The history of Islamic thought in the Middle Ages, the impact of Greek philosophy and science, and the formation of an own theological tradition, is a long and complex one. The articles in this volume dedicated to Hans Daiber, one of the pioneering scholars in this field, offer new insights from a variety of perspectives: philological, philosophical, and historical. The subjects range from Islamic philosophy and theology, over the history of science, the transmission into other medieval cultures to language and literature. In addition to their specific discoveries, they give an impression of the dynamics of medieval Islamic intellectual history as well as of the diversity of approaches needed to understand this dynamics.

Islamic thought is the most beautiful result of a multicultural dialogue. Islamic culture became a bridge between antiquity, Iranian scholars, Syriac and Arabic Christians and the Latin Middle Ages. Its richness of ideas, its plurality of values can contribute to the requirements of modern plurality. The monograph aims at a historical and bibliographical survey of the qurʾānic and rational world-view of early Islam, of the period of translations from Greek into Syriac and Arabic, and of the impact of Islamic thought on the Latin Middle Ages. Critical reflexions of Muslim scholars stimulated new scientific ideas and make us aware of the contribution of Islam to humanity.

T. M. Rudavsky presents a new account of the development of Jewish philosophy from the tenth century to Spinoza in the seventeenth, viewed as part of an ongoing dialogue with medieval Christian and Islamic thought. Her aim is to provide a broad historical survey of major figures and schools within the medieval Jewish tradition, focusing on the tensions between Judaism and rational thought. This is reflected in particular philosophical controversies across a wide range of issues in metaphysics, language, cosmology, and philosophical theology. The book illuminates our understanding of medieval thought by offering a much richer view of the Jewish philosophical tradition, informed by the considerable recent research that has been done in this area.

The print edition is available as a set of two volumes (9789004113473).

This volume provides the advanced student or scholar a set of introductions to each of the world's major non-European philosophical traditions. Sections on Chinese philosophy, Indian philosophy, Buddhist philosophy, East Asian philosophy, African philosophy, and trends in global philosophy are all edited by an expert.

Early modern Protestant scholars closely engaged with Islamic thought in more ways than is usually recognized. Among Protestants, Lutheran scholars distinguished themselves as the most invested in the study of Islam and Muslim culture. Mehmet Karabela brings the neglected voices of post-Reformation theologians, primarily German Lutherans, into focus and reveals their rigorous engagement with Islamic thought. Inspired by a global history approach to religious thought, Islamic Thought Through Protestant Eyes offers new sources to broaden the conventional interpretation of the Reformation beyond a solely European Christian phenomenon. Based on previously unstudied dissertations, disputations, and academic works written in Latin in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Karabela analyzes three themes: Islam as theology and religion; Islamic philosophy and liberal arts; and Muslim sects (Sunni and Shi‘a). This book provides analyses and translations of the Latin texts as well as brief biographies of the authors. These texts offer insight into the Protestant perception of Islamic thought for scholars of religious studies and Islamic studies as well as for general readers. Examining the influence of Islamic thought on the construction of the Protestant identity after the Reformation helps us to understand the role of Islam in the evolution of Christianity.

A unique introductory guide to the rich, complex and diverse tradition of Islamic philosophy. Islamic Philosophy A-Z comprises over a hundred concise entries, alphabetically ordered and cross-referenced for easy access. All the essential aspects of Islamic philosophy are covered here: key figures, schools, concepts, topics, and issues. Articles on the Peripatetics, Isma'ilis, Illuminationists, Sufis, kalam theologians and later modern thinkers are supplemented by entries on classical Greek influences as well as Jewish philosophers who lived and worked in the Islamic world. Topical entries cover various issues and key positions in all the major areas of philosophy, making clear why the central problems of Islamic philosophy have been, and remain, matters of rational disputation. This book will prove an indispensable resource to anyone who wishes to gain a better understanding of this fascinating intellectual tradition.

The endeavour to prove God’s existence through rational argumentation was an integral part of classical Islamic theology (kalām) and philosophy (falsafa), thus the frequently articulated assumption in the academic literature. The Islamic discourse in question is then often compared to the discourse on arguments for God’s existence in the western tradition, not only in terms of its objectives but also in terms of the arguments used: Islamic thinkers, too, put forward arguments that have been labelled as cosmological, teleological, and ontological. This book, however, argues that arguments for God’s existence are absent from the theological and philosophical works of the classical Islamic era. This is not to say that the arguments encountered there are flawed arguments for God’s existence. Rather, it means that the arguments under consideration serve a different purpose than to prove that God exists. Through a close reading of the works of several mutakallimūn and falāsifa from the 3rd‒7th/9th‒13th century, such as al-Bāqillānī and Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī as well as Ibn Sīnā and Ibn Rushd, this book proffers a re-evaluation of the discourse in question, and it suggests what its participants sought to prove if it is not that God exists.

Salvation and Hell in Classical Islamic Thought uses classical Islamic sources to trace the development of Islamic eschatology during the formative centuries of Islamic intellectual history. Marco Demichelis draws on classical Islamic scholars, including Ibn Sina, al-Ghazali, Ibn Taymiyya, and Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, to bring together concepts from Islamic philosophy, theology and mysticism – including proto-Sufism – to examine the interplay of these concepts between these traditions. The doctrines of salvation from Hell are examined in depth, in particular the theory of the annihilation of Hell, which proposes the idea that there will be a time when Hell will be empty and no longer inhabited. This is the first book to examine Islamic eschatology in the classical period, and adds to the growing scholarship on Islamic views on salvation and the eternity of Hell. It will be essential reading for scholars of Islamic intellectual history, theology, and comparative religion.

Since the publication of the author ́s BIBLIOGRAPHY OF ISLAMIC PHILOSOPHY in 1999 more than 3000 new books and articles in the field of Islamic philosophy, its Greek sources and its aftermath in European philosophy appeared and illustrate the increasing interest of the Islamic and the Western world. Philosophical thought as part of the Islamic culture became a medium in the dialogue between cultures and a tool for reflexion and methodology, which are indispensable for creativity and human behaviour. This supplement covers all new publications as far as they were available and could be included in the extensive index on authors, texts, translations and commentaries, and philosophical terms and concepts.