at the Wayback Machine, use TOC
  2. ^ Mustapha, Ariyanti; Nazri, Mohammed Arif (January 2022). "The Golden and Dark Ages of Islamic Jurisprudence: Analyzing the Orientalist Thought". QALAM International Journal of Islamic and Humanities Research. 2 (3): 9–17. ISSN 2773-6334. Archived from the original on 10 March 2023. Retrieved 10 March 2023.
  3. ^ El-Bizri, Nader (September 2005). "A philosophical perspective on Alhazen's optics". Arabic Sciences and Philosophy. 15 (2): 189–218. doi:10.1017/S0957423905000172. S2CID 123057532.
  4. ^ Haq, Syed Nomanul (22 December 2009). "Science in Islam". Islam & Science. 7 (2): 151–159. Gale A217042312.
  5. ^ Sabra, A.I. (1989). The Optics of Ibn al-Haytham. Books I–II–III: On Direct Vision. London: The Warburg Institute, University of London. pp. 25–29. ISBN 0-85481-072-2.
  6. ^ Toomer, G. J. (1 December 1964). "Ibn al-Haythams Weg zur Physik. Matthias Schramm". Isis. 55 (4): 463–465. doi:10.1086/349914.
  7. ^ Adamson, Peter (February 2020). "al-Kindi". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University. Archived from the original on 21 May 2019. Retrieved 10 March 2023.
  8. ^ Druart, Therese-Anne (2020). "al-Farabi". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University. Archived from the original on 10 July 2022. Retrieved 10 March 2023.
  9. ^ Spier, Ray (2002). "The history of the peer-review process". Trends in Biotechnology. 20 (8): 357–358. doi:10.1016/S0167-7799(02)01985-6. PMID 12127284.
  10. ^ Al-Shafi'i, al-Risala, Bulaq, 1321; ed. Sheikh Ahmad Muhammad Shakir, Cairo, 1940 (ed. Shakir), 55
  11. ^ Schacht, Joseph (1959) [1950]. The Origins of Muhammadan Jurisprudence. Oxford University Press. pp. 37–8.
  12. ^ Hasse, Dag Nikolaus (2020). "Influence of Arabic and Islamic Philosophy on the Latin West". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University. Archived from the original on 21 March 2019. Retrieved 10 March 2023.