⬜️⬛️
God, So What? The Significance of God’s Existence or Nonexistence
By Nick Zangwill, University College London
The question of whether or not God exists matters a great deal to billions of people. The question is taken to be an important question. Theists and atheists agree on this. And the question generates much heat. Much is thought to turn on it. But there is a puzzle about why this should be. First, I clarify the question at issue, distinguishing it from various other issues. Then I reject a number of familiar ideas for addressing this question. Having cleared the ground, I offer a positive suggestion according to which theism is committed to shared essences between human beings and God, plus a dependence relation between those essences. The debate turns out to be one about human nature, in such a way as to make sense of heat generated. After that, a familiar Aristotelian theist view is contrasted with Platonist shared essentialism to the advantage of the latter. Lastly, I consider some religious consequences of the shared essentialism.
Link: https://doi.org/10.37977/faithphil.2023.40.4.5
—————————————————————
Tags: #God #Aristotle #Religion
⬜️⬛️
Islamic Finance and Sustainable Development
By M. Kabir Hassan, University of New Orleans;
Aishath Muneeza, INCEIF University Coventry University and Rashedul Hasan
Islamic finance is rooted in Shariah or Islamic law, which promotes the well-being of humanity and discourages harmful practices. This Element highlights the nexus between Islamic finance and sustainable development, emphasizing the ethical and socially responsible nature of Islamic finance. It discusses how Islamic financial institutions contribute to sustainable development through the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals , Environmental, Social, and Governance criteria, and Socially Responsible Investment practices. Case studies from different parts of the world demonstrate practical applications of Islamic finance principles in supporting SDG. It suggests reforms that can unlock the full potential of Islamic finance, including the institutionalization of Islamic social finance, convergence with commercial finance, leveraging technology, integrating Shariah-based financial products, considering social return as a benchmark for approving products, introducing blended finance, and collaborating with humanitarian agencies. The potential of Islamic finance for sustainable development provides valuable insights for academicians, practitioners, and policymakers.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009464963
—————————————————————
Tags: #Religion #Islam #Shariah #Law
⬜️⬛️
God, So What? The Significance of God's Existence or Nonexistence
By Nick Zangwill, University College London and Lincoln University
The question of whether or not God exists matters a great deal to billions of people and is taken to be an important one. Theists and atheists agree on this, and the question generates much heat, with much thought to turn on it. However, there is a puzzle about why this should be. First, I clarify the question at issue, distinguishing it from various other issues, and then reject several familiar ideas for addressing it. Having cleared the ground, I offer a positive suggestion: theism is committed to shared essences between human beings and God, plus a dependence relation between those essences. The debate ultimately revolves around human nature, which explains the intensity it generates. Following this, a familiar Aristotelian theist view is contrasted with Platonist shared essentialism, favoring the latter. Finally, I consider some religious consequences of shared essentialism.
Link: https://doi.org/10.37977/faithphil.2023.40.4.5
—————————————————————
Tags: #Theism #God #Aristotle #Religion
⬜️⬛️
Uncertainty in the philosophy of Ibn ‘arabī and Nūr al-Dīn al-Jāmī
By Ismail Lala, Gulf University for Science and Technology
The renowned mystical thinker Muḥyī al-Dīn ibn ‘Arabī (d. 638/1240) believes uncertainty (ḥayra) has a higher epistemological value than certainty. This is because certainty is only of ostensible reality, which ignores the true ontological underpinnings of phenomenality. To become cognisant of the reality that palpitates beneath the facade of the sensible world, we only have recourse to uncertainty. Uncertainty makes us realise that all existents are loci of divine manifestation. Nevertheless, God is simultaneously transcendent and immanent, which means we can only know God through discarding the rule of the excluded middle. This, says Ibn ‘Arabī, gives rise to metaphysical uncertainty. Ibn ‘Arabī’s notion of uncertainty was subsequently taken up by an important commentator, Nūr al-Dīn al-Jāmī (d. 898/1492), who systematises uncertainty into different levels and offers an original hierarchy that defines which types of uncertainty are positive and which are negative.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1080/09552367.2025.2476312
—————————————————————
Tags: #Islam #Religion #IbnArabi #God
⬜️⬛️
The Sufi Shaykh of Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb? An Overview of the Writings of the Madinan Ḥadīth Scholar Muḥammad Ḥayāt al-Sindī
By Zachary Wright, Northwestern University
