Yet a careful study of the Qur’an and the various schools of...

Yet a careful study of the Qur’an and the various schools of scholastic theology that arose under the inspiration of Greek thought disclose the remarkable fact that while Greek philosophy very much broadened the outlook of Muslim thinkers, it, on the whole, obscured their vision of the Qur’an. Socrates concentrated his attention on the human world alone. To him the proper study of man was man and not the world of plants, insects, and stars.

How unlike the spirit of the Qur’an, which sees in the humble bee a recipient of Divine inspiration6 and constantly calls upon the reader to observe the perpetual change of the winds, the alternation of day and night, the clouds,7 the starry heavens,8 and the planets swimming through infinite space!9 As a true disciple of Socrates, Plato despised sense- perception which, in his view, yielded mere opinion and no real knowledge.10 How unlike the Qur’an, which regards ‘hearing’ and ‘sight’ as the most valuable Divine gifts11 and declares them to be accountable to God for their activity in this world.12 This is what the earlier Muslim students of the Qur’an completely missed under the spell of classical speculation.

They read the Qur’an in the light of Greek thought. It took them over two hundred years to perceive - though not quite clearly - that the spirit of the Qur’an was essentially anti-classical,13 and the result of this perception was a kind of intellectual revolt, the full significance of which has not been realized even up to the present day.

It was partly owing to this revolt and partly to his personal history that Ghaz«lâ based religion on philosophical scepticism - a rather unsafe basis for religion and not wholly justified by the spirit of the Qur’an.

Ghaz«lâ’s chief opponent, Ibn Rushd, who defended Greek philosophy against the rebels, was led, through Aristotle, to what is known as the doctrine of Immortality of Active Intellect,14 a doctrine which once wielded enormous influence on the intellectual life of France and Italy,15 but which, to my mind, is entirely opposed to the view that the Qur’an takes of the value and destiny of the human ego.16 Thus Ibn Rushd lost sight of a great and fruitful idea in Islam and unwittingly helped the growth of that enervating philosophy of life which obscures man’s vision of himself, his God, and his world.