Philosophy declined in the Sunni world after al-Ghazali, and his
criticism of philosophy certainly accelerated this decline. Nearly a century
later, Ibn Rushd
(Averroes) made desperate efforts to resist the trend by refuting al-Ghazali's Tahafut
in his Tahafut
al-tahafut (The Incoherence of the Incoherence) and Fasl al-maqal
(The Decisive Treatise), but he could not stop it. Philosophy was gradually
absorbed into Sufism and was further developed in the form of mystical
philosophy, particularly in the Shi'ite world (see Mystical philosophy in Islam).
In the Sunni world also, Aristotelian logic was incorporated into theology and
Sufism was partially represented philosophically. In all this, al-Ghazali's
influence was significant.
Ghazali committed himself seriously to Sufism in his later life,
during which time he produced a series of unique works on Sufism and ethics
including Mizan al-'amal
(The Balance of Action), composed just before retirement, Ihya' 'ulum
al-din, his magnum opus written after retirement, Kitab
al-arba'in fi usul al-din (The Forty Chapters on the Principles of Religion),
Kimiya'-yi sa'adat (The Alchemy of Happiness), Mishkat al-anwar
(The Niche of the Lights) and others. The ultimate goal of humankind
according to Islam is salvation in paradise, which is depicted in the Qur'an
and Traditions as various sensuous pleasures and joy at the vision of God. The
greatest joy for al-Ghazali, however, is the seeing of God in the intellectual
or spiritual sense of the beatific vision. In comparison with this, sensuous
pleasures are nothing. However, they remain necessary for the masses who cannot
reach such a vision.
Resurrection for Ibn Sina means each
person's death - the separation of the soul from the body - and the rewards and
punishments after the 'resurrection' mean the pleasures and pains which the
soul tastes after death. The soul, which is in contact with the active
intellect through intellectual and ethical training during life, is liberated
from the body by death and comes to enjoy the bliss of complete unity with the
active intellect. On the other hand, the soul that has become accustomed to
sensual pleasures while alive suffers from the pains of unfulfilled desires,
since the instrumental organs for that purpose are now lost. Al-Ghazali calls
death 'the small resurrection' and accepts the state of the soul after death as
Ibn Sina describes. On the other hand, the beatific vision of God by the elite
after the quickening of the bodies, or 'the great resurrection', is
intellectual as in the view of the philosophers. The mystical experience (fana')
of the Sufi is a foretaste of the real vision of God in the hereafter.
A similar influence of philosophy is also apparent in
al-Ghazali's view of human beings. Human beings consist of soul and body, but
their essence is the soul. The human soul is a spiritual substance totally
different from the body. It is something divine (amr ilahi), which makes
possible human knowledge of God. If the soul according to al-Ghazali is an incorporeal
substance occupying no space (as Ibn Sina implies, though he carefully avoids
making a direct statement to that effect), then al-Ghazali's concept of the
soul is quite different from the soul as 'a subtle body' as conceived by
theologians at large. According to al-Ghazali, the body is a vehicle or an
instrument of the soul on the way to the hereafter and has various faculties to
maintain the bodily activities. When the main faculties of appetite, anger and
intellect are moderate, harmonious and well-balanced, then we find the virtues
of temperance, courage, wisdom and justice. In reality, however, there is
excess or deficiency in each faculty, and so we find various vicious
characteristics. The fundamental cause for all this is love of the world (see Soul in Islamic philosophy).
The purpose of religious exercises is to rectify these evil
dispositions, and to come near to God by 'transforming them in imitation of
God's characteristics' (takhalluq bi-akhlaq Allah). This means
transforming the evil traits of the soul through bodily exercises by utilizing
the inner relationship between the soul and the body. Al-Ghazali here makes
full use of the Aristotelian theory of the golden mean, which he took mainly
from Ibn Miskawayh.
In order to maintain the earthly existence of the body as a vehicle or an
instrument of the soul, the mundane order and society are necessary. In this
framework, the traditional system of Islamic law, community and society are
reconsidered and reconstructed.
The same is also true of al-Ghazali's cosmology. He divides the
cosmos into three realms: the world of mulk (the phenomenal world), the
world of malakut (the invisible world) and the world of jabarut
(the intermediate world). He takes this division from the Sufi theorist Abu
Talib al-Makki, although he reverses the meanings of malakut and jabarut.
The world of malakut is that of God's determination, a world of angels free
from change, increase and decrease, as created once spontaneously by God. This
is the world of the Preserved Tablet in heaven where God's decree is inscribed.
The phenomenal world is the incomplete replica of the world of malakut,
which is the world of reality, of the essence of things. The latter is in some
respects similar to the Platonic world of Ideas, or Ibn Sina's world of
intelligibles. The only difference is that the world of malakut is
created once and for all by God, who thereafter continues to create moment by
moment the phenomenal world according to his determination. This is a major
difference from the emanationist deterministic world of philosophy. Once the
divine determination is freely made, however, the phenomenal world changes and
evolves according to a determined sequence of causes and effects. The
difference between this relationship and the philosophers' causality lies in
whether or not the relation of cause and effect is necessary. This emphasis on
causal relationship by al-Ghazali differs from the traditional Ash'arite
occasionalism.
The Sufis in their mystical experience, and ordinary people in
their dreams, are allowed to glimpse the world of the Preserved Tablet in
heaven, when the veil between that world and the soul is lifted momentarily.
Thus they are given foreknowledge and other forms of supernatural knowledge.
The revelation transmitted by the angel to the prophets is essentially the
same; the only difference is that the prophets do not need any special
preparation. From the viewpoint of those given such special knowledge of the
invisible world, says al-Ghazali, the world is the most perfect and best
possible world. This optimism gave rise to arguments and criticism even in his
lifetime, alleging that he was proposing a Mu'tazilite or philosophical
teaching against orthodox Ash'arism. He certainly says in his theological works
that it is not incumbent upon God to do the best for humans; however, this does
not mean that God will not in fact do the best of his own free will. Even so,
behind al-Ghazali's saying that God does so in actuality, we can see the
influence of philosophy and Sufism.
