Dogma and Reason

Ibn Khaldun believed that the Islamic community was divided between the few (khaas) and the many (aam) among the believers. The aam made up the general Muslim population who followed the religious law without using their reason. Whereas the khaas were those in the minority who followed the religious law unquestioning, but also used their reasoning to understand it. 

The use of reasoning is limited in the religious sciences, where most of it is accepted directly from divine sources to be intrinsically the truth. Nevertheless, with the development of jurisprudence limited reasoning became part of the religious sciences, e.g. Hanafi jurisprudence makes heavy use of reason, as does the process of analogical reasoning and dialectical reasoning which are part of the Islamic sciences. It is important to keep the role of reasoning limited to its purpose and not give free reign when it comes to Islamic sciences.

Ibn Khaldun calls the khaas members of the community philosophers as they use their reason to understand things including religion. Before him, Ibn Rushd described the scenarios of reasoning with respect to the Islamic sciences. If a philosopher's reasoning is not in conflict with Islam, then there is no issue. Whereas, if the conclusion of reasoning is in conflict with Islamic principles, the reasoning needs to be reinterpreted as reasoning which is against Islam must be faulty. Thus the philosopher is not antagonistic to religion, rather they play a role as an inheritor to the Prophet (SWAS) in implementing Islam while trying to understand it. 

According to classical Muslim philosophers, a philosopher must not disclose their activities of using reason to understand the religion to the general (aam) public as it might lead them astray, To them, they preach the unquestioning religious law, without arguments of reason. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Evolution of a State

Image
According to Ibn Khaldun, every state undergoes 5 stages of development in its life cycle. Primitive culture organized itself finding synergy and solidarity in Al-Assabiya and religion, seeking escape from poverty, marginal living, lack of leisure, etc. by seeking an urban living. What can be achieved in urban life cannot be achieved in a primitive lifestyle. Thus, the attraction of wealth, recreation, stability, and intellectual development pulls the nomadic tribesmen to capture city after city, to form a state. Ibn Khaldun calls the refined culture of the cities, "civilization". Initially, the state is established based on zeal and fervor when its sense of social cohesion is strong. It is united by a leader to who the population has given their allegiance. As the state gets established, this sense of solidarity weakens as the heroes who established the state become dispersed throughout the state. The extent of the boundaries of the state will depend on the extent of this s...
Read more

Primitive Culture

Image
A primitive society ( umran badawi ) is the simplest of societies. It is characterized by groups of people of the same extended family, living off the land in nomadic or simple agricultural existence. They typically work hard using the simplest of resources and tools to just survive. Their economy is simple and restricted, often based on barter. Their food is plain. Their characters are strong, upright, and well-rounded. Their skills are broad, deep, and practical, allowing them to survive in the toughest of environments.  There is less possibility for them to be engaged in vice as vice is often detrimental to their subsistent existence. Even if they wish to engage in vices, they usually do not get the opportunities to do so. In contrast, they are more likely to be guided to good moral living if someone preaches that to them as it directly benefits their way of life.  Social cohesion in primitive societies is primarily through natural kinship and affinity to one's relations. T...
Read more

The Birth of New Social Sciences

Image
According to Ibn Khaldun, history has two forms, external and internal. For the most part, history before him was narrated as an external history in the form of a chronology of reports. There were important exceptions to this, most notably the accounts in the Quran, which always have parables and analysis for our guidance narrated with the history. Such internal history, in which there is an analytical study of events, was what Ibn Khaldun was interested in. Thus, he undertook the task of writing the Book of Ibaar (wise lessons from history). He writes in his preface about his theory of history or historiography.  He describes how he developed the solution to the problem of scrutinizing the historical accounts based on their veracity. The traditional method that Islamic historical narrations used was to study the authority of the chain of narrators of a historical report critically which Ibn Khaldun supplemented with a new science he developed -- the Science of Culture -- to valida...
Read more