The Curse of Philosophy 337
to its summit in a unique attempt to establish a uniquely Islamic log-
ic.^35 In the view of the Muslim authors who dealt with this topic, Ibn
Taymiyya undertakes the task without falling like al-Ghazālī into the
trap of philosophy. Ultimately derived from the sacred texts of Islam,
i. e. the Koran and Sunna, Ibn Taymiyya’s alternatives to Aristotelian
logic confirm, thus, the jurists’ judgment that whoever studies logic is
a heretic (man tamanṭaq tazandaq).^36
The core of Ibn Taymiyya’s critique of Aristotle’s logic is his denial
of the logicians’ claim that the “true definition” (al-ḥadd al-ḥaqīqī)
is the only way to conceptually capture the quiddity of an existent
(taṣawwur al-māhiyya).^37 Such a definition consists essentially of two
elements: 1) the essential attributes which are common (al-dhātiyya al-
mushtaraka) between the existent and other existents of the same genus
(jins); and 2) the attributes which are common between the existent and
its species (nawʿ) and which distinguish a specific existent from other
existents (al-dhātiyya al-mumayyiza), i. e. the difference (al-faṣl).^38
He furthermore argues that such a definition is either impossible or
extremely difficult to develop, which makes definitions actually use-
less for the perception of truth.^39 For him, existents are too complicat-
ed to be conceptually captured through such insufficient and superfi-
cial logical constructions; natural beings should, rather, be investigated
rationally and empirically. This is, actually, what Muslim scholars after
Ibn Taymiyya failed to do, according to critical contemporary Muslim
authors.^40 However, Ibn Taymiyya considers the definition useful in
distinguishing the definiendum from other similar things. Definitions,
thus, essentially resemble names; they do not lead to the conception of
existents, but merely serve as “reminders”.^41 Ibn Taymiyya is, thus, a
nominalist.^42
35 Ibid., p. 148.
36 Ibid., p. 169.
37 Ibn Taymiyya, al-Radd, p. 46/5. See Aristotle: Topica et Sophistici Elenchi, edit-
ed by Sir William David Ross, Oxford 1979, p. 5.
38 Ibn Taymiyya, al-Radd, p. 47/5.
39 Ṭabaṭabāʾī, al-Mufakkirūn, p. 94; Ibn Taymiyya, al-Radd, p. 50/9.
40 ʿAbd al-Rāziq, Khamsa, p. 125; Ṭabaṭabāʾī, al-Mufakkirūn, p. 98.
41 Ṭabaṭabāʾī, al-Mufakkirūn, 98; Ibn Taymiyya, al-Radd, p. 84/43. Ibn Taymiyya’s
views continue the tradition of Arab grammarians; see von Kügelgen, Ibn
Taymīyas Kritik an der aristotelischen Logik, pp. 187–188.
42 Qadir, An Early Islamic Critic, pp. 499–501. See the concise discussion of this
subject in von Kügelgen, Ibn Taymīyas Kritik an der aristotelischen Logik,
pp. 187–192.
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