direction of explicit proofs and conceptual analysis. More subtle arguments
were added in the next centuries, especially in the AshÀarite lineage (al-Baqil-
lani, al-Juwayni, al-Ghazali); for instance, the proof that if an object (the
world) has particular characteristics but could have had others, there must be
something (God) which caused it to be particularized (Davidson, 1987: 174–
178). This line of argument, foreshadowing Leibniz’s principle of sufficient
reason, was developed by al-Juwayni in the mid-1000s. Further subtleties arose
as the creationists debated Aristoteleans over the eternity of the world. Al-
Farabi, Ibn Sina, and later Ibn Rushd (Averroës) responded to kalam by
distinguishing among different types of infinities and infinite regresses (David-
son, 1987: 127–143). Ibn Sina broke ground beyond these cosmological proofs
by arguing on the basis of analysis of the concepts of necessary and possible
being.^16 By the time of al-Ghazali (al-Juwayni’s pupil), it had become possible
to point out that even a proof of the existence of a creator or first cause does
not prove its unity or incorporeality, and that philosophy comes up against
epistemological limits beyond which it must cede to religious authority.- The payoff of this accumulation of arguments is not only in the philoso-
phies of Ibn Sina and al-Ghazali; it is also already found in al-Baqillani, the
first systematizer of the AshÀarite position. In order to undergird his time-
atomism and his proofs of God and creation, al-Baqillani set forth a theory of
knowledge. He divided knowledge into God’s eternal knowledge and creatures’
knowledge, and the latter into what is known through the senses, through
discourse, or authoritatively through history or revelation. Among necessary
knowledge he included knowledge of one’s own existence; here we have the
“cogito ergo sum,” but al-Baqillani did not separate its indubitability from
that of other sensory knowledge. Al-Baqillani’s epistemology is uncritical and
not very sophisticated. But the emergence of epistemology is itself a break-
through. Further AshÀarite systematizers in this lineage, such as al-Baghdadi
(167 in Figure 8.2) and al-Juwayni, also now based their expositions on an
epistemology. The major conceptual ingredients for more abstract and critical
philosophy were in place, on which was built the creativity of Ibn Sina and
al-Ghazali.
The ShiÀite Alliance and the United Front of Heterodoxies
The 900s mark a turning point in the intellectual and political history of Islam
and in their connecting link, religious politics. Religious factions lined up for
a power showdown. The large number of Sunni legal schools had winnowed
down to a few main schools of law; the earlier struggle between hadith and
QurÁan as scriptural basis was now resolved by inclusion. On the ShiÀite side,
the old factional opposition, once fragmented among many contenders, became
414 •^ Intellectual Communities: Western Paths