Avicenna And The Aristotelian Left

Ernst Bloch was one of the most significant twentieth-century German thinkers, yet he remains overshadowed by his Frankfurt School contemporaries. Known for his engagement with utopianism and religious thought, Bloch also wrote incisively about ontological questions. In his short masterpiece Avicenna and the Aristotelian Left, Bloch gives a striking account of materialism that traces emancipatory elements of modern thought to medieval Islamic philosophers’ encounter with Aristotle. Bloch argues that the great medieval Islamic philosopher Avicenna (Ibn Sina) planted the seeds of a radical materialism still relevant for critical theory today. He contrasts Avicenna’s and Aquinas’s interpretations of Aristotle on form and matter to argue that Avicenna’s reading democratizes power and undermines clerical and political authority. Bloch explores Avicenna’s world and metaphysics in detail, showing how even his most recondite theoretical concerns prove capable of pointing toward radical social transformation. He blazes an original path through the history of ideas, including Averroes (Ibn Rushd), Spinoza, and Marx as well as lesser-known figures. Here translated into English for the first time, Avicenna and the Aristotelian Left is at once a succinct summation of Bloch’s own idiosyncratic materialism, a provocative reconstruction of the Western philosophical tradition in light of its exchanges with Islamic thought, and a vital resource for contemporary debates about materialism in critical theory.

Through close study of Avicenna's statements and major works, Dimitri Gutas traces Avicenna's own sense of his place in the Aristotelian tradition and the history of philosophy in Islam, and provides an introduction to reading his philosophical works by delineating the approach most consistent with Avicenna's intention and purpose in philosophy. The second edition of this foundational work, which has quickened fruitful research into the philosopher in the last quarter century, is completely revised and updated, and adds a new final chapter summarizing Avicenna's philosophical project. It is also enlarged with the addition of a new appendix which offers a critical inventory of Avicenna's authentic works, updating the work of Mahdavi (1954) with additional information on all manuscripts and important editions and translations. Its usefulness enhanced, the book provides primary orientation to Avicenna's philosophy and works and constitutes an indispensable research tool for their study.

This volume examines many aspects of the philosophy of Avicenna, the greatest philosopher of the Islamic world.

"This volume-the proceedings of a 2018 conference at LMU Munich funded by Fritz Thyssen Stiftung-brings together, for the first time, experts on Greek, Syriac, and Arabic traditions of doxography. Fourteen contributions provide new insight into the state of the art in contemporary research on the widespread phenomenon of doxography. Together they demonstrate that Greek, Syriac, and Arabic forms of doxography share common features and raise related questions in such a way that current research would benefit from interdisciplinary exchange among colleagues from various disciplines, such as classics, Arabic studies, and the history of philosophy"--

Avicenna’s Metaphysics (in Arabic: Ilâhiyyât) is the most important and influential metaphysical treatise of classical and medieval times after Aristotle. This volume presents studies on its direct and indirect influence in Arabic, Hebrew, and Latin culture from the time of its composition in the early eleventh century until the sixteenth century. Among the philosophical topics which receive particular attention are the distinction between essence and existence, the theory of universals, the concept of God as the necessary being and the theory of emanation. It is shown how authors such as Averroes, Abraham ibn Daud, Albertus Magnus, Thomas Aquinas and John Duns Scotus react to Avicenna’s metaphysical theories. The studies also address the philological and historical circumstances of the textual tradition in three different medieval cultures. The studies are written by a distinguished international team of contributors, who convened in 2008 to discuss their research in the Villa Vigoni, Italy.

This book, first published in 1958, examines the life and works of Avicenna, one of the most provocative figures in the history of thought in the East. It shows him in the right historical perspective, as the product of the impact of Greek thought on Islamic teachings against the background of the Persian Renaissance in the tenth century. His attitude can be of guidance to those in the East who are meeting the challenge of Western civilization; and to those in the West who have yet to find a basis on which to harmonize scientific with spiritual values.

An integrative approach to Jewish and Muslim philosophy in al-Andalus Al-Andalus, the Iberian territory ruled by Islam from the eighth to the fifteenth centuries, was home to a flourishing philosophical culture among Muslims and the Jews who lived in their midst. Andalusians spoke proudly of the region's excellence, and indeed it engendered celebrated thinkers such as Maimonides and Averroes. Sarah Stroumsa offers an integrative new approach to Jewish and Muslim philosophy in al-Andalus, where the cultural commonality of the Islamicate world allowed scholars from diverse religious backgrounds to engage in the same philosophical pursuits. Stroumsa traces the development of philosophy in Muslim Iberia from its introduction to the region to the diverse forms it took over time, from Aristotelianism and Neoplatonism to rational theology and mystical philosophy. She sheds light on the way the politics of the day, including the struggles with the Christians to the north of the peninsula and the Fāṭimids in North Africa, influenced philosophy in al-Andalus yet affected its development among the two religious communities in different ways. While acknowledging the dissimilar social status of Muslims and members of the religious minorities, Andalus and Sefarad highlights the common ground that united philosophers, providing new perspective on the development of philosophy in Islamic Spain.

Syllogism is a form of logical argument allowing one to deduce a consistent conclusion based on a pair of premises having a common term. Although Aristotle was the first to conceive and develop this way of reasoning, he left open a lot of conceptual space for further modifications, improvements and systematizations with regards to his original syllogistic theory. From its creation until modern times, syllogism has remained a powerful and compelling device of deduction and argument, used by a variety of figures and assuming a variety of forms throughout history. The Aftermath of Syllogism investigates the key developments in the history of this peculiar pattern of inference, from Avicenna to Hegel. Taking as its focus the longue durée of development between the Middle Ages and the nineteenth century, this book looks at the huge reworking scientific syllogism underwent over the centuries, as some of the finest philosophical minds brought it to an unprecedented height of logical sharpness and sophistication. Bringing together a group of major international experts in the Aristotelian tradition, The Aftermath of Syllogism provides a detailed, up to date and critical evaluation of the history of syllogistic deduction.