1. C IVILIZATION S TUDIES P ROGRAM (AUB) CVSP 202: The Monotheistic Traditions from Late Antiquity to the 13 th Century I NTRODUCTION TO ‘C LASSICAL I SLAMIC T HOUGHT ’: C HANGE AND C ONTINUITY D AHLIA E. M. G UBARA February 29, 2016

2. I. I NTRODUCTION : Scholars have often approached the subject of ‘Classical Islamic Thought’ by identifying a certain period (broadly the 9 and 10 th centuries – with some variations) as the ‘Golden Age’ - al-‘asr al-dhahab ī - of Islam during which its essential features and greatest contributions to human civilization were made before entering a long period of decline - in ḥ i ṭ ā ṭ - until the more recent efforts at European-led modernization beginning in the late 19thc.  But what does the past mean to us today?  What is ‘C LASSICAL ’? What is ‘I SLAMIC ’ ? What is ‘T HOUGHT ’?

3. Expansion of the Islamic State

4. II. L ATE A NTIQUITY, I SLAM AS A T RADITION  Two conventional theories on the formation of Islam: ‘Out of Arabia’ and/or the Late Antique Near East  More than an epoch: Late Antiquity as a ‘shared epistemic space’ (a space of knowledge-making)

5. II. I SLAM AS A T RADITION  Balancing the old and the new: Revelation and Prophecy as the linchpin of tradition Tradition is an arena that sustains in ways both conscious (thought) and unconscious (unthought) a particular mode of life and knowledge-making Tradition is therefore not opposed to reason, debate and change, it is their condition of possibility

6. II. G ROUNDING K NOWLEDGE IN T RADITION  Epistemic certainty: how do I know that what I know is true?  How to justify or legitimize knowledge as one perceives it in its immediacy but also as one receives it from the many pasts through transmission – i.e. what is the relationship between al-manq ū l [transmitted knowledge] and al-ma’q ū l [interpretative knowledge]; and how has this relationship animated scholarship in the Islamic tradition, and the texts before us.

7. Ikhw ā n al- Ṣ af ā ʾ wa Khull ā n al-Waf ā ʾ wa Ahl al-Hamd wa Abn ā ʾ al-Majd (the Brethren of Purity, the Loyal Friends, People of Praise, and Sons of Glory)

8. Al-Ghaz ā l ī ’s Wanderings

9. The Har ū niyya, (Seljuk-Ilkhanid mausoleum in Tus, near Mashhad, Iran) where al-Ghaz ā l ī is said to be buried (http://archnet.org/sites/3885/media_contents/62839)

10. III. C OMMON N ARRATIVES, C ONTEXTUAL M ATTERS : Our authors, their times, their works, and their reception

11. Ikhw ā n al- Ṣ af ā ʾ, Epistle 22: The Case of the Animals vs. Man before the King of the Jinn (online source)

12. “These cattle, beasts of prey and wild creatures – all animals in fact – are our slaves. We are their masters. Some have rebelled and escaped. Others obey grudgingly and scorn our service” The King replied, “What proof or evidence have you to back up your claims?” “Your Majesty,” said the human, “we have both traditional religious arguments and rational proofs of our position.” “Very well,” said the King, “lets us hear them.” (Ikhw ā n, Epistle 22: The Case of the Animals vs. Man before the King of the Jinn, p. 103)

13. IV. L EVELS OF I NTERPRETATION : Epistemic certainty:  Integrated Methods, Modes of Reasoning The Ends of Knowledge:  Social: pedagogy, instruction, initiation, social and political order  Individual: happiness, salvation (soteriology - the final return to God, yawm al- ḥ isāb )

14. “In myself I know that, even if I went back to the work of disseminating knowledge, yet I did not go back. To go back is to return to the previous state of things. Previously, however, I had been disseminating the knowledge by which worldly success is attained (...). But now I am calling men to the knowledge whereby worldly success is given up. (...) It is my earnest longing that I may make myself and others better. I do not know whether I shall reach my goal or whether I shall be taken away while short of my object. I believe, however, both by certain faith and by intuition that there is no power and no might save with God, the high, the mighty, and that I do not move of myself but am moved by Him, I do not work of myself but am used by Him.” (al-Ghazali, al-munqidh - trans. by W. M. Watt)

16. V.F INAL C ONSIDERATIONS :  Reason vs. Revelation? ( al-manq ū l and al- ma‘q ū l )  Origins, Borrowing - Syncretism and Reconciliation?  Philosophy vs. Religion?

17. Postscript – ‘Polymathesis,’ Education, Edification

18. the ‘CVSP Man’