The pronounced Sufi affiliations of nearly all notable eighteenth-century scholars active in the eighteenth-century, with the notorious exception of Muḥammad b. ʿAbd al-Wahhāb, most often appear in academic literature as a secondary consideration: a vestige of ‘tradition’ still in process of ‘reformation’. Described as the ‘bearer of the banner of the Sunna in Medina’, Muḥammad Ḥayāt al-Sindī (d. 1750) was situated at the heart of scholarly networks in the eighteenth-century Hijaz. He was allegedly the direct teacher of such influential figures as Shāh Walī-Allāh (d. 1762), Muḥammad al-Sammān (d. 1775), and Muḥammad b. ʿAbd al-Wahhāb (d. 1792). This article explores his writing on pedagogy, ḥadīth, jurisprudence, theology, and Sufism to argue that this key scholar articulated a coherent identity as a Sufi intellectual within the Akbarian-influenced networks of eighteenth-century Arabia. Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb’s alleged affiliation to al-Sindī was the exception that proved the rule of dynamic theological and mystical scholarly exchanges within the period.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1093/jis/etaf013
—————————————————————
Tags: #Islam #Religion #Hadith #History
⬜️⬛️
The Mālikiyya in the Twenty-First Century: A Traditionalist Islamic Legal School Navigating State Co-optation, Reformist Pressures, and Neotraditionalist Impulses
By Alexander Thurston, University of Cincinnati
This article examines the contemporary trajectories of the Mālikiyya, one of the four main extant legal schools within Sunni Islam. The article argues that the contest around defending, attacking, and reformulating traditionalist Islamic fiqh (jurisprudence) is one of the key venues for negotiating Islamic identity in the twenty-first century. Yet traditionalist jurists have been an afterthought in discussions of the “makers” or “shapers” of contemporary Islam, who are often held to be either lay-led Islamist movements or reformist intellectuals and activists. Using an interdisciplinary lens drawn from religious studies and political science, the article examines how the Mālikī school’s jurists are navigating their consequential relationships with states, reformists, and neotraditionalists. The school is transforming and adapting as Mālikīs variously accept or reject state patronage, embrace or resist reformism, subscribe to or challenge neotraditionalism, and adjust or reaffirm the traditionalist canon. Meanwhile, other actors co-opt, criticize, or otherwise engage elements of Mālikism. The article draws on a wide array of textual and audiovisual sources produced by contemporary Mālikīs as well as on government websites, reformist and neotraditionalist texts, and my fieldwork in Mauritania and Morocco. This inquiry into the trajectory of the Mālikī school has wider ramifications for understanding constructions of traditionalist religious authority in the world today, particularly in terms of how religious law functions as an arena where identities are defined and debated.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1086/732494
—————————————————————
Tags: #Islam #Religion #Traditionalism #Shariah
⬜️⬛️
Islamic Discourse and Armed Resistance: Fatah’s Strategic Use of Islam in the Palestinian Struggle 1970–1982
By Ido Zelkovitz, University of Haifa
This article examines Fatah’s strategic and ideological evolution during the 1970s and early 1980s, focusing on its adoption of Islamic discourse to strengthen internal cohesion and broaden its influence. It explores how this shift shaped Fatah’s political and military strategies, contributing to its identity formation and support within the Palestinian and Arab public. The findings underscore the role of ideological flexibility in navigating geopolitical dynamics and forging alliances with Islamist factions, including Hezbollah, highlighting the nuanced interplay between pragmatism and ideology in national liberation movements. The study focuses on understanding how Fatah’s adoption of Islamic discourse influenced its political and military strategies during this period. By incorporating Islamic myths and symbols, Fatah not only strengthened internal cohesion but also expanded its influence among young Islamists eager to engage in the Palestinian struggle. This research addresses the central question: How did the adoption of Islamic discourse shape Fatah’s political and military strategies during its transition from Jordan to Lebanon, and how did it contribute to the movement’s identity formation and its success in garnering support among the Palestinian and broader Arab public?
Link: https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16030298
—————————————————————
Tags: #Politics #Islam #Religion
⬜️⬛️
THE CONTROVERSY OVER RECITING THE QUR'AN WITH TONES (AL-QIR'AH BI’L-ALHAN )
By Christopher Melchert, Oxford University
Whether it is acceptable to recite the Qur'an with tones (al-qira'ah bi'l-alhan) touches on two larger issues, the acceptability of music and the distinctiveness of Islam from Christianity and Judaism. Various hadith reports apparently caused difficulty for traditionalists who rejected recitation with tones. The reports themselves were evidently too well established to be rejected. Sometimes they were nullified by more or less strained interpretation, sometimes by paraphrase. Early Hanbali literature is strongly opposed to recitation of the Qur'an with tones. Maliki literature also rejects it, but the Hanafi school seems to have been divided. By contrast, the earliest Shafi'i literature is permissive.
