Avicenna's Philosophy Handout 03 (Backgrounds)

Outline

Qur'an and Hadith (Islamic Holy Text) as inspiration (regulative and constitutive elements) for Islamic Philosophy

Greek Philosophy as the formal and historical background for Islamic Philosophy

      Similarities and Differences between Greek and Islamic Philosophy/Metaphysics

	Greek Philosophy	Islamic Philosophy
Subject Matter	Being qua being First Causes (aitia) And Principles (Archai) of things	Being qua being The first origin
Method	Rational analysis	Rational analysis
Goals	Does X Exist? What is X? Why does it Exist? How do we know all of this?	Does X Exist? What is X? Why does it Exist? How do we know all of this?
Main questions and concerns	Motion, Cosmological order and elements	Motion, Being, First Cause, Human soul and its eternity
Background and context	Homer and Hesiod	Qur’an and Sunna

                                                             i.     Muslims knew of Greek philosophy through different mediations. in particular, Christian mediation made 1- mixture between Aristotelian and Platonic traditions; and 2- omission of humanistic parts of Greek tradition, like Homer and Hesiod

Excerpts

Corbin-Sources of Philosophy in Islam

Qur'an & Hadith as sources for Philosophy-Nasr

Backgrounds of Islamic Philosophy-Fakhry

F.E. Peters- Foreign backgrounds of Islamic Philosophy

Bertolacci- BETWEEN AMMONIUS AND AVICENNA