Islamic Philosophy from Its Origin to the Present: Philosophy in the ...

278 Part 4: The Current Situation
al-Attas, Osman Bakar, and Mu±ammad Båqir, have made important
contributions to the restatement and spread of Islamic philosophy in
its authentic sense.
The case of the Arab world outside of Iraq is somewhat different.
On the one hand, many works of and about Islamic philosophy continue
to appear in Arabic, and there seems to be much interest in
Islamic philosophy in such countries as Syria, Jordan, and Egypt and
to some extent the Maghrib. On the other hand, the philosophical
scene is dominated mostly by one form or another of rationalism, and
even the Islamic philosophical tradition is often interpreted rationalistically
with open opposition to what some call in a pejorative sense
“merely” mystical philosophy. This tendency is to be seen in the case
of the Moroccan thinker Mu±ammad al-Jåbir¥, while some forms of
philosophical thought that remain popular such as those of ‘Abd Allåh
Laroui and ¡asan ¡anaf¥ have a leftist tinge, and, while often possessing
penetrating insights, especially in the case of ¡anaf¥, they cannot
be said to be an organic continuation of the Islamic philosophical tradition
as defined above.
Interestingly enough, this tradition has also found a home for
itself outside the Islamic world. The seminal writings of Corbin, Izutsu,
and some of my own humble works have introduced this “prophetic
philosophy” to the world at large, and there are those in the West,
such as Christian Jambet and Gilbert Durand in France, who have
been deeply influenced by it as philosophers and not just as scholars.
In Germany the Persian philosopher Jawåd Fal冨r¥, who was a student
of the great master M¥rzå Mahd¥ ≈shtiyån¥, taught Islamic philosophy
for many years as I have done for over a quarter century in
America. Recently, a whole journal entitled Transcendent Philosophy
has begun to appear in London devoted to the presentation of this
philosophical tradition (especially its later currents) in the contemporary
world and its interaction with various schools of Western philosophy.
Many younger philosophers, Muslim and non-Muslim, who
are attracted to this “prophetic philosophy” contribute to this journal
and the philosophical activities associated with it.
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The vast majority of Muslims still live in a world that can be
characterized as the land of prophecy, and they have faith in the reality
of revelation. Yet many think and philosophize as if prophecy
were a reality associated only with faith and action and unrelated to
the activities of the mind. This attitude has given rise to a crisis that