Al-Ghaza¯lı¯’s Philosophical


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God is viewed as the omniscient engineer of an ingenious network of what ap-

pears to people to be causes and effects. Once that network runs, however, God 

does not change it. After its initial creation, the world follows the plan that God 

made in His eternity: 

 The Omniscient determines [all] this in His eternity (  fi    azalihi ) and 

the things become manifest through His wisdom in accordance 

with what He has determined. Then, they take place according to 

His determination, which follows an undisturbed calculus ( h.isa¯b la¯ 

yukhtalla ) and an unbroken order. 

120


  

 These words recall al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s comparison of the created world with a water 



clock ( s.andu¯q al-sa¯  a¯t ), which will be discussed below. 

121


  Yet, unlike al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯, 



Ibn Tu

¯mart uses language that is—as far as I can see—unambiguously occa-

sionalist. 

122


  We will see that occasionalism is very much within the range of 

what might be called Ghazalian theology. We will also see that the great theolo-

gian from Khorasan was reluctant to express his ideas about God’s predetermi-

nation of future events all too candidly. The works of Ibn Tu

¯mart, who shows 

fewer scruples in this respect, are therefore a welcome and helpful interpreta-

tion of what was taught at the Niz.a¯miyya in Baghdad during the fi rst years of 

the sixth/twelfth century. 

 Ibn  Tu¯mart’s view of divine creation and predetermination refl ects much 

of what al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ has written on this subject. At the beginning of his  Creed , 



for instance, Ibn Tu¯mart says that a Muslim’s belief ( ı¯ma¯n ) and piety ( ikhla¯s. ) 

are the result of chains of events that eventually go back to the miracle that 

confi rms the mission of the Prophet. 

123


  We will see that these chains of events 

(al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ says: “the chaining of causes,”  tasalsul al-asba¯b ) play a very impor-



tant role in al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s theology. For instance, al-Ghaza¯l



ı

¯ mentions a very 

similar chain in the thirty-fi rst book of his  Revival of the Religious Sciences   on 

the subject of patience and thankfulness ( Kita¯b al-S.abr wa-l-shukr ). 

124

   These 



chains of events are a novel concept and cannot be found in the works of earlier 

Ash ¶arite thinkers. 

 After Ibn Tu

¯mart’s death in 524/1131 and the Almohads’ conquest of Mo-

rocco and al-Andalus, Ghazalism became fi rmly established in a region where 

thus far the political leaders had been openly hostile toward it. In 503/1109, 

the Almoravids, the predecessors of the Almohads as rulers over the Magh-

rib, burned al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s  Revival of the Religious Science  in the courtyard of the 



mosque in Cordoba. The Almoravids were conservative Ma¯likites who rejected 

al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s critique of their legal method as well as his rationalist and Sufi  



tendencies. 

125


  After their demise at the hands of the Almohads, al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s 



 

m os t   in f lue n t i a l   s t u de n t s   a nd   e a r l y   f ol low er s  

8 1

position within the theological climate in the Maghrib changed dramatically. 



While under the Almoravids, al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s teachings were regarded as unbe-



lief; they fl ourished under the Almohads, who actively promoted them. 

126


   The 

philosophical and theological teachings of such important Almohad thinkers 

as Ibn T.ufayl (d. 456/1061) and Averroes are part of the Ghazalian tradition, de-

spite the fact that both made a point of criticizing al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯. 


127

  Almohad theol-

ogy and philosophy is said to have disappeared after the defeat of the Almohad 

Empire by the Christian Reconquista in the fi rst half of the seventh/thirteenth 

century. Yet the rationalist attitude of Almohadism and Ghazalism continued 

to have a long-lasting effect on intellectuals of the Maghrib. The Ma¯likite jurist 

al-Sha¯t.ibı¯ (d. 790/1388), who was active in Granada during the Nas.rid era, is 

a good example of the application of Ghazalian principles in jurisprudence 

(  fi  qh ). His stress on public benefi t ( mas.lah.a ) as a source of Islamic law is a 

development of al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s earlier rationalist teachings along these lines. 