Link: https://doi.org/10.31441/jiqsa.4.2019.a003
—————————————————————
Tags: #Quran #Islam #Hadith
⬜️⬛️
A Utilitarian Islamic Jurist: al-Shāṭibī
By Metin Aydın and Feyza Cevherli, Sakarya University
Utilitarianism is a theory of morality and law that aims for the greatest happiness of the greatest number of people. The two names that come to mind when utilitarianism is mentioned in Western thought are Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, the founders of the theory. Although this theory emerged in Western philosophy, theories that appeal to the concept of utility as the standard of rightness of moral and legal actions can be found in almost every tradition of thought. One of these traditions is Islamic philosophy. In particular, the theory of maṣlaḥa, which is one of the most important legal theories of Islamic legal thought, is a theory that accepts the concept of utility as a fundamental principle. In this article, we focus on the theory of maṣlaḥa of Abū Isḥāq al-Shāṭibī, one of the most prominent thinkers of the theory of maṣlaḥa. Our aim in this article is to point out the similarities and differences between maṣlaḥa theory and utilitarianism, thereby drawing attention to the functionality of the concept of utility as a standard of right or wrong for ethics and law, regardless of society and period
Link: https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16030290
—————————————————————
Tags: #Utilitarianism #Islam #Shariah #Law
⬜️⬛️
AVICENNA AND THE PROBLEM OF INDIVIDUATION VALORIZING THE INDIVIDUALS
By Amir Hossein Pournamdar, McGill University
This study tries to shed further light on Avicenna’s (d. 1037) philosophical and linguistic innovations as suggested in his various accounts of the problem of individuation. To better contextualize his discussions, a background is given from both Porphyry’s (d. 305) Isagoge and Fārābī’s (d. 950) remarks in his Isāġūǧī. I have also enumerated all the candidates for the principle of individuation in Avicenna’s œuvre. It is argued in this paper that the pre-Avicennian Peripatetic tradition hardly engaged, both epistemologically and ontologically, with individual per se as having its own unique identity. Instead, individual was ontologically treated as instantiation of universals and epistemologically it was inquired about to the extent that it could be only told apart. Introducing the notion of individuation as tašaḫḫuṣ, instead of the traditional individuation as tamayyuz, Avicenna offers a new way of looking at intra-species differences for a more complex understanding of the individual per se. According to this view, individual with its unique šaḫṣiyya must be understood on its own through sense perception. This approach appears to propose that the individual should not be deemed as subordinate to Aristotelian universals whose assemblage, in Peripatetic thought, was vainly expected to lead to the knowledge and definition of the individual.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0957423924000122
—————————————————————
Tags: #Avicenna #Islam #Metaphysics #Epistemology
⬜️⬛️
READING BOOK II WITHIN ARITHMETICAL-ALGEBRAIC PRACTICES
THE CASE OF AL-KARAǦĪ, WITH A CONTINUATION IN AL-ZANǦĀNĪ
By Eleonora Sammarchi, University of Bern
In Arabic treatises on algebra, Book II of Euclid’s Elements quickly became a traditional work of reference, especially for justifying quadratic equations. However, in many of these treatises we find a representation of Euclid’s notions that deviates from the “original Euclid.” In this article, I focus on the way in which propositions of Book II were understood and reported by al-Karaǧī (11th c.) in two of his algebraic writings. Inspired by the variety of arithmetical practices of his time, al-Karaǧī transposed these Euclidean propositions from geometrical objects to numbers and applied them to an algebraic context. This allowed him to combine various argumentative strategies deriving from different fields. Building upon al-Karaǧī’s work, al-Zanǧānī (13th c.) no longer needed to mention Euclid and instead conceived of a justification of quadratic equations (the “cause” of the equation) which is completely internal to algebra. These case studies provide evidence for the use of the Elements as a toolbox for the development of algebra. More importantly, they shed further light upon a typical feature of medieval mathematics, namely the existence of a plurality intrinsic in the name “Euclid.”
Link: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0957423924000092
—————————————————————
Tags: #Arabic #Mathematics #History
⬜️⬛️
On Responsibility: Islamic Ethical Thought Engages with Jewish Ethical Thought
By Ufuk Topkara, Berlin Institute for Islamic Theology
A remarkable amount of work on the study of Islamic ethical thought is published annually, covering an unprecedented variety of topics and themes. Yet despite the strides made, these debates have not addressed vital questions about how Islamic ethical thought can contribute to ongoing discourses that affect not only the Muslim community but society at large. In other words, how can we bring Islamic ethical thought into systematic engagement with modern philosophy? Specifically, how can Islamic ethical thought learn from contemporary philosophy, as it learned from Greek philosophy in the Middle Ages? And how might it be possible to develop Islamic ethical thought that can withstand both religious and rational scrutiny? In this programmatic overview, I respond to these questions by engaging with responsibility ethics within and beyond the Islamic tradition. As much as the debate about ethics has reached new heights in contemporary philosophical discourses, so too has the debate about responsibility re-emerged in theological discourses. In this paper, I bring into conversation the thought of Taha Abdurrahman on responsibility, which is nested within his larger paradigm of contemporary Islamic ethics, and Jewish thinker Hans Jonas’ concept of an ethics of responsibility. I argue that orchestrating this scholarly dialog between a 20th-century German Jewish thinker (Jonas) and a contemporary Muslim thinker (Abdurrahman) can lead to both a productive and constructive elaboration of Islamic ethical thought. Furthermore, I suggest that Habermas’ philosophy can serve as a bridge in this discussion, facilitating a comparative exploration of the ethical frameworks presented by both thinkers. By engaging with Habermas, we can highlight how Islamic thought can approach modernity, including philosophical debates, in a manner similar to that of 20th-century Jewish scholars like Jonas. This engagement not only enhances our understanding of responsibility within these traditions but also underscores the potential for interdisciplinary dialog in navigating contemporary ethical challenges.
