254 Anke von Kügelgen
(Īsāghūjī) and al-Kātibī’s^4 treatise on some logical questions (al-Risāla
al-Shamsiyya) respectively were to become the most often-copied and
annotated handbooks. Another common feature was the adoption
of philosophical terminology, categories and concepts in their own
writings.^5 The extent of adoption differed, however, from scholar to
scholar. Philosophical notions were thus often modified and harmo-
nized with theological and mystical dogmata.^6 Ibn Taymiyya was not
only well-familiar with their works,^7 but was also in direct or indirect
touch with several of their pupils, among them Naṣr al-Dīn al-Manbijī
(d. 719/1319–20), a powerful Sufi Shaykh who propagated the doc-
trines of mystical union according to the teachings of Ibn al-ʿArabī
(d. 638/1240) and Ibn Sabʿīn and provoked Ibn Taymiyya’s banishment
from Damascus in 1305 and his subsequent imprisonment in Egypt.^8
In the penultimate decade of his life, Ibn Taymiyya took up his pen
Charles Burnett (ed.): Glosses and Commentaries on Aristotelian Logical Texts.
The Syriac, Arabic and Medieval Latin Traditions, London 1993, p. 63, n. 161);
Gutas, Dimitri: The Study of Arabic Philosophy in the Twentieth Century. An
Essay on the Historiography of Arabic Philosophy, in: British Journal of Middle
Eastern Studies 29 (2002), pp. 5–25, here 15–16; İzgi, Cevat: Osmanlı Medrese-
lerinde İlim, Istanbul 1997, vol. 1, pp. 164, 168–174.
4 Street, Arabic Logic, pp. 247, 252–256.
5 Gutas, The Study of Arabic Philosophy, pp. 6–7, 13, 15–17 et passim; on p. 7 he
presents an “outline of Arabic Philosophy (IX–XVIIIc.)” in which he shows that
philosophy was vivid during the whole period, with different types of “Avicennism”
as the dominant directions; Gutas, Dimitri: The Heritage of Avicenna. The Golden
Age of Arabic Philosophy, 1000–ca. 1350, in: Jules Janssens and Daniel de Smet
(eds.): Avicenna and His Heritage. Acts of the International Colloquium, Leuven –
Louvain-la-Neuve, September 8–11, 1999, Leuven 2002, pp. 82–97, here 89–97.
6 Griffel, Frank: Apostasie und Toleranz im Islam. Die Entwicklung zu al-Ghazālīs
Urteil gegen die Philosophie und die Reaktionen der Philosophen, Leiden, Boston
and Cologne 2000, pp. 341–353.
7 See Ibn Taymiyya: Darʾ taʿāruḍ al-ʿaql wal-naql, ed. by Muḥammad Rashād
Sālim, Riyadh 1399–1400/1979–1980, “Fihris al-aʿlām”, s. v.; and below, chapters
9–11.
8 Laoust, Henri: Essai sur les doctrines sociales et politiques de Takī-d-dīn Aḥmad
Ibn Taimīya, canoniste Ḥanbalite. Né à Ḥarrān en 661/1262, mort à Damas en
728/1328; thèse pour le doctorat, Cairo 1939, pp. 128–132; Bori, Caterina: Ibn
Taymiyya. Una vita esemplare; analisi delle fonti classiche della sua biografia, in:
Rivista degli Studi Orientali 76 (2003), pp. 131–132. While in custody in Alexandria
in 1309/1310 he met several disciples of the Maghrebian philosophical, mystical
and juridical schools; see Laoust, Henri: La biographie d’Ibn Taymīya d’après Ibn
Kathīr, in: Bulletin d’études orientales 9 (1942), pp. 115–162, here 144–146; Laoust,
Henri: L’influence d’Ibn Taymiyya, in: Alford T. Welch and Pierre Cachia (eds.):
Islam. Past Influence and Present Challenge, New York 1979, pp. 15–33, here p. 16.
Brought to you by | Nanyang Technological University
Authenticated