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Algazel on the Soul: A Critical Edition

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 February 2016

Eva St. Clair
Eva St. Clair*
Affiliation:
Berkeley, California
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Extract

Modern scholars of medieval philosophy have had access to the work of Abū Ḥâmid Muhammad al-Ghāzalī (1058–1111) since 1933, when Joseph T. Muckle published an edition of the great Muslim theologian's Maqāsid al-falāsifa (“The Opinions of the Philosophers”). In this work, al-Ghāzalī (known to the West as Algazel) summarized ideas proposed by Avicenna (940–1036) in his Danesh Nameh. Algazel's Maqāsid al-falāsifa was composed of three parts, the Metaphysics, Physics, and Logic; medieval authors read and referred to Algazel's work accordingly, as three separate works.

Type
Research Article
Information
Traditio , Volume 60 , 2005 , pp. 47 - 84
Copyright
Copyright © Fordham University 

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References

1 Indeed, the Metaphysics, Physics, and Logic were not always copied together, and were always presented as three different, complete works in the manuscripts in which they survive.Google Scholar The editor is greatly indebted to Rega Wood, Neil Lewis, and Jennifer Ottman for their contributions to the preparation of this article and edition. The edition has particularly benefited from Neil Lewis's critical acumen.Google Scholar

2 Notes in the manuscripts and elsewhere designate Gundissalinus's collaborator as “Master John,” whom Charles Lohr states was not John of Spain. John of Spain was indeed involved in the translation project at Toledo under Bishop Raimond through which many important works came to the West, but he would have been a very old man by the time Gundissalinus was translating Algazel's works. Lohr, Charles H., “Logica Algazelis: Introduction and Critical Text,” Traditio 21 (1965): 223–90, at 228.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

3 Algazel, , Physics 4.2.3.Google Scholar

4 Ibid., 4.2.2.Google Scholar

5 The common Italian abbreviation for qui during the thirteenth century when V was copied is a q with a bar through the descender, but in many other regions that abbreviation was meant to represent quod. It is easy to confuse the two or forget the Italian origin of one's manuscript.Google Scholar

6 Algazel, , Physics 4.3.4. Google Scholar

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9 BNF 14700 employs this convention frequently, often adding an expunged i or o at the end of a line to keep columns even.Google Scholar

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11 Prepared by examining common variants among the six manuscripts for all of Tractates Quartus. Distance from θ is approximately equal to the quality/dating of the manuscript. A dotted line connecting two manuscripts indicates that the lower manuscript was possibly corrected by referencing the higher manuscript or a similar tradition.Google Scholar

12 Besides the fact that he “improves” the text, he is copying at a later date from an inferior exemplar; consequently, his text is full of homoioteleuta and numerous similar errors of which he was either unaware or accidentally introduced himself.Google Scholar

13 Algazel, , Physics 4.5