Link: https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16030274
—————————————————————
Tags: #Islam #Judaism #Ethics #Modernism
⬜️⬛️
The Problem of God in Buddhism
By Signe Cohen, University of Missouri
Since Buddhism does not include a belief in a personal god instrumental to the creation of the world or to human salvation, it is often assumed that gods play no part in Buddhism at all. This Element complicates the simplistic assessment of Buddhism as an 'atheistic religion' and discusses the various roles deities play in Buddhist texts and practice. The Problem of God in Buddhism includes a comprehensive analysis of the Buddhist refutations of a creator God, the idea of salvation without divine intervention, the role of minor deities in Buddhism, the question of whether Buddhas and Bodhisattvas can function as gods in certain forms of Buddhism, and the notion of the sacred as apart from the divine in Buddhist traditions.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009269223
—————————————————————
Tags: #Buddhism #Atheism #God #Religion
⬜️⬛️
The Conceptualization of Jurisprudential Exegesis as the Intersection of Tafsir and Fiqh: A Critical Approach
By Bayram Demircigil, Sakarya University
This article comprehensively analyzes the conceptual and methodological differences between tafsīr and fiqh, two core disciplines in Islamic scholarship, emphasizing their respective relationships with the Qur’ān. The study employs a historical and comparative approach to explore key Islamic texts, highlighting the evolution of each discipline and their distinct approaches to Qur’ānic interpretation. The primary objective is to clarify the unique intellectual aims, methods, and outcomes of tafsīr and fiqh, despite both disciplines engaging with the Qur’ān as their foundational text. The research concludes that tafsīr, as an exegetical field, is dedicated to interpreting the Qur’ān’s verses by examining their original meaning within their historical, linguistic, and theological contexts. In contrast, fiqh focuses on deriving legal principles from the Qur’ān, addressing the pragmatic needs of the Muslim community through ijtihād. This foundational methodological divergence has led to the frequent merging of tafsīr and fiqh, especially in the formulation of fiqh-based tafsīr (tafsīr fiqhī), which the study contends distorts the independent scholarly character of tafsīr and obscures the distinct functions of both disciplines. This article contributes to the academic discourse by challenging contemporary interpretations of fiqh-based tafsīr, urging a more precise differentiation between tafsīr as an exegetical discipline and fiqh as a juridical field. The study advocates for a more thorough and methodical approach to Qur’ānic interpretation, stressing the importance of maintaining tafsīr’s independent role in understanding the Qur’ān in its original context, without the influence of the legal frameworks that often shape fiqh interpretations. Additionally, the article encourages further scholarly investigation into the historical progression of the Aḥkām al-Qur’ān literature, particularly about the influence of madhāhib (legal schools) on Qur’ānic exegesis. The study proposes that such future research would significantly enrich contemporary Islamic scholarship and offer a deeper understanding of tafsīr and fiqh’s roles in Qur’ānic interpretation.
Link: https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16020254
—————————————————————
Tags: #Quran #Shariah #Islam #Exegesis
⬜️⬛️
Monotheism and Peacebuilding
By John D Brewer, Queen's University
This Element addresses the opportunities and constraints operating on monotheistic peacebuilding, focusing on the three Abrahamic faiths, Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, which share a common origin. These opportunities and constraints are approached through what the volume calls 'the paradox of monotheism'. Monotheism is defined by belief in one omnipotent, benign, and loving God, but this God does not or cannot prevent violence, war, and conflict. Moreover, monotheism can actually promote conflict between the Abrahamic faiths, and with other world religions, giving us the puzzle of holy wars fought in God's name. The first section of the Element outlines the paradox of monotheism and its implications for monotheistic peacebuilding; the second section addresses the peacebuilding efforts of three Abrahamic monotheistic religions and the constraints that operate as a result of the paradox of monotheism. This paradox tends to limit monotheistic peacebuilding to inter-faith dialogue, which often does not go far enough.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009342681
—————————————————————
Tags: #Monotheism #Religion #Politics #Culture
⬜️⬛️
Exploring Metaphysical Foundations: Avicenna's Insights on Evolution and the Multiverse
By Tahereh Jamali, Shahed University;
Hamid Faghanpour Azizi, Shiraz University; Omid Moazeni, Tehran University
The friction between science and religion often arises from the metaphysical and non-empirical origins of key scientific theories such as the multiverse and evolution. Despite being considered triumphs of modern science, the main ideas of these theories are not solely modern and experimental. In this article, drawing from Avicenna's works, notably Al-Shifa, we uncover that the central concepts and metaphysical underpinnings of these theories have been subjects of debate in philosophy and natural sciences for centuries. By integrating ancient wisdom with modern scientific knowledge, we explore chance and purpose as crucial elements linking science and religion within these theories.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1080/14746700.2025.2472127
—————————————————————
Tags: #Avicenna #Multiverse #Evolution
⬜️⬛️
Life, Reproduction, and the Paradox of Evolution
By Edward Feser, Pasadena City College
A neglected but challenging argument developed by Peter Geach, John Haldane, and Stephen Rothman purports to show that reproduction cannot be explained by natural selection and is irreducibly teleological. Meanwhile, the most plausible definitions of life include reproduction as a constitutive feature. The implication of combining these ideas is that life cannot be explained by natural selection and is irreducibly teleological. This does not entail that life cannot be explained in evolutionary terms of some kind, but it does lend support to the controversial view of Jerry Fodor and Thomas Nagel that evolutionists need to look beyond the constraints of Neo-Darwinism.