128

   In 


theology and law, scholars in the Maghrib became more open to accepting the 

view that these disciplines must be accompanied by the study of philosophi-

cal logic. In the Muslim East, infl uential interpreters of al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯, such as 



the two Damascenes Ibn al-S.ala¯h. al-Shahrazu¯rı¯ and Yah.ya¯ al-Nawawı¯, rejected 

this element of his teachings. Like Jala¯l al-Dı¯n al-Suyu

¯t.ı¯ (d. 911/1505), they re-

garded Aristotelian logic as a dangerous innovation that would lead students 

to become receptive to the heterodox thought of the  fala¯sifa . 

129


  In the Magh-

rib, however, the study of Aristotelian logic fl ourished and produced a great 

number of works written throughout the eighth/fourteenth to the twelfth/

eighteenth centuries. 

130

 

 At the end of the twelfth/eighteenth century, the 



Egyptian-based scholar and Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ commentator al-Murtad.a¯ al-Za¯bidı¯ ob-



served that Maghribı¯ scholars had reintroduced the study of philosophical logic 

into Egypt two generations before. 

131

  By this time, the Ma¯likite Maghrib, where 



al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s books were burned during his lifetime, had become more Ghazal-



ian than the Muslim East. 

 ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t al-Hamadha¯nı¯ (d. 525/1131) 

 Like Ibn Tu¯mart,  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t al-Hamadha¯nı¯ (or:   ¶Ayn al-Quz

.

a¯t-i Hamada¯nı¯) 



was not a direct student of al-Ghaza¯lı¯’s, never having even met the great scholar. 

  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t was born in 492/1098 in Hamadan in central Iran to a family of 

scholars. The historian al-Bayhaqı¯ characterizes   ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t as an author who 

“mixed the teachings of the Sufi s with those of the philosophers.” 

132

  As a young 



adult,   ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t had met al-Ghaza¯lı¯’s brother Ah.mad and was so impressed 

by him that, despite his age,   ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t became his student (fi gure 2.1). 

 Although    ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t had studied al-Ghaza¯lı¯’s  Revival  before, his close 

contact with Ah.mad caused him to immerse himself again in the works of 

Muh.mmad al-Ghaza¯lı¯ and to appreciate them greatly. In one of his books,   ¶Ayn 

al-Qud.a¯t writes how he had come to the conclusion that Muh.ammad al-Ghaza¯lı¯ 

belongs, like his brother Ah.mad and himself, to a select group of ten scholars 

fi rmly rooted ( ra¯sikh ) in knowledge and knowing the outer as well as the inner 



figure 2.1 

Ayn al-Qud.a¯t al-H.amadha¯nı¯ meets Ah.mad al-Ghaza¯lı¯ in a garden. Mini-



ature from a manuscript of Kama¯l al-Dı¯n Ga¯zurga¯hı¯’s (d. after 909/1503–4) Assemblies 

of God-Lovers (Maja¯lis al- ushsha¯q), produced c. 967/1560 in India. (MS London, British 

Library, Or. 11837, fol. 57b). 



 

m os t   in f lue n t i a l   s t u de n t s   a nd   e a r l y   f ol low er s  

8 3

meanings of the Qur’an (cf. Q 3:7). 



133

  Like As ¶ad al-Mayhanı¯,  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t be-

lieved that al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s intelligence (  ¶aql  ) reached a stage that few other humans 



can match. 

134


  He considered himself a disciple of 

al-Ghaza¯lı¯’s 

books. 

135


  

 A close reading of  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t’s works shows that he was well acquainted 

with the most important motifs in al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s theology, frequently adopting 



them as his own. He criticizes, for instance, the  fala¯sifa ’s concept of effi cient 

causality with arguments that are inspired by al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s seventeenth chapter in 



his  Incoherence . 

