TITLE:
The Dominant Islamic Philosophy of Knowledge
AUTHORS:
Hassan Ajami
KEYWORDS:
Islamic Philosophy of Knowledge, Certainty-Oriented Culture, Meaning, Causation, Al-Ghazali, Ibn Taymiyyah
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Access Library Journal,
Vol.3 No.2,
February
2,
2016
ABSTRACT: The Arab-Islamic culture is certainty-oriented, such that most Arabs and
Muslims consider their beliefs to be certainties. This enabled the
traditionalist philosophical school of knowledge to be dominant in the Arab-Islamic
world. Both Muslim philosophers Al-Ghazali and Ibn Taymiyyah articulated the
dominant philosophical theory of knowledge. While Al-Ghazali claimed that God
creates knowledge in us, Ibn Taymiyyah held that knowledge is justified true
belief or a set of beliefs presented by an infallible person, such as the
prophet Muhammad. Both philosophers provided a traditionalist account of
knowledge, according to which, God is the ultimate source of any genuine
belief. Their conceptions of knowledge became dominant in the Arab-Islamic
world because their theories of knowledge cohere with the fact that the
Arab-Islamic culture is certainty-oriented. The best way to maintain that
one’s beliefs are certainties, i.e.
absolutely true and unchangeable, resides in holding that they are the products
of God Himself. In addition, one’s theory of meaning and causation is related
to one’s conception of knowledge. While Ibn Taymiyyah’s account of meaning
paved the way for his endorsement of his unique theory of knowledge,
Al-Ghazali’s conception of causal relationships, as being unnecessary, led him
to accept the traditionalist view that God creates knowledge in us.