Link: https://doi.org/10.2478/biocosmos-2025-0003
—————————————————————
Tags: #Theism #God #Evolution #Teleology
⬜️⬛️
Blending Pilgrimage and Learning or the Literary Genres of Riḥla and Muʿjam: Al-Tujībī’s Travelogue to Egypt and Ḥijāz
By Muhammet Enes Midilli, Istanbul University
From the early centuries of Muslim history, one of the most popular pilgrimage routes for the Andalusian and Maghribī pilgrims involved traveling through Alexandria to Cairo, then onward to Upper Egypt, followed by a sea journey to Jidda and finally reaching Makka. In the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, several Maghribī scholars followed this route, combining the pilgrimage journey with scholarly pursuits. Among them, al-Qāsim b. Yūsuf al-Tujībī (d. 730/1329) compiled a travelogue titled Mustafād al-Riḥla wa-l-Ightirāb(The Benefits of Travel and Being Abroad), in which he blended the literary genres of riḥla (travelogue) and muʿjam al-shuyūkh (biographical dictionary of one’s teachers). This article spatializes al-Tujībī’s journey, as depicted in Mustafād al-Riḥla, by employing geographical information systems software to map the locations and routes described in his travelogue. Additionally, the paper examines the structure and style of the travelogue, which blends the riḥla and muʿjam genres, highlighting the combination and hybridization of literary forms. This analysis considers al-Tujībī’s engagement with encyclopedic compilations in Mamluk Cairo and the influence of this intellectual environment on his work. Finally, by highlighting the scholarly network that al-Tujībī established in Egypt and Ḥijāẓ, the paper explores the role of pilgrimage journeys in merging religious duty with scholarly pursuits.
Link: https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16030344
—————————————————————
Tags: #Islam #Religion #History
⬜️⬛️
Pleasure, Pain, and Desire: Epistemology and Ontology of Mental States in Kalām
By Fedor Benevich, University of Edinburgh
This article addresses the primary arguments, concepts, and methods associated with the philosophical analysis of mental states in classical kalām. My discussion will be based on the analysis of pleasure and pain, as well as desire and aversion. These two closely related pairs serve as perfect examples of kalām strategies in the philosophy of mind. We will see that scholars of kalām commonly rely on direct, either phenomenal or empirical, observations to identify the reality of mental states. Once the reality of mental states is established, a scholar of kalām typically engages in a discussion of their ontology, enquiring whether there is a certain separate entity (maʿnā) behind the mental phenomenon or the sensible perception in question and whether it gives rise to a non-perceptible state (ḥāl) that belongs to the entire individual. Among the results of this study is a hypothesis that the methods and concepts of kalām philosophy of mind (particularly the Muʿtazilī tradition) influenced post-Avicennan post-classical Islamic philosophy, particularly Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī (d. 1210).
