The End of The Golden Age: Part 1

Intro:

The Golden Age of Islam, roughly from 800 to 1200 c.e., saw the greatest flourishing of philosophy, mathematics, and the natural sciences the Islamic world had ever known. While Europe languished in the Dark Ages, Muslim (and some Christian and Jewish) thinkers of this era translated ancient Greek philosophy and science into Arabic, expanded upon the ideas contained, and made lasting contributions to human thought. For instance, Muhammad ibn Musa Al-Khwarizmi was a well known mathematician whose work with quadratic equations gave us the term “algebra,” from the title of his book on the subject (al-jabr), and even his name was taken as the basis for the word “algorithm.” Other thinkers such as the Banu Musa worked in pneumatics and the studied the flow of air and water. Their principles on the concentric siphon would not be matched until almost a thousand years after their death. And even modern chemistry owes a debt of gratitude to Arab “alchemy,” especially ibn Zakariyyah Al-Razi (Rhazes) who developed a method of distillation and extraction that is little different than the methods we use today.

However, this dedication to philosophy and science seems to have waned, prompting many historians to question: why did the Golden Age of Islam come to an end? The older school of scholarship offered various explanations, ranging from blaming Islam as being anti-science to singling out the Muslim philosopher Al-Ghazali as the one who destroyed the discipline with his book, The Incoherence of the Philosophers. In the past, I have even used the latter argument, and indeed Al-Ghazali’s work seems that way upon initial reading. However, I have since come to the conclusion that answering the question demands a closer look into the intellectual climate of the era and a more historical understanding of the thinkers in this time period. By examining the nature of their writings, not simply the content, one can see a concern for certain trends in Muslim philosophy. And, these trends may indicate to us what exactly happened to end this so-called “Golden Age.”

What follows is a single section of a larger essay, broken into smaller parts with each analyzing a different theme that may have contributed to the changing intellectual climate of the Muslim world. At this point, they are preliminary musings, and the reading should take them as opinion articles, not scholarly history. I will be writing mostly from memory, so citations will be limited. However, I will try at the end of each section to highlight a few critical texts that the reader can explore in order to make his own judgments. I will post each major section separately so that readers can concentrate on specific points and so that replies can be more precise. Each section will relate to my main theme and question: “What ended the Golden Age of Islam?”

Part I: Neo-Platonism, Al-Ghazali, and the End of Metaphysics

I will start this section with Al-Ghazali, who lived from 1058 to 1111 c.e. To some, his book The Incoherence of the Philosophers spelled the demise to come for philosophy in the Muslim world. Certainly, the title of this major discourse on the subject would seem to imply such a motive and such an end. But, we must remember that the Arabic word for “philosopher” at this time was not used as loosely as we use it today. Rather, it was a term that applied most accurately to a specific group of thinkers who followed the influence of Aristotle, Plato, and the works of such Muslim thinkers as Al-Farabi and Avicenna (ibn Sina). Al-Ghazali was not refuting philosophy in general, but the ideas of those particular philosophers. It is my argument that the demise of philosophy truly has its roots with them, not Al-Ghazali. By taking the ideas of Aristotle and merging them with Neo-Platonism and the mystical ideas of Avicenna, these philosophers removed the protective barrier of distinction between theology and metaphysics and infused the discipline with untenable assertions while simultaneously divorcing philosophy from real application. If anything, Al-Ghazali attempted to restore the barrier and uphold practical science and reason (and faith) against the pernicious influence of Avicenna’s corrupted and irrational metaphysics. It was, however, to no avail.

Let us first examine Al-Ghazali’s attitude toward philosophy and science. In his book Freedom and Fulfillment, he gives his opinion on various disciplines. On the topic of mathematics, Al-Ghazali has no qualms as such. He does, however, cite a disgust for the tendency of mathematicians to assume that, since they are using the same basic logic as metaphysicians, the conclusions of the metaphysicians must also be as accurate, and therefore they can be trusted as truth. Al-Ghazali finds fault only with this point, and rightly so. On the topic of physics and the natural sciences, Al-Ghazali again finds no fault with the disciplines themselves. Indeed, he is known for praising the natural sciences throughout his works. But again, his single issue with them is the same issue he has with the mathematicians. Getting deeper to the core of philosophy, Al-Ghazali examines the nature of the ethicists and their field of inquiry. He does not find anything wrong with it, but states that it is a basically useless field, since it only reiterates truths found in revelation.

Finally, Al-Ghazali comes to metaphysics, and the bulk of his writing in this book and others is directed towards criticizing the metaphysicians. His qualms with their ideas stem from two major reasons. First, he finds them irrational, and in the Incoherence he sets himself to the task of demolishing them with logical argument. It is worthy to note that his arguments are strictly logical, indicating that he clearly had a high respect for formal reasoning. His second major objection to the metaphysicians is that their ideas contradict Islam. This last category of objection has gotten the most attention since the time of his death and on into the present time. It would seem in many of his ideas that he is trying to “make room” for faith, miracles, revelation, and religion in general within the context of philosophy. I do not believe this was the case. It seems, rather, that Al-Ghazali saw the metaphysicians as stepping into territory where they did not belong, namely theology. Al-Ghazali’s admiration for science, logic, and the philosophical mentality clearly indicates that he believed those things had a proper place in intellectual life. Yet, the metaphysics of Avicenna, Al-Farabi, and others attempted to describe the nature of God, the afterlife, and the creation of the universe. To Al-Ghazali, it was inappropriate to apply philosophy to these areas, which clearly belonged to theology and above all, religion. Of course, the ethicists were treading on the same ground. But, what made them different in Al-Ghazali’s mind is that the ethicists were simply repeating what could be learned in revelation, whereas the metaphysicians were creating their own image of God, the spirit, and the universe based on their faulty principles. It is here that Al-Ghazali found exception, and thus his criticisms and ideas were about “making room for God,” in metaphysics, but excluding that brand of metaphysics from the room altogether. It was not a motive for inclusion, but for exclusion.