136


  Like Ibn Tu

¯mart,  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t was infl uenced by Avicenna’s 

proof of God’s existence. Unlike his contemporary in the Muslim West, how-

ever, he was aware of this philosophical infl uence and discussed it openly.  ¶Ayn 

al-Qud.a¯t begins his most theological work,  The Essence of Truths   ( Zubdat al-

h.aqa¯ 7iq ), with a brief autobiography in which the rediscovery of al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s 



books shortly before 512/1118 takes center stage. Once he had been pointed to 

these books, he studied them for four years, and it was only by reading them 

that he began to understand the religious sciences. 

137


  The discussion of theology 

in this book starts with a comparison between the merits of the  kala¯m  proof for 

God’s existence and the one developed by Avicenna.  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t clearly prefers 

the latter and excuses al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ for having produced a version of the  kala¯m  



proof in his  Balanced Book on What-To-Believe . 

138


   Al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s attitude to Avicen-



na’s so-called “Proof of the Reliable Ones” ( burha¯n al-s.iddı¯qı¯n ) was ambiguous. 

In his  Scandals of the Esoterics,  he produces a version of this proof and says its 

conclusion is necessary. 

139


  In the fourth and fi fth discussion of his  Incoherence , 

however, he criticizes several elements of the Avicennan proof and suggests that 

it is demonstrative only after adding the additional premise that the world was 

created in time. 

140

  The original Avicennan proof from contingency has indeed 



some implications that are undesirable for al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯. It proves the existence of 



God as the origin of all being ( wuju

¯d ) and as the only being that is necessary by 

virtue of itself ( wa¯jib al-wuju



¯d bi-dha¯tihi ). This implies that all aspects of God’s 

being are necessary, including His will and His actions. It also implies that God 

creates necessarily, meaning continuously from pre-eternity. We will see that al-

Ghaza¯l


ı

¯ harshly criticizes Avicenna for teaching that God’s will and His actions 

are necessary. Some aspects of the Avicennan proof, however, were quite appeal-

ing to al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯, primarily the fact that it enables humans “to give evidence to 



the created things by way of their Creator, rather than giving evidence to Him by 

way of the created things.” 

141

  Thus, Avicenna’s proof avoids the ascent from the 



low to the high and allows one to prove God’s existence solely by contemplating 

on the nature of existence. This is more reliable and nobler ( awthaq wa-ashraf  )  

than any other argument for God’s existence. 

142


  

 Al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ accepted a version of Avicenna’s proof that avoids the implica-



tion of eternal creation, and he seems to have regarded it as equivalent—or 

maybe even preferable—to the traditional  kala¯m   proof. 

143

  The fact that all exist-



ence is either by itself possible or by itself necessary opens a way to proof that 

God’s existence is the origin for the existence of all other things. In such works 

as  The Niche of Lights,   al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ expresses approval for this aspect of the Avicen-



nan proof. In that book, al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ explains that the sun’s light is the best meta-



phor to show how everything in this world emerges from God’s existence.  ¶Ayn 

8 4   a l - gh a z a

¯ l 1


¯ ’ s   ph ilosoph ic a l   t h e olo g y

al-Qud.a¯t enthusiastically follows him in this approach. In his collection  Preludes  

Tamhı¯da¯t ),  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t explains how the simile of light works, and he ex-

pands upon it with a much more complicated notion of lightness and darkness, 

personifi ed by the pre-Islamic dualistic fi gures of Yazda¯n and Ahriman. 

144


  

Ayn   al-Qud.a¯t’s theology is infl uenced by the Ghazalian notion that God 



bestows existence onto the created world. God is the only real existence, while 

all other things have their existence borrowed for a limited time from Him. 

Everything is, by itself, sheer nothing: “Every contingent being ( mumkin ),  in 

so far as it is looked at in itself and not considered sustained by the Necessary, 

is by itself non-existent ( ma du

¯m ).” 

