Medieval Philosopy
Kalam is similar to Logos.
Medieval philosophy as we have defined it is philosophy with its root in Greek, but transplanted into monotheistic faith. Figures like Al-Farabi then are obviously medieval philosophers.
Al-Farabi lived in 870-950.
His background is a bit obscure. He could be Turkish or Persian, and Khazakhstan currently claims him as their own. They even have him on their money. In the Almaty University they also have a huge statue of Al-Farabi.
The main city where he worked and lived howeve was Baghdad, where he lived until he moved to Damascus where he died.
He was in the school of the Baghdad Peripatetics. His work became important 100 years after his death, partially thanks to Ibn Sina, who was deeply influenced by him. He is called the second philosophical master, second to Aristotle in importance.
He wrote Enumeration of Sciences which ends up having a huge influence on the latin world. According to the place that you give to each part of philosophy, it implies the importance you give to that part. For Al-Farabi, politics is one of the last parts of the works, but also one of the main parts of philsophy itself. It adds an important implication on how you consider the role of every science.
Like many other he also wrote commentaries on Aristotle and Music. He also summarises Plato’s Laws, and wrote about the Republic.
Abelard, the 12th centry scholar, would have only read Timaeus, so crucially couldn’t read the political philosophy of Plato. Muslim world would have shortened versions of these kinds of texts by Plato. The muslim world would have had access to all of Aristotle except Politics. And to a certain extent neo-platonic philosophers.
Original title of perfect state is Principles of the opinions of the people of the virtuous city.
It probably came from the end of his career. Politics is one of the last but most important parts of the sciences. This kind of work, the perfect state, is an islamic interpretation of the platonic philosophers king. It is however a very eclectic work. It is both influenced by Plato and Aristotle.
He holds a neoplatonic view of the supralunary world, whilst the sublunary world is entirely aristotelian. Human beings are neoplatonically structured, whilst the city state is a bit neoplatonic, but with a lot of originality.
Supralunary means cosmos. In this world there is the first principle, God, who is also the first cause of all being, the one/mind. There is not much trace of the muslim concept of creation in his works. Not even of Aristotle’s idea of the unmoved mover. This framework is the neoplatonic emanation basically from the one. From the one we have 10 immaterial intellects. They are all self-reflective, they think their own essences, and think the first causes.
The eleventh intellect is the active intellect: the activity of each intellect. It is immaterial. It thinks about its own essence, activity, and thinks the first cause.
The sublunary world is a further emanation from the immaterial world, which has a hylomorphic structure. He makes an analogy with the healthy body and the perfect state, and with the ordered cosmos.
The point of the active intellect is the human cognitive ability.
Basic principles of cognitive theory developed by Al-Farabi.
Fundamental distinction between the material and the immaterial, between senses and intellect. However also a kind of empiricism, as nothing is in the intellect that was not in the senses.
It is only philosophers who can have a really acquired intellect, whilst the mass of people only know the symbols.
Felicity is joining the intellect. Being free from the matter, freed by knowledge and thinking. This is the degree of perfection we can reach in our life. After a certain point of acquired intellect you don’t need the senses anymore.
For Al-Farabi there is a tight link between ultimate happiness, salvation, and the virtue or excellence of the ruler who imposes on his community a religion, which is the opinions and actions the population must have and practice for eternal happiness. The good political life is central to achieving human happiness.
Political life is integral to human happiness.
Ultimate perfection of individual humans and society is social. And to do this you need to live in an excellent society.
Al-Farabi distinguishes 4 types of contraries to this existence in the pefect state. The ignorant, the wicked, the changed, and the lost. Ignorants follow superficial goods like wealth or pleasure. Wicked know the truth but don’t act it out. The Changed used to be a perfect state, but for one reason or another changed their views. The Lost were deceived by their rulers to change their formerly perfect views. He mainly stresses the ignorant state in order to show what the superficial goods are.
He is similar to Hobbes in certain ways, because without a state there is a kind of state of war of all against all. Ignorant cities are much like this for Al-Farabi. In the perfect city you stress the importance of fundamental cooperation, whilst in ignorant cities one disagrees one the kinds of bonds that are needed to tie society together. Even religion in an imperfect state is done mainly for bad goals.
Al-Farabi mentions democracy too. He critiques it. He means that a democratic city is one where everyone has an unbound desire, much too free. There is no rule which brings everyone together, nor is it necessarily ruled by the best. The rulers in democracy have to preserve the variety of desires of the people in the city. This is the role of the ruler in the city. It is not helping people to achieve fundamental happiness. But rather preserves their multiplicity, which is different from happiness.
Al-Farabi parallells the excellency of a functional body with a functional state. All the organs have thier seperate functions and makes the life of the organism perfect. Same with a state. It’s a less spiritual analogy than in Plato’s Republic.
The perfect state also follows the perfection of the cosmos. The relation of the first cause to existence is like the relation to the king and its other parts. The first cause should in some manner always be the ruler. A ruler who is taught properly in some sense becomes similar to the other intellects in that all the ruler does is think. If a ruler acquires enough acquired intellect, he can literally act like an intellectual principle. You literally become like the divine intelligence. Active intellect then acts like a kind of revelation for what is like a prophet.
You need two things in the perfect city: you need your function that you can do well, but also you need to also acquire good dispositions of the soul: a bunch of fundamental knoweldge. Everybody needs to think in order to reach felicity. This can be impressed upon people by either thinking or by having this knowledge impressed upon you through symbolic representation; then they can all learn the truth more easily. If you are not a philosopher you need the symbol to understand the first cause and so on. Good religion should give this kind of knowledge.
What is interesting for Al-Farabi is that there can be different perfect states with different religions. You need the same symbolic representation, but the fundamental truth is basically the same.