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

Philosophy in the Land of Prophecy Yesterday and Today 279
has paralyzed to a large extent intellectual creativity among the Muslim
intelligentsia and brought about a chasm between faith and reasoning
in the souls and minds of many, a chasm that classical Islamic
thought was able to bridge in different fashions. Yet because faith in
prophecy remains strong, and individuals seriously engaged in philosophical
thought do not cease to appear, Islamic philosophy continues
as a living intellectual tradition and in fact, after relative eclipse during
the colonial period in many lands, is now reasserting itself with
ever greater vigor.
As for the world at large, although both secular philosophy and a
formalistic interpretation of religion opposed to in-depth philosophical
introspection continue to dominate the public scene, interest in philosophy
functioning in the land of prophecy, which means in a world dominated
by the sense of the sacred and ultimate meaning, also continues
to grow. The ever-greater interest in perennial philosophy is also related
to this deep need to discover a mode of knowing related to the
inner and sacred dimensions of existence. So, as already mentioned, we
can detect in the West itself ever greater interest in different expressions
of the perennial philosophy in general and in Christian and Jewish
philosophical thought in particular. As for other civilizations, we see
the revival of interest in Hindu, Buddhist, Taoist and Neo-Confucian
philosophies in various Asian countries even amidst ever greater entanglement
with secularist philosophies issuing from the West.
As for the Islamic world, which stands between the West and the
Oriental worlds of India and the Far East, it is one in which the reality
of prophecy remains as strong as ever, while the long philosophical
tradition that was created in light of this reality and in response to it
while making use of the intellectual and rational faculties that make
philosophizing possible, although partly weakened, has survived and
is now being revived and renewed in a contemporary context. This
philosophical tradition needs to respond not only to secular philosophies
but also to other schools of philosophy outside the abode of
Islam that have come into being over the ages in the various lands of
prophecy defined in its most universal sense. The Islamic philosophical
tradition is in fact itself one of the most powerful and multi-faceted
of all traditional philosophies; it is one of the main expressions of
what earlier Islamic philosophers Musk¨yah (Miskawayh) and
Suhraward¥ referred to as “Jåw¥dån-khirad/al-÷ikmat al-khålidah” and that
came to be known later in Latin as philosophia perennis.
The reality of prophecy is like that of the Sun; it can be eclipsed,
but it always returns as an abiding reality. As for philosophy understood
in its time-honored sense, it is the quest for the truth, for