Abū Bakr al-Rāzī (d. 925), a doctor known not only for his medical expertise but also for his notorious philosophical ideas, has not yet been given due credit for his ideas on the ethical treatment of animals. This paper explores the philosophical and theological background of his remarks on animal welfare, arguing that al-Rāzī did not (as has been claimed) see animals as possessing rational, intellectual souls like those of humans. It is also argued that al-Rāzī probably did not, (...) as is usually believed, endorse human-animal transmigration. His ethical stance does not in any case depend on shared characteristics of humans and animals, but rather on the need to imitate God’s providence and mercy. (shrink)

Ethics plays an essential role in the philosophical framework of Abū Bakr al-Rāzī. Although most of his philosophical works have become extinct, two surviving works serve as primary sources for understanding his ethical theory. Although sharing certain foundational principles, these two works diverge in terms of ethical standards and exhibit distinct logical approaches to ethics, a facet that has largely remained unexplored within contemporary scholarly discourse. I aim to extract and reconstruct both of his ethical decision-making systems by shedding (...) light on the place of ethics in his philosophy, explaining the interconnection of the two ethical frameworks, reconstructing both of these ethical systems, and finally presenting them in patterns. (shrink)

Nuestro propósito aquí es el de dar cuenta, de un modo sumario, de la figura de Abu Bakr Zakariyya al-Razi (el Rhazes de los latinos) y los posibles orígenes de su pensamiento, así como presentar la originalidad de su pensamiento filosófico en el contexto de su tiempo y su cultura.

Abū Bakr al-Ṣūlī, The Life and Times of Abū Tammām. Edited and translated by Beatrice Gruendler. Library of Arabic Literature. New York: New York University Press, 2015. Pp. xxx + 421. $40.

This article argues that a fragment from a lost treatise by Abū Bakr al-Rāzī (d. 925) is preserved in the Book on Morphology Kitāb al-Taṣrīf) by Ps-Ǧābir ibn Ḥayyān. Paul Kraus reached the conclusion that the collection to which this book belongs was written between the end of the ninth and the beginning of the tenth century AD. This fragment represents the first attempt – to our knowledge – to analyze the logical structure of sign-based inference in Arabic, which (...) is known as istidlāl bi-al-šāhid ʿalā al-ġāʾib among theologians and philosophers. The author distinguishes between sign-inferences based on homogeneity (al-muǧānasa), course of habit (maǧrā al-ʿāda) and traces (āṯār). After providing a translation of the fragment, the first part of this paper argues that its author is Abū Bakr al-Rāzī. My argument is based on a comparison between this text and a passage from the Doubts About Galen, which is also by Abū Bakr al-Rāzī. I hypothesize that at least two other fragments from the same work or from different works by Abū Bakr al-Rāzī are preserved in the corpus attributed to Ps-Ǧābir. The second part of the paper aims to reconstruct Abū Bakr al-Rāzī’s theory of sign-inference. In so doing, I show the historical influence that Hellenistic debates on sign-inference might have had on al-Rāzī, and I situate al-Rāzī’s theory in the context of the prominent use that the theologians of the kalām made of the istidlāl bi-al-šāhid ʿalā al-ġāʾib. To offer a more comprehensive reconstruction of al-Rāzī’s theory of sign-inference, this article compares the critical approach presented in the newly identified fragment with the epistemological framework outlined in the Doubts About Galen. Finally, this article shows that Abū Bakr al-Rāzī’s theory of sign-inference had a strong influence on al-Fārābī’s logical developments especially in his Epitome of the Prior Analytics, even if he does not acknowledge this intellectual debt. (shrink)

The present article explores the views of al-Jāḥiẓ, Abū Bakr al-Rāzī, and Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī - three pre-modern thinkers of the Islamic world outside the Peripatetic tradition - on the question o...