145


  Things only come into existence when 

the conditions ( shuru



¯t. ) are fulfi lled for a particular possible existent to receive 

existence from God. This idea of the conditions for future contingencies had 

already been put forward by al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ in his  Revival of the Religious Sciences  



as an attempt to reconcile the limitless world of an occasionalist cosmology 

with the necessary restrictions to which any future moment is subject. What 

can possibly be created in the next moment depends on what already exists in 

this one. 

146

  God’s plan of creation responds to these limitations. He determines 



necessarily what has been created in the past and what will be created in the 

future. There is no arbitrariness in God’s plan; it exists in a timeless sphere and 

was already there when creation began. Thus, whatever will exist in the future 

is already determined in God’s timeless knowledge. 

147

  

 ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t was particularly attracted to al-Ghaza¯l



ı

¯’s ontology. He quotes 

and explains, for instance, al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s ideas on semantics in his account of the 



relationship between a name and what it names ( ism wa-musamma¯ ) from the 

introduction to al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s  Highest Goal in Explaining the Beautiful Names of 



God . 

148


  There is no evidence that  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t was aware of the philosophical 

background of these particular teachings, although he clearly did understand 

the intellectual connection between Avicenna and al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯.  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t crit-



icizes the  fala¯sifa  together with the  mutakallimu

¯n  because their negative theology 

cannot lead to an adequate understanding of the Divine, 

149

  yet he also expresses 



a fondness toward Avicenna. One of  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t’s original teachings is that the 

true seeker after God should be acquainted with a certain kind of unbelief ( kufr ) 

in order to reach a higher degree of belief. This position,  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t claims, 

had already been expressed by Avicenna in his  Epistle on the Occasion of the Feast 



of Sacrifi ce   ( al-Risa¯la al-Ad.h.awiyya ). According to  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t’s account, when 

a Sufi  asked Avicenna to provide a proof—for what exactly remains obscure—he 

simply said: 

 [The proof is] to enter true unbelief ( al-kufr al-h.aqı¯qı¯ ) and to leave 

what is (only) metaphorical Islam ( al-Isla¯m al-maja¯zı¯ ) and to pay 

attention only to what is beyond the three [types of ] people until you 

are a believing Muslim  and  an unbeliever. If you are beyond this 

[level] you are neither believer nor unbeliever. If you remain below 

this, then you are a polytheist Muslim. If you are ignorant of this, 

then you will know that there will be no resurrection for you, nor will 

you return as one of the existing beings. 

150


  

 

m os t   in f lue n t i a l   s t u de n t s   a nd   e a r l y   f ol low er s  

8 5

 None of this can be found in Avicenna’s  Epistle on the Occasion of the Feast of 



Sacrifi ce  or elsewhere in his writings. It is, in fact, a Ghazalian notion inspired 

by his explanation of four levels of believe in divine unity ( tawh.ı¯d ) at the begin-

ning of the thirty-fi fth book of his  Revival . There, al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ says that the true 



seeker of God should aim for the fourth and highest level of insight as to what 

belief in one single God ( tawh.ı¯d ) really means. On this level, he understands 

that all being is God. The three lower levels represent lesser insights, insuf-

fi cient for the true seeker. 

151

   In  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t’s pseudo-Avicennan quote, this 



notion is combined with the idea that the true believer is one who cannot be 

defi ned by categories such as “Muslim” or “unbeliever.” A portion of unbelief 

is required to reach the highest level of understanding divine unity ( tawh.ı¯d ). 

 What is meant by requiring such a portion of unbelief is illuminated 

in another passage in  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t’s  Preludes . Here, he defends Avicenna’s 

position of the world’s pre-eternity. When Avicenna said that the four prime 

elements are pre-eternal ( qadı¯m ), he did not mean to say,  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t ex-

plains, that anything in the sublunar sphere and the world of coming-to-be and 

passing-away is pre-eternal. Only the building materials of the earthly world 

are pre-eternal, and these are the “real elements” (  ¶ana¯s.ir-i h.aqı¯qı¯ ). This teach-

ing is correct, says  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t, and “Avicenna should be excused for saying 

this.” 


