HISTORY OF ISLAMIC PHILOSOPHY

The History of Islamic Philosophy course is one of the related or complementary educational activities of the degree course.
It aims to introduce the fundamental elements in the history of classical Arab-Islamic theological and philosophical thought, as a necessary complement to the study of history, Islamology and Islamic law, disciplines also included in the course of studies. We specify "Classical Islam" because the period covered by the course in question includes approximately the eighth to twelfth centuries, that is, from the time of the first theoretical debates and the reception of Greek works, to the complex philosophical elaboration of Averroes (d. 1198 AD).
The main objective is to provide students with a basic knowledge of the main themes and authors of the theological and philosophical tradition of classical Islam; an equally important objective is to make them aware of the theoretical interest of elaborations coming from a different cultural tradition; finally, especially for students who have not received a philosophical education in high school, the course aims to make them aware of the different ontological and ethical problems, and to educate them in the elaboration of a personal vision of the multiple questions concerning man and his place in the universe.

The aim is to present some major questions of Arab philosophy (the relationship between philosophy and religion, the question of the interpretation of the sacred text, that of happiness, the status of man, the creation or eternity of the world, the relationship to politics, the order of the sciences). The aim is to be able to understand and analyse a "classic" text of falsafa.

No special prerequisites are required. We will make constant reference to Arabic texts. Knowledge of the language is an advantage, but not an obligation. We will work on translations. The level in 'philosophy' is introductory.

This course is an introduction to Arabic philosophy (falsafa). We will take Averroes' "Decisive Discourse" as a basic text. Starting from the question formulated by Averroes (that of the legal status of philosophy in relation to the sharî'a), we will approach other authors (al-Fârâbî, Ibn Sînâ, al-Ghazâlî, Ibn Bâjja, Ibn Tufayl) and some major problems of Arab thought (knowledge, action, happiness, the status of metaphysics, etc.).

The reference text is Averroes' "Decisive Discourse". We will also use other fundamental texts of the falsafa (from al-Fârâbi, Ibn Sînâ, ibn Tufayl, Ibn Bâjja). A bibliography will be distributed at the beginning of the course.

The examination will be oral. You will have to comment on a short text that develops one of the points covered in the course. You will then have to answer some follow-up questions.

You will work from the translation texts distributed at the beginning of each lesson, which will be commented on and explained.

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