Abstract:
The dissolution of the Western-dominated Postwar Order, and the Eurocentric myths that sustain it, presents a unique opportunity to ponder an old question posed by every new generation: How can philosophy, which Islamic and ancient Greek learning traditions have long defined as the pursuit of “wisdom,” resume its millennial civilizing role? This paper looks beyond passing political events to reconsider why philosophy was viewed in this role. As different as al-Fārābī, Ibn Sīnā, Ibn Khaldūn, Mullā Ṣadrā, Hegel and Heidegger are from each other, they all approached the question of civilization philosophically by way of the fundamental question of beingness (MAWJŪDIYYA) and existence (WUJŪD). Moreover, they strove for “completeness” of thinking with the “practical,” where, however, they resisted the temptation to reduce man to his practical or biological functions. Given the magnitude of the present challenges we all face, no dialogue across cultural boundaries can ignore the caution with which philosophical tradition has laid out the terms of this completeness in being
The dissolution of the Western-dominated Postwar Order, and the Eurocentric myths that sustain it, presents a unique opportunity to ponder an old question posed by every new generation: How can philosophy, which Islamic and ancient Greek learning traditions have long defined as the pursuit of “wisdom,” resume its millennial civilizing role? This paper looks beyond passing political events to reconsider why philosophy was viewed in this role. As different as al-Farabi, Ibn Sina, Ibn Khaldun, Mulla Sadra, Hegel and Heidegger are from each other, they all approached the question of civilization philosophically by way of the fundamental question of beingness (mawjudiyya) and existence (wujud). Moreover, they strove for “completeness” of thinking with the “practical,” where, however, they resisted the temptation to reduce man to his practical or biological functions. Given the magnitude of the present challenges we all face, no dialogue across cultural boundaries can ignore the caution with which philosophical tradition has laid out the terms of this completeness in being.
Machine summary:
in a Post-Western World Anthony Shaker Received: 09/07/2020 | Accepted: 28/09/2020 Abstract The dissolution of the Western-dominated Postwar Order, and the Eurocentric myths that sustain it, presents a unique opportunity to ponder an old question posed by every new generation: How can philosophy, which Islamic and ancient Greek learning traditions have long defined as the pursuit of “wisdom,” resume its millennial civilizing role?
As different as al-Fārābī, Ibn Sīnā, Ibn Khaldūn, Mullā Ṣadrā, Hegel and Heidegger are from each other, they all approached the question of civilization philosophically by way of the fundamental question of beingness (MAWJŪDIYYA) and existence (WUJŪD).
Dr. Hao Wang, one of the most eminent Western defenders of Analytic philosophy, ranks modern philosophers’ search for a comprehensive view of the world alongside what he sees as a “universal wish to unify knowledge and action (or theory and practice in the political domain)” (Hao Wang, 1988, 41).
Whatever their differences, Heidegger and Hegel, al-Fārābī and Ibn Sīnā, Ibn Khaldūn and Mullā Ṣadrā all approached the question of man’s being in the world, not through the beings investigated in the positive sciences but through beingness (mawjūdiyya) in respect to both the permanence and movements of being.
Al-Fārābī was the first to work out a concept of civilization (ʿumrān) and “human settlement” (madaniyya) as man’s mode of existence within the inquiry into beingness, the classic subject-matter of the First Philosophy.
Man happens to share the attribute of wisdom with the (Supreme) First Existent, who nevertheless alone intellects His Essence and thereby possesses the permanent knowledge of the best of things.