152

  Yet, al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ had branded this position as unbelief and apostasy from 



Islam. It seems that  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t aimed to turn his condemnation into some-

thing positive that the Sufi  should embrace. 

 ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t also incorporates many of the major ideas of al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯’s 



moral teachings. He follows al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ closely in his critique of  kala¯m . 



153

   Like 


al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯, he criticizes the political elite for their corruption and calls them 



in one of his letters “a Satan among the Satans of humanity and an enemy 

among the enemies of God and His messenger.” 

154

  Those scholars who seek 



the rulers’ patronage and who do not use their knowledge to earn the afterlife 

are condemned. He advises his students to “serve the sandals” ( khidmat-i kafsh ) 

rather than to serve the sultan, 

155


  using the Ghazalian expression “serving of the 

sandals” coined in his  Niche of Lights.  It means that one should follow the ex-

ample of Moses, whom God had asked in the valley of T.uwa¯ to “take off the two 

sandals” (Q 20:12). Al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ interprets this verse as meaning that Moses was 



asked to leave the worldly affairs ( al-dunya¯ ) behind him and concentrate fully 

on the afterlife. Several mystics in the generation after al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ picked up this 



metaphor.  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t’s usage is joined, for instance, by his contemporary 

Ibn Qası¯ (d. 546/1151) from al-Andalus. In 539/1144, he was the leader of a Sufi  

revolt against the antimystical Almoravids. Ibn Qası¯’s movement had its center 

in what is today the Algarve in southern Portugal. 

156

   Ibn  Qası¯’s main work is 



 The Book on Taking Off the Two Sandals  ( Kita¯b Khal  al-na  layn ), and here he pur-

sues the same Ghazalian motif as  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t persued, “to throw off the two 

worlds ( kawna¯n ).” Moses, al-Ghaza¯l

ı

¯ says, obeyed God’s imperative outwardly 



by taking off his sandals and inwardly by throwing off the two worlds. 

157


  

 Western scholarship on  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t has mostly focused on his political 

signifi cance. In 525/1131, at age thirty-three, he was crucifi ed in Hamadan along 

with other offi cials with whom he had close ties. This happened during the 



8 6   a l - gh a z a

¯ l 1


¯ ’ s   ph ilosoph ic a l   t h e olo g y

reign of the Seljuq sultan Mah.mu¯d ibn Muh.ammad Tapar (reg. 511–25 / 1118–31) 

and during the vizierate of Qawwa¯m al-Dı¯n al-Dargazı¯nı¯ (d. 527/1133). This is 

the same Sultan Mah.mu¯d who, as a child, when he held the governorship of 

Baghdad, had invited As ¶ad al-Mayhanı¯ to teach at the local Niz.a¯miyya. He was 

not known for antirationalist or antiphilosophical tendencies. The Seljuq ruling 

family, particular Mah.mu¯d’s uncle, the Supreme Sultan Sanjar, had formally 

embraced the teachings of al-Ghaza¯lı¯ after the accusations against him were 

dismissed. 

158


  The sources do not allow us to determine fully why  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t 

was executed and whether this was a reaction to his teachings. Most historians 

have tried to explain his execution as the outcome of a court intrigue in which 

al-Dargazı¯nı¯ is usually assigned the role of the villain. 

159

  

 The scholarly community during  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t’s days did not share these 



misgivings at the Seljuq court. His contemporary al-Sam ¶a¯nı¯ has high praise 

for  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t’s virtue and his Sufi  scholarship. 

160

  Another early historian 



wrote: “He was one of the great imams and friends of God ( awliya¯ 7  ) who was 

noble-hearted and who followed in his works Abu

¯ H

. a¯mid al-Ghaza¯l



ı

¯.” 


161

   From 


his prison cell in Baghdad,  ¶Ayn al-Qud.a¯t wrote a treatise in his defense ad-

dressed to the scholars of Islam. It reveals that he was formally charged with 


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