“Philosophy in the Hellenistic Period”

20-21 September 2017

Alexandria Center for Hellenistic Studies
Bibliotheca Alexandrina
Al-Farabi: Harmonization between the Greek Legacy of Philosophy
and the Islamic Principles.
Written by: Nermine Sami Abd Elfattah

Summary:
This paper reviews the originality of Al-Farabi‟s achievement in harmonizing between the
Greek Legacy of Philosophy and Islamic principles, his attempt should be appreciated even if
the scholar did not reach the perfection level in such point. Al-Farabi was the first philosopher
who sought to confront, and to bridge the Islamic religion, particularly the political philosophy
that was revealed through a prophet-legislator (Prophet Muhammed PBUH), and the Classical
Greek thought. His work presented such tolerance and openness of Islam to all kind of science
and the world intellectual movement.

Al-Farabi: Abu Nasr Muhammed Ibn Muhammed Ibn Tarkhan Al-Farabi, he was born in
Turkestan, circa 258 A.H./A.D.870. It is generally referred to him in the Arabic sources as the
Second Teacher (al-Mu„allim al-Tha¯ ni) after Aristotle and with a good reason, since he has
made a significant contribution to logic, and occupies a unique position in the history of
philosophy, to the link between Greek philosophy and Islamic thought. He showed a great
interest in Aristotle‟s works in logic, by producing it in his book “Introduction to Logic‟. In
addition, Al Farabi wrote commentaries on “Aristotle's Physics”, “Meteorology”, and “De
Coelo et Mundo‟. Therefore he gained the reputation as one of the world’s great intellectual
since he was not just philosopher but logician, Musician, and major political scientist.

“A single scholar of religion is more powerful against the Devil than a thousand devout
individuals.”, is a hadith that could briefly represent the mentality of Muslim thinkers such as
Al-Farabi, who realized the importance of education, thinking, and logic, and how to apply all
of them in philosophy to reach the reality in order to understand and answer all questions that
could rise up concerning universe, creator, life, death and sciences. But there are much of the

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debates to be concerned about Al-Farabi’s attempt in harmonizing between the Plato and
Aristotle’s philosophies, and whether he was aware of their differences or if they were
important! His works carried ideas that might have been discussed by earlier philosophers but
his originality is in simplifying issues and chose what suits his audience, being aware of what
could be acceptable and rejected in different social circles which remarks his intelligence.

Al-Farabi concludes that the true philosophy was handed by the Greeks "from Plato and
Aristotle only". They did not said only what philosophy is but also explained the ways to it, and
how to reestablish it when it becomes confused or extinct. The Aristotelian bias is naturally the
characteristic of Al-Farabi as a whole, which controls the manner in which he discovers the
philosophy of Plato. The main concept of Al-Farabi is that the philosophy is a demonstrative
science, the study of beings in so far as they are existent beings; al notions of Aristotle have
served the aim of Al-Farabi to reach answers. But it must be pointed out here that Al-Farabi
really wanted to harmonize the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle with a great awareness of their
differences but the philosophy of all three Philosophers, Plato, Aristotle and Al-Farabi is the
same, at least in purpose and intent. The Platonism which Al-Farabi offered was as the
Philosophy of Plato but was strained through an Aristotelian sieve and then presented as if the
broth were never once a stew of flesh and bone.

It is notably that Al-Farabi imposes a correlation between speculative philosophy and

practical philosophy, the two are of necessity for the man's happiness in this life, of which
became a characteristic feature of subsequent Islamic thought, in which ethical, religious and
eschatological preoccupations appeared so large. For instance to answer questions about the
Cosmology, Relation of God to the World, Eternity of Matter and Eternity of the World, and
Dualism of Good and Evil, Topics related directly to sciences that are neither sensible nor
intelligible, and which required another sciences to be united with philosophy to find such a
perceived evidence.

The foundation of Islamic Neo-Platonism is credited to Al-Farabi and to be added to his

originality among the other intellectuals of his time, a real founder due to his writing of the first
systematic exposition in Arabic of the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle, in addition to revive
the study of Neo-Platonism in the East with the formulation in his best- known book, “the
Opinions of the Inhabitants of the Virtuous City”. This treatise is inspired by the same utopian
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ideal as Plato's Republic but is essentially an exposition of the emanations worldview of
Plotinus. It had hardly any impact on political developments in Islam, but it did inspire
subsequent writers on political philosophy such as Ibn Bajja.