How consistent is the takfir of the Peripatetic philosophers at the root of the opposition to Islamic philosophy?

After characterizing al-Kindi as the first Muslim philosopher, we state that the founding philosopher of Islamic philosophy was al-Farabi. We state that he brought philosophy back to its original homeland and in the context of the new system brought by the Prophet Muhammad, he read ancient cultures and brought a new perspective and built its philosophical foundations, and this is called the Peripatetic doctrine. We state that Ibn Sina developed this further and established an Eastern Philosophy, Hikmat al-Mashrikiyya, and that its representatives in Andalusia were distinguished minds such as Ibn Tufayl, Averroes, Ibn Bacca, and that these scholars had a significant impact on the enlightenment of the West, or rather, that ancient Greek philosophy was rediscovered with their interpretations. 

With respect to my professors Hüseyin Atay and Mehmed Bayrakdar

It is said that with al-Ghazali's takfir of Farabi and Ibn Sina for three issues, philosophy, that is, the deep contemplation of the God-universe-human connection, was marginalized in the Islamic world. 

According to Hüseyin Atay, philosophy in the Islamic world ended with al-Ghazali. According to Mehmed Bayrakdar, whom I also worked as an assistant, al-Ghazali may have had a partial influence, but it cannot be said that it ended with al-Ghazali, because after him, theology also started the process of philosophizing, theological/theological problems began to be discussed with philosophical concepts, and it became clear that the knowledge of those who do not know logic cannot be trusted. As we know, the aim of philosophy is tahsilu's-saade, that is, to ensure happiness, and Logic is the key to this, that is, miftahu's-saade. Moreover, it can be said that he indirectly contributed to bringing philosophy down to the people by writing a comprehensible text on Maqasid al-falasifa, the aims of philosophers. Because when we look at the socio-political conditions of the period in the context of the connection of ideas and events, beyond paying attention to the sociological dimensions of al-Ghazali's takfir, those who said why this takfir looked at his Maqasid al-falasifa. 

Ibn Rushd has already said that al-Ghazali was inconsistent in his work titled Tehafut al-Tahafut, the inconsistency of the philosophers. In Faslu'l-Makal, he said that these two philosophers were believers, but that the differences in their interpretations did not mean that they rejected the first proposition, that is, al-Ghazali, who said that their proofs were inconsistent, was also inconsistent, and that therefore, to disbelieve a believer would return to the speaker like a boomerang.

Whether this revived philosophical contemplation in the Islamic world, or at least diminished al-Ghazali's influence, is still being debated. But what I want to tell you here is that Peripateticism/peripateticism is the founding doctrine, but there is Ishraqism, which further developed it with criticisms, and then there is the Akberi doctrine, that is, the wahdat al-wujud philosophical/tasawwufi traditions.  Why is Islamic philosophy reduced to a single doctrine and the claim of takfir against the founding philosopher and the scholars who developed it spread to the whole field and create an anti-philosophy, this term is inadequate, an enemy of philosophy?

To what extent is it consistent to oppose philosophy through Peripateticism?

Let us look for the answer to this question through al-Ghazali: Al-Ghazali has a work that is known to everyone, regardless of whether they are interested in the theological, philosophical theological or Sufi perspectives of Islamic thought. al-Munkiz mine'de-Dalal (A Guide for the Confused, trans: M. Uyanık-Aygün Akyol, Ankara: Elis Publishing House 2020) It is a generally accepted judgment that the anti-philosophical views began to gain momentum with his acceptance of the Sufi perspective after he criticized the theological, philosophical and Batinite teachings in the context of the conceptions of truth and dismissed the philosophers. 

In fact, there are groups who claim that Munkız is a Sufi book in the sense that it avoids those who claim ittihad and hululul, that is, it considers the discourses of Sufis such as Hallac and Bistami as extreme interpretations. This image is complete when the translation is published with a green cover.  What if I say that al-Ghazali, who clearly made the distinction between the commons/people and the havas/elites, in his work Mishkat al-anwar, made sentences that were similar to the views of these two scholars whom he dismissed, and even went further, and moreover, he did not dismiss them here?

