The relation between philosophy and religion or more correctly, the disputes between the philosophers and the theologians was one of the issues of interest not only among the intellectuals of classical Islam, but also among Ottoman...
moreThe relation between philosophy and religion or more correctly, the disputes between the philosophers and the theologians was one of the issues of interest not only among the intellectuals of classical Islam, but also among Ottoman intellectuals. This article examines one of the products of such interest. For this purpose, first, the author briefly gives a description of Tahāfut tradition, then, discusses Khojazāda’s methodology in his Tahāfut al-Falāsifah and finally, in order to understand the nature of Khojazāda’s discussions, focuses on three problems as examples, namely, whether God is the necessitating cause or a free agent, whether the world is eternal, and whether God knows particular things. The article concludes that Khojazāda’s work has many weakness. One of these weaknesses is that Khojazāda neglected to examine the works of the philosophers, preferring instead to rely on Ghazālī’s interpretation of their views. Another weakness is arguably that he hewed very close to Ghazālī’s presentation, often ignoring later discussions by both theologians and philosophers. Although Khojazāda pointed to some of the misunderstandings of Ghazālī on these issues, he could not go further and accept the positions of the philosophers.