This particular point is repeated in the famous work of historian/philosopher Ibn Khaldun. In his introduction to history, the Muqaddimah, he bemoans the fact that metaphysics and theology, that the speculative and the revealed, somehow became intertwined and confused with one another. He argues that originally, logic was brought into philosophy in order to defend the tenets of Islam against the arguments of unbelievers (there is historically validity for this assertion). But, somehow it devolved into speculating on the nature of God and reinterpreting religion based on supposedly rational grounds. This, he argues, is not only a negation of the religion, but a misuse of logical reasoning and philosophy. Philosophy, argues Ibn Khaldun, is meant to sharpen the mind so that one can determine a good argument from a bad one and use one’s own mind to come to decisions. He believed that applying reason to mathematics and the sciences was in fact the best expression of philosophy, and it is a testament to his respect for reason that he attempted to create a rational understanding of history in his works. Like Al-Ghazali, I believe Ibn Khaldun saw the Neo-Platonic metaphysics of Avicenna and others as a misuse of philosophy altogether. Although, only Al-Ghazali seems to have written lengthy treatises on the matter.

What of the Neo-Platonists? Do they really deserve this kind of criticism? From a philosophical standpoint, I think Al-Ghazali and Ibn Khaldun were on target. Avicenna’s metaphysics is so thoroughly mystical that it would have made Auguste Comte groan with profound disapproval, had he been born yet. Avicenna started from Aristotle, true, but he began positing a host of new ideas that incorporated, among other things, a sort of mind-body dualism, successive layers of spirituality between God and the physical world, and so on. It was enough even to raise the ire of that great, Andalusian rationalist Averroes (Ibn Rushd). Although ostensibly his book, The Incoherence of the Incoherence was meant as a refutation of Al-Ghazali’s book, Averroes spent a good amount of time discrediting the ideas of Avicenna as non-Aristotelian and irrational. In several points throughout the book, it seems as if he comes to a sort of implied agreement with his arch-foe Al-Ghazali. In several cases, when addressing a particular criticism leveled by Al-Ghazali, Averroes simply states that the criticism is only valid for Avicenna, not of Aristotle. Indeed, much of Averroes’ life was spent commenting upon the works of Aristotle and purifying them of the mistakes and Neo-Platonic influences they had received in the East. That entire region seemed to be rising against this perceived pernicious influence of the Eastern philosophers around Averroes’ time. Unfortunately, however, the damage was already done.

Before Averroes, Ibn Khaldun, and other Andalusian scholars could begin challenging Avicenna and re-asserting the value of reason, it seems as if thinkers were generally becoming sick of the whole problem of philosophy. Some groups ran with the ideas and took them to extremes, such as the Nizari Ismai‘li “Assassins,” much to the chagrin of their neighboring Muslims. Other groups, such as the Sufis, seemed to offer a more purely mystical path that provided a way out of the contradictions and obtuse reasoning. Finally, the old religious scholars who simply practiced reason as a didactic approach to theology (called the mutakallimun) were replaced with the Ash‘arite school of philosophy which was essentially an anti-philosophy: that is, their goal was to use reason only to demolish the arguments of philosophers. They eventually did such a good job that later scholars essentially considered the matter settled. Philosophy was done, and so was everything that had anything to do with it. Al-Ghazali’s urging for Muslims to continue to pursue science and reasoning was ignored; only his refutations were studied. Ibn Khaldun’s true innovation, a scientific approach to history, received no credit from others. Instead, scholars were content to simply study his theories rather than his method, and instead of building upon it they simply accepted it as given (it would take hundreds of years before the modern social sciences would grow, despite the fact that Ibn Khaldun had laid the groundwork long before). As for Averroes, his books were banned, burned, or just simply ignored.

To conclude, if anyone is responsible for the downfall of philosophy in the Muslim world, it is not Al-Ghazali, but rather Avicenna and the other Neo-Platonists. They confused, muddled, and distorted philosophy with their irrational ideas to the point that they ultimately defamed the entire thing. They infected philosophy with a poison that spawned an all-encompassing backlash against all its branches, from metaphysics to mathematics to the natural sciences. Their ideas were not just pernicious to Islam, but pernicious to reality. They divorced the intellect from the body, the universal from the concrete, the concept from the subject, and finally philosophy from practicality.

But, since Avicenna’s ideas and Neo-Platonism were so wide spread, it begs the question as to whether this part of history can really be called a “Golden Age.” Wouldn’t the majority of thinkers have to be part of the problem? Around the time Al-Ghazali was writing, this very well may be true. Thus, we may have to reconsider what exactly is meant by this supposed “Golden Age.” Perhaps the gold ought to lose a bit of its luster. In any case, it is still hard to imagine how and why philosophy would go in this direction in the Muslim world, and why it would come to an end despite the Andalusian reaction and Al-Ghazali’s respect for science and logic. Why were people willing to simply study the refutation and not the exaltation of reason? Why did people begin to blindly follow the authority of certain scholars rather than analyze the spirit of their work or attempt to build upon it themselves? Why was Averroes largely ignored by Muslims until the modern era? These questions will be the subject of another section.