In addition, what about the similarities between his Maqasid al-falasifa and Ibn Sina's Danishname, which he denounced, and the similarities between the information in his treatise Maqamat al-arifin and his explanation of the state in al-Munkiz in which he states that he experienced the moment of timelessness and spacelessness once? What is the result of a comparative reading of the terminology he uses in his metaphysics of light in Mishkat with that used in the Peripatetic, Illuminationist and Wahdat al-Bodyist traditions? 

In other words, while al-Ghazzali's distinction in al-Munkiz between the intellectual and the Batinī interpretation and his experience of experiencing the moment of timelessness and spacelessness with "ittihat" while adopting the Sufi method is not consistent, in Mishkat al-Anwar he writes, "God is manifested in His essence, with His essence, for His essence. Therefore, the hijab (veil) is for the ashamed (the veiled). And those who are ashamed among the people are in three groups." What about the fact that he analyzed the seekers of truth in three groups with a different language and avoided a marginalizing and takfirizing style to the maximum extent?  

Aside from the fact that he even counts philosophers and Mutazilite scholars in the category of those who are only in contact with light, albeit to a lesser extent, it is also said that he takes a wahdat/i wujudist stance in his metaphysics of light in Mishkat, while finding the Sufi approach, which can be called ittihad and hululism, wrong in Munkız. So much so that he states that the one who sits on the throne of Wahdaniyyat and from there orders the layers of the heavens can say "Ene'l Hak", "I glorify myself". He emphasizes that these statements need interpretation, but that he will not say more because he does not think the reader will tolerate more than that. 

To summarize, those who identify Islamic philosophy with Peripateticism and are anti-philosophical should also state their position with the teachings of Ishraqism and the Akbarian tradition, that is, the doctrines of Wahdat al-wujud.  

Originality of Islamic Philosophy

It is important that Muslim philosophers (as we mentioned in our previous article) critically examined different readings of ancient philosophical accumulations and put forward their own conception of God-universe and human beings, and especially with Farabi, the effort to establish an ethical-political system by transferring this to society through civil sciences (fiqh-theology-ethics) is important. (M. Uyanık, A. Akyol, Islamic Philosophy: Introduction (Thematic Reading), Elis publishing house, 2020, 766 vd),

These distinguished minds critically analyzed the works of their predecessors and started the formation of a tradition that we can call shukuk/doubts.  You already know about the criticism within themselves, the criticism of Farabi and Ibn Sina by al-Ghazali and his criticism by Averroes and the formation of a tradition of Tehafut (inconsistency) that was carried on to the Ottoman Empire.  In addition to these, they were the first philosophers to create the tradition of questions (hevamil) and answers (shawamil) directed by one philosopher to another philosopher, where they directed very serious and harsh criticisms at each other. Their question and answer discussions with Ibn Sina and Biruni have become classics in the history of Islamic philosophy.  If we say that the first example of this in the West was between Newton and Leibniz, the issue of authenticity becomes clear.  So much so that when Ibn Sina's monumental work al-Kanun Fi't-Tıbb was translated into Latin, some say that it triggered the beginning of modern medicine in the West, that it was the "Bible of medicine". Again, the Indians built an entire school of medicine, which is still practiced today, on Ibn Sina's Kanun. In short, many authorities consider Ibn Sina and Biruni to be the most scientific minds of the period between antiquity and the Renaissance, if not of modern times. Therefore, without knowing Islamic philosophy with all its currents, in Etienne Gilson's words, the philosophy of the Middle Ages cannot be known, and without knowing it, philosophy cannot be known. (Mehmet Vural, İslam Felsefesi Tarihi, Elis Yayınevi 2019:477-493, Starr, S. Frederick. The Lost Enlightenment: The Golden Age of Central Asia from the Arab Conquests to Timur, trans: Yusuf Selman İnanç, (Istanbul: Kronik Kitap, 2019, 46) 

If what you call modern philosophy or Western philosophy are, as Whitehad says, footnotes to Plato, the fact that the Muslim philosophers who read and interpreted them in their own time triggered the idea of the Renaissance in the West, it is imperative to emphasize the originality of Islamic philosophy and what it says and will say today. As the late Fuat Sezgin said, "Western Civilization is the child of Islamic Civilization". Attention to those who call themselves anti-philosophers.