Abu Bakr Razi, one of the important Islamic philosophers who produced thoughts on how to protect the physical and spiritual health of people, states that there is a close connection between the psychological well-being of people and their moral competence in his philosophical treatises on morality. In this article, Razi's moral thoughts on getting rid of sadness and healing spiritually are discussed in connection with the vital troubles of the modern individual. The main purpose of the article is to (...) discuss the possible contributions to the individual of approaching the problematics shaped by the dominant paradigm of the era in which the modern individual lives in line with Razi's thoughts on the improvement of morality. The importance of this study stems from the fact that Razi tries to analyze her spirituality-oriented philosophical thoughts in the context of the existential dilemmas of the modern individual who has strayed from the sacred, forgotten the purpose of existence, and identifies happiness with materiality. In the article, it is concluded that the moral thoughts of Razi, who put the Transcendent One at the center of her philosophy and act with the guidance of reason, are valuable philosophical thoughts that can guide today's modern individuals as well as her contemporaries. (shrink)

Abū Bakr al-Rāzī (d. ca. 925), a well-known physician and Muslim philosopher, has not yet been widely considered for his philosophical reflections on animals. An inspection of al-Rāzī’s works demonstrates his endeavor, based on his cosmology, to come up with a way of the perfection of the soul and becoming liberated from the terrestrial world. As this paper maintains, his investigation of animals is aimed at developing his theory of the perfection of the soul. After a brief clarification of (...) the theory, which entails a discussion of the interaction of the two theoretical and practical aspects of human reason, this paper will discuss seven cases in which al-Rāzī uses the discussion of animals to develop his theory of the perfection of the soul. (shrink)

The Andalusi Abū Bakr Ibn al-ʿArabī, one of the great figures of the Mālikī tradition, gained his scholarly credentials through a journey to seek knowledge in the East. He commemorated his journey in a travelogue so widely admired that it initiated a new genre of Arabic travel writing. This article examines both the journey and the travelogue as strategies Abū Bakr employed to regain his family’s elite status and property, both lost when the Almoravids overthrew the (...) ṭāʾifa of Seville that his father served as a vizier. (shrink)

This article revisits the controversy between Abū Bakr al-Rāzī and Abū al-Qāsim al-Balḫī. Based on the testimony of the Kitāb taṯbīt dalāʾil al-nubuwwa of the Qāḍī ʿAbd al-Ǧabbār, it is shown that the two philosophers must have clashed at the court of Aḥmad b. Sahl al-Marwazī, governor of Balḫ, during the 910s, and that the virulence of the tone of their exchange can be explained above all by this context of professional rivalry. In terms of content, their conversation must (...) have focused on the question of divine justice and on the best way to give an account of prophecy and Qurʾanic wisdom. We then turn to the study of chap. VIII, 4 of Faḫr al-Dīn al-Rāzī's Al-maṭālib al-ʿāliya and show that, contrary to a recently held view, this chapter constitutes an echo not of Abū Bakr al-Rāzī, but of the first argument of Ibn al-Rāwandī's Kitāb al-zumurrud, which contrasted the autonomy of reason with the necessity of prophecy in order to conclude from the former to the negation of the latter. Finally, it is suggested that Abū Bakr al-Rāzī's doctrine of prophecy, like that of the great theologians of his time, both Muʿtazilites and Ašʿarites, aims to escape the dilemma set up by Ibn al-Rāwandī a few decades earlier. (shrink)

This article offers the first edition and translation of two heretofore unpublished pharmacological treatises by Abū Bakr al-Rāzī, namely Fī ittikhādh māʾ al-jubn and Fī manāfiʿ māʾ al-jubn, which seem to have formed part of a lost volume on dairy products. As it demonstrates, al-Rāzī’s examination of whey is connected to his philosophical interest in the complex nature of simple substances such as milk. The article also highlights how these two treatises built on the Greek pharmacological tradition by (...) incorporating ingredients from Persia and India. (shrink)

This book studies the phenomenon of freethinking in medieval Islam, as exemplified in the figures of Ibn al-Rāwandī and Abū Bakr al-Rāzī. It reconstructs their thought and analyzes the relations of the phenomenon to Islamic prophetology and its repercussions in Islamic thought.

This paper introduces two newly discovered epistles by the celebrated physician and philosopher Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn Zakariyyāʾ al-Rāzī. The first epistle addresses the question of why and how clothing can be used both to stay warm and to stay cool, drawing on the Aristotelian tradition of problem literature. The second epistle arises out of a court polemic and treats the question of whether one should consume mulberries after watermelons. This study offers analysis, editions, and translations of these (...) previously unknown epistles, situating them within their broader literary and cultural contexts. (shrink)