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Al-Tanqihat fi Sharh al-Talwihat

By Ibn Kammuna
Refinement and Commentary on Suhrawardi’s, Intimations
A Thirteenth Century Text on Natural Philosophy and Psychology.

Critical Edition, with Introduction and Analysis by
Hossein Ziai & Ahmed Alwishah

The present volume is a critical edition of a highly significant 13th century text,  Al-Tanqihat fi  Sharh al-Talwihat : al-Fann al-Thani fi al-Tabi‘, on natural philosophy and psychology.

The text was written in Arabic by Sa‘d b. Mansur b. Hibat-Allah b. Kammuna, better known as Ibn Kammuna (d. 683 A.H./1284 A.D.), a distinguished philosopher and oculist from a learned Jewish family of Baghdad, at the Nizamiyya Madrasa in the year 667 A.H./1268A.D. It demonstrates the analytical side of rationalist Islamic philosophy, specifically of the holistic system known as the  “Philosophy of Illumination,” and is an extensive commentary on one of the four major texts by the 12th century Persian (Iranian) innovative philosopher, Shihab al-Din Suhrawardi.  The text, as indicated by its title, is not a simple commentary, rather an analytical refinement of the Persian thinker’s arguments on natural philosophy and psychology, with specific emphasis on Illuminationist philosophy.

Ibn Kammuna’s  position in Islamic philosophy is well established.  He is known as an Illuminationist philosopher, and is identified as such by the Persian philosopher Mulla Sadra in a discussion of philosophical schools in his al-Asfar al-Arba‘.  His genuinely analytical views on philosophy, evidenced in the present text, Al-Tanqihat fi  Sharh al-Talwihat, is proof that philosophy had not died out in the East during the 13th century.  This text, the second part of which on natural philosophy is published for the first time, helped solidify the position of Illuminationist philosophy in the 13th century, providing an alternative philosophical system to Islamic Peripatetic philosophy.  This, at a time when thinking had been circumscribed by philosophical “text-books” composed by theologians.  Ibn Kammuna’s text, together with Suhrawardi’s own compositions plus other commentaries on his other works, defined the “new” school of Islamic philosophy, the Illuminationist.

The edition has been prepared by Hossein Ziai, Professor of Islamic and Iranian Studies at UCLA, with the assistance of one of his advanced graduate students in Islamic philosophy, Mr. Ahmed Alwishah.  The volume includes an English introduction to the text, which introduces the life and works of the author, Ibn Kammuna, and examines a selected number of philosophical topics of the text.

Specifications:
xii+548pp, text in English and Arabic, index.
ISBN:1-56859-106-3 (paper): $55.00

[Bibliotheca Iranica: Intellectual Traditions Series, No. 9]

  
 
 

Al-Tanqihat fi Sharh al-talwihat
The Ball and Polo Stick or The Book of Ecstacy
Book of Radiance
The Mirror of Meaning
Philosophical Allegories


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