Link: https://doi.org/10.1093/jis/etaf011
—————————————————————
Tags: #Islam #Religion #Razi #Avicenna #Kalam
⬜️⬛️
Avicenna on the Meaning of Logic: Revisiting Five Major Works
By Shahab Khademi, KU Leuven
Avicenna's logic has gathered much interest in recent decades. However, one significant point that has hitherto been frequently neglected is what logic means to Avicenna in the first place. Considering this issue, the main aim of this paper is to investigate Avicenna's account of logic. This is done by focusing on the logical sections of five of his comprehensive works, namely, the Kitāb al-Madkhal (of the Kitāb al-Shifāʾ, the Cure), al-Najāt (the Salvation), Dānishnāmi-yi ʿAlāʾ ī (Philosophy for ʿAlāʾ-ad-Dawla), al-Mashriqiyyūn (the Easterners) and al-Ishārāt wa-t-tanbīhāt (the Pointers and Reminders). The reason for choosing these five works is fourfold, namely, logico-philosophical, linguistic, chronological and diversity of intended audience. Each work is analyzed based on the three fundamental elements which Avicenna links to the notion of logic, i.e. its definition, its status and its goal. The results of this analysis are then compared. Overall, Avicenna seems to have held a very stable account of logic across these works.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1080/01445340.2024.2444757
—————————————————————
Tags: #Islam #Religion #Avicenna #Logic
⬜️⬛️
Moral knowledge: theism vs. Naturalism
By Zoheir Bagheri Noaparast, Stellenbosch University
Noah McKay (2023) has proposed a novel argument against naturalism. He argues that while theism can explain our ability to arrive at a body of moral beliefs that are generally accurate and complete’, naturalism fails to do so. He argues that naturalism has only social and biological grounds to account for our moral beliefs, which means that naturalism can only claim pragmatic value for our moral beliefs. McKay dedicates his paper to arguing against naturalism. This paper will focus on theism and examine whether theism can explain what naturalism cannot. Theism could rely on guided evolution or the miraculous intervention of God. In contrast to naturalism, theism has revelatory and supernatural grounds for our moral beliefs. This paper will demonstrate some of the challenges that these grounds would encounter. Finally, McKay’s argument implies a dichotomy between unguided evolution and theism, which rests on a problematic assumption about evolutionary theory; by abandoning the assumption, the dichotomy also dissolves.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11153-025-09950-8
—————————————————————
Tags: #Morality #Theism #Atheism #Naturalism #God #Miracle
⬜️⬛️
Addressing a Sibling Rivalry: In Seeking Effective Christian–Muslim Relations, to What Extent Can Comparative Theology Contribute? An Evangelical Christian Perspective
By Joy S. Hadden, Belfast School of Theology
There is a long and complex history of Christian–Muslim engagement, one which is fraught by socio-political tensions and complicated by fear. Theological tensions likewise contribute to the sibling rivalry between these Abrahamic faiths. Accounting for fundamental theological differences between Islam and Christianity, and noting a potential dichotomy between apologetic-style and interfaith engagement, this article contends that effective Christian–Muslim relations must navigate both opposing truth claims and efforts to seek peace. Consequently, comparative theology is critically evaluated, from an evangelical Christian perspective, as a potential mediating approach. In considering the complex relationship between comparative theology and theology of religion, and indeed, between theology and ‘people of faith’, recommendations are formulated with a view to contributing to effective Christian–Muslim relations. The overall aim of this research therefore is to explore approaches to developing more effective Christian–Muslim relations, with a specific focus on comparative theology. While motivated by and accounting for a personal Christian–Muslim sibling relationship, the research method predominantly references academic literature, with sections structured by an amended version of Osmer’s four-task model of practical theology. Findings from this research discern that comparative theology is not quite the mediating approach sought; however, its potential contribution towards a ‘hybrid approach’ is explored. The implications of this article seek to encourage orthodox Muslims and evangelical Christians to engage in comparative exchanges that employ a balanced and in-depth approach to understanding our respective faiths. Finally, this article emerges from within the UK; therefore, discussions presented may be differently received by evangelical Christians operating out of divergent biographical contexts.
Link: https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16030297
—————————————————————
Tags: #Christianity #Islam #Religion
⬜️⬛️
Defining “Romans” in the Late Antique Near East: Some Preliminary Thoughts on the “Romans” in Sūrat al-Rūm
By Nestor Kavvadas, University of Bonn Center for Comparative Theology and Social
In the opening lines of the sūrah named after the “Romans,” Q Rūm 30, the qurʾānic preacher expresses his solidarity with the “Romans” who had then been defeated by the Persian army. In seeking to better understand these verses, one may start with the question: Who exactly are the “Romans” here? “Roman” was a broad, multifaceted term, as Yannis Stouraitis has lately pointed out, based mainly on sources written after the seventh century and stemming from the Greek-speaking “West” of the Byzantine Empire. In this study, using mainly Syriac sources but also some hitherto unnoticed Greek testimonies coming from the Near East, this semantic variability of the word “Roman” is shown to further expand when going East. Like in most Syriac sources, “Romans” in Q Rūm primarily means members of the Byzantine army (and state apparatus), be they ethnic Greeks, Syrians, or Arabs. At the same time, the “Romans” of this sūrah are all inhabitants, all “citizens” of the Byzantine Empire – not just its armies and magistrates. This latter sense corresponds to the broader sense in which “Romans” is used not only in Syriac, but also in Greek sources (and in other languages of the Late Antique Near East). That broader sense is one that we find in a definition by the Damascene Sophronios of Jerusalem, according to whom “Roman” is anyone “stemming from a city subject to the Romans.”
Another qurʾānic passage that refers to the Byzantines (though without naming them), which has very much to do with the same geopolitical context of the Byzantine-Persian wars, Q Māʾidah 5:17, seems to criticize a “Byzantine” confidence in the invincibility of Christ and Mary. Why does the Qurʾān chose to name the Romans when expressing solidarity with them, yet leave them unnamed when criticizing them? Could it be the case that this difference between naming the “Romans” and leaving them unnamed is somehow meant to show that the solidarity with the “Romans,” as declared expressis verbis in the Sūrat al-Rūm, concerns the entire Byzantine world whereas the sharp criticism in al-Māʾidah is not general in the same sense?
Link: https://doi.org/10.1515/jiqsa-2024-0001
—————————————————————
Tags: #Quran #Islam #History
⬜️⬛️
THE EXTENSION OF REALITY
THE EMERGENCE OF MIND-INDEPENDENT REALITY IN POSTCLASSICAL ISLAMIC PHILOSOPHY
By Bilal Ibrahim, Providence College
Avicenna’s distinction between external existence and mental existence is seminal to logic and philosophy in the Islamic tradition. This article examines philosophers who depart from Avicenna’s external-mental existence framework. They view the former as failing to support a general analysis of reality and truth, as mental existence is neither necessary nor sufficient for analyzing propositional truths, i.e., true propositions are true irrespective of “the very existence of minds” and “the perceptual acts of perceivers.” They propose that Avicenna’s semantics for categorical propositions needs revision, as there are true metathetic and hypothetical propositions, i.e., subject terms need not exist – in external reality or in a mind – for such propositions to be true. This counter-Avicennan current of thought articulates a third distinction in the analysis of reality, which focuses on the mind-independent nature of propositional content – particularly propositions with empty, hypothetical, or impossible subject terms – as a way to think generally about reality, in contrast to the Avicennan emphasis on the existential status of terms and essences. Notably, the analysis of mind-independent reality is supported by a novel semantics of “real” (ḥaqīqī) categorical propositions, which avoids external and mental existence conditions.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0957423924000134
—————————————————————
Tags: #Avicenna #Islam #Metaphysics #Epistemology #Truth
⬜️⬛️
MAD MAN, SLEEPER, AND FIRE AVICENNA ON THE PERCEPTION OF THE EXTERNAL
By Zhenyu Cai, Peking University
Avicenna is well-known for rejecting Aristotle’s dichotomy between perception and the intellect by introducing the so-called estimative power, which connects perception and the intellect. The estimative power is similar to sensory cognition because what is estimated is always mixed with the sensibles. Additionally, the proper object of estimation is the individualised macnā, which seems similar to the object of the intellect as the intelligible macnā. Given the special role of estimation, scholars have recently begun debating whether Avicenna has a conceptualist theory of perception. This article contributes to that debate by focusing on Avicenna’s discussions about the perception of externals in Al-taclīqāt. I argue for a reading that steers between Mohammad Azadpur’s conceptualist reading and Luis Farjeat’s anti-conceptualist reading. For Avicenna, the presence of the sensible form in a sensory power is non-conceptual, but the perceptual judgement exhibits a weak epistemic conceptualism.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0957423924000110
—————————————————————
Tags: #Avicenna #Islam #Metaphysics #Epistemology
⬜️⬛️
Is It Rational to Reject God?
By Pao-Shen Ho, Soochow University
According to the free will theodicy of hell, the damned agent freely chooses to suffer in hell, or equivalently, to reject God. Against this view, Thomas Talbott argues that it is impossible for the agent to freely reject God because doing so is not rational. The aim of this essay is to critically respond to Talbott’s argument that it is not rational to reject God, rather than offering a full defense of the free will theodicy of hell itself. Drawing on recent work on rationality, I argue that not only does Talbott’s argument commit the fallacy of equivocation, but its two premises are also indefensible. I also explain what the reasons are for rejecting God: when the agent’s happiness consists of an incoherent combination of attitudes, it is both structurally and substantively rational for her to reject God.
Link: https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16030270
—————————————————————
Tags: #God #Hell #Atheism
⬜️⬛️
Iranian Madrasa Historiographies on the Fate of Falsafa after Averroes: The Structure, Scope, and History of ‘Islamic Philosophy’ from Mīr Dāmād to ṬabāṬabāʾī and Āshtiyānī
By Hanif Amin Beidokhti, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich
Iranian philosophers train in a living tradition of falsafa that gives them a different perspective from that of modern European scholars. They call their profession philosophy, and philosophy for them is not a historical phenomenon, though it has a past. Contemporary falsafa has a narrative of its past, which I outline in this article, calling it the madrasa narrative. It is presented in the form of historiographies of falsafa, which, though less than a century old, form an extensive body of texts. After introducing this narrative, I focus on Mīr Dāmād’s (d. 1631) conception of the course of falsafa and his relation to his predecessors. I argue that he should be credited as the initiator of ‘Islamic philosophy’, both conceptually and terminologically. I emphasize the continuous line he draws linking himself to Fārābī (d. ca. 950-1) through Avicenna (d. 1037). Thereafter, I outline the formative contributions of Muḥammad Ḥusayn Ṭabāṭabāʾī (1904–81) in the contemporary practice of falsafa, and in historiography of Jalāl al-Dīn Āshtiyānī (1925–2005) who, together with Henry Corbin (1903–78), shaped the modern madrasa narrative. I show that Āshtiyānī’s historiographical effort was a reaction to what he considered Europeans’ unawareness of the continuity and vitality of falsafa in the Islamic East. I conclude with some observations on the scope, structure, and historiography of contemporary falsafa in Iran.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1093/jis/etaf002
—————————————————————
Tags: #Islam #History #Philosophy
⬜️⬛️
Reduction, Emergence and the Metaphysics in Science
By Carl Gillett, Northern Illinois University
Over the last century, working scientists have twice been gripped by reduction–emergence debates that they took to have a direct, and significant, impact on their research. These scientific discussions have revolved around apparently metaphysical issues about the structure of nature such as the extent of compositional relations and models/explanations, the existence of downward whole-to-part determination, and the character of the fundamental laws, among others. The centrality of compositional models/explanations to these debates, for example, is seen in the famous slogans of the rival views in these discussions. Various kinds of reductionists in the sciences have famously claimed “Wholes are nothing but their parts,” though they often mean very different things by this in distinct periods, while emergentists have contended that “Wholes are more than the sum of their parts” and, more recently, that “Parts behave differently in wholes.”
Link: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009083423
—————————————————————
Tags: #Metaphysics #Science #Reductionism
⬜️⬛️
Monotheistic Hindus, Idolatrous Muslims: Muḥammad Qāsim Nānautvī, Dayānanda Sarasvatī, and the Theological Roots of Hindu–Muslim Conflict in South Asia
By Fuad S. Naeem, University of St. Thomas
Contrary to popular notions of a perpetual antagonism between ‘Hinduism’ and ‘Islam’, played out on Indian soil over the centuries, this article examines the relatively recent origins of a Hindu–Muslim conflict in South Asia, situating it in the reconfigurations of ‘religion’ and religious identity that occurred under British colonial rule in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The multivalent and somewhat fluid categories of religious identification found in pre-modern India gave way to much more rigid and oppositional modern and colonial epistemic categories. While much has been written on how colonial policies and incipient Hindu and Muslim nationalisms shaped the contours of modern Hindu–Muslim conflict, little work has been done on the important role religious actors like Muslim and Hindu scholars and reformers played in shaping the discourse around what constituted Hinduism and Islam, and the relationship between the two, in the modern period. This study examines the first-known public theological debates between a Hindu scholar and a Muslim scholar, respectively, Swami Dayānanda Sarasvatī (1824–1883), founder of the reformist Arya Samaj and first exponent of a Hindu polemic against other religions, and Mawlānā Muḥammad Qāsim Nānautvī (1832–1880), co-founder of the seminary at Deoband and an important exponent of Islamic theological apologetics in modern South Asia, and how they helped shape oppositional modern Hindu and Muslim religious theologies. A key argument that Nānautvī contended with was Dayānanda’s claim that Islam is idolatrous, based on the contention that Muslims worship the Ka’ba, and thus, it is not a monotheistic religion, Hinduism alone being so. The terms of this debate show how polemics around subjects like monotheism and idolatry introduced by Christian missionaries under colonial rule were internalized, as were broader colonial epistemic categories, and developed a life of their own amongst Indians themselves, thus resulting in new oppositional religious identities, replacing more complex and nuanced interactions between Muslims and followers of Indian religions in the pre-modern period.
Link: https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16020256
—————————————————————
Tags: #Monotheism #Religion #Islam #Orientalism
⬜️⬛️
Monotheism and Miracle
By Eric Eve, Harris Manchester College
Monotheism implies a God who is active in creation. An author writing a novel provides a better analogy for God's creative activity than an artificer constructing a mechanism. A miracle is then not an interruption of the ordinary course of nature so much as a divine decision to do something out of the ordinary, and miracle is primarily a narrative category. We perceive as miracles events that are extraordinary while also fitting our understanding of divine purpose. Many miracle accounts may remain problematic, however, since recognizing that a given story purports to narrate a miracle does not determine whether the miracle occurred. This Elementweighs competing narratives. In doing so the understanding of the normal workings of nature will carry considerable weight. Nevertheless, there can be instances where believers may, from their own faith perspective, be justified in concluding that a miracle has occurred.
Link: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009386500
—————————————————————
Tags: #Monotheism #Miracle #Religion
