Pour Hassan: discuss and criticism the various horizons of philosophers’ ideas

IBNA: Lecturer and author of Islamic philosophy and faculty member of Allameh Tabatabai University said in an interview with Iran Book News Agency (IBNA): the number of philosophy histories written by Muslims, is not low. The Philosophy History by "M. M. Sharif", “Seyed Hussein Nasr", "Hana Alfakhori" and "Majied Fakhri" are amongst them.

He added: perhaps these books are useful as they present a report on philosophers’ lives and ideas, but the important point about these books is that none of them have an analytical approach to philosophy. Therefore, through reading these works, one cannot obtain the impacts of the social and political conditions on the philosophers’ ideas and the reasons behind their thinking and attitudes formation as well.

Pour Hassan continued: This works are merely a handful of historical reports and do not provide us with an analysis on the significant and influential orientations of Islamic philosophers. For example, within these works, there is nothing about whys of the Muslim philosophers’ separation from Greek idea and its criticism by some philosophers like Sohrevardi. Most of ideas of Farabi and Avicenna should be interpreted based on Iranian, Shiite and Bateni thinking, whereas these points have been mentioned in none of the philosophy histories written by Muslims.

He knew the three-volume book entitled: "The Adventure of Philosophical Thought in the Muslim World" by Ibrahimi Dinani as -to some extent- an exceptional which enjoys the analytical approach and said: More than anything else, this book analyzes ideas rather than paying attention to the reasons behind the formation of those ideas and the impacts of social and political conditions on the philosophers as well.

The first chapter of the book, "We and The History of Islamic Philosophy” written by Davri Ardakani takes also an analytical approach toward this philosophical tradition. With this interpretation, however we see that lots of important analytical issues have still remained unexplored.

Several books should be written about various aspects of every individual philosopher’s thought. We have to be able to investigate and analyze the different aspects of Avicenna's thought in10 independent analytical books.

Regarding the reasons behind the lack of analytical approach toward philosophical historiography he said: the philosophy histories written by Muslims, philosophies, enjoy mainly a reportage methodology and background. Writing an analytical history of philosophy require some back grounds. For example, several books should be written about various aspects of every individual philosopher’s thought. We have to be able to investigate and analyze the different aspects of Avicenna's thought in10 independent analytical books. In the history of philosophy cannot possibly do such a thing, but if so, writing such works would serve as a strong and powerful support for these works.

Pour Hassan then presented a description about the function of domestic insight to the Islamic philosophy and said: demystifying means to understand how the previous philosophers’ thoughts can work for Iranian today's civilization. For example, in this approach we can work on why and how Sohrevardi supported from the Iranian and Shiite thoughts. If we are to revive philosophy within today’s modern Iranian civilization, then the rationality elements of Farabi and Avicenna can help us with our contemporary lives.

The lecturer and author of Islamic philosophy did not accept that the philosophy histories so far written by the Orientalists are necessarily the only resources to be used by researchers and said: I reject the assumption that Muslims’ understanding of Islamic philosophy is exactly the same as those of orientalists, rather we have a philosophical understanding of ourselves.

Considering the major difference between the philosophy histories of Orientalists and of Muslims he said: Orientalists consider the Islamic philosophers just as the mere followers of Greek philosophy who has no innovation of their own selves. Let alone, they even think that the Islamic philosophers’ innovations- if there were any -are originated from Greek ones. In fact, they do not accept the authenticity and originality of innovation in Islamic philosophy, and ignore indeed about the importance of Shiite thoughts in philosophy. Orientalists also call Islamic philosophy Arabic, while it were Iranians who more than any other nations have all the time shouldered the border of this version of philosophy in the region.