278 Anke von Kügelgen
from the early 17th or late 19th century^106 and two from the turn of the
19 th to the 20th century.^107
The work is divided into 44 arguments, all of which echo its leit-
motif, the refutation of the precedence of ratio over scripture in case
of their divergence. Binyamin Abrahamov has concisely summarized
them, and only some major points shall be mentioned. Ibn Taymiyya
questions the assumption that reason is the basis of tradition or of the
knowledge of its soundness; pointing to the numberless disagreements
about dogmas that are based on so-called rational proofs, he maintains
that multiply-transmitted reports constitute a necessary knowledge,
qualifies his adversaries’ use of the Arabic language as improper, and
distinguishes in the Koran and the Sunna between orally transmitted
(samʿī) and rational (ʿaqlī) proofs.^108 As shall be shown, Ibn Taymiyya
eventually aims to show that “clear reason” cannot contradict the
sound religious tradition, thereby dismissing his adversaries’ use and
understanding of reason.
The appearance of his leitmotif is always the beginning of a long
and vigorous attack on the metaphysical positions of philosophers
and kalām theologians. He therein displays a tremendous first-hand
knowledge not only of his forerunners’ refutations of falsafa among
the kalām theologians, but also of the works of the most prominent
Muslim philosophers, like al-Fārābī, Ibn Sīnā and Ibn Rushd.^109 This
106 Ibid., p. 45.
107 Ibid., pp. 33, 37.
108 Abrahamov, Binyamin: Ibn Taymiyya on the Agreement of Reason with Tra-
dition, in: The Muslim World 82 (1992), pp. 256–272. Nicholas Heer directly
confronted Ibn Taymiyya’s arguments with those of kalām theologians: The
Priority of Reason in the Interpretation of Scripture. Ibn Taymiyyah and the
Mutakallimun, in: Mustansir Mir (ed.): Literary Heritage of Classical Islam.
Arabic and Islamic Studies in Honor of James A. Bellamy, Princeton 1993,
pp. 181–195. Yahya Michot translated and commented upon the ninth of the
44 arguments (Michot, Vanités intellectuelles, pp. 597–617). Some of them are
reproduced in a programmatic manner by the Moroccan Islamist Muḥammad
Yatīm (b. 1956) (Yatīm, Muḥammad: Ibn Taymiyya wa-masʾalat al-ʿaql wal-
naql, in: al-Furqān 3 (1407/1987), pp. 16–24.) Ibn Taymiyya’s distinction
between rational and transmitted within the Koran and the Sunna has been
recently studied by Sait Özervarli: The Qurʾānic Rational Theology of Ibn
Taymiyya and His Criticism of the Mutakallimūn, in: Yossef Rapoport and
Shahab Ahmed (eds.): Ibn Taymiyya and His Times, Karachi 2010; I am grate-
ful to Yossef Rapoport for providing me with the article in press.
109 Laoust, Essai sur les doctrines sociales et politiques, pp. 84–86; Hallaq, Ibn
Taymiyya, p. xlv; see Darʾ taʿāruḍ al-ʿaql, vol. 11, “Fihris al-aʿlām” and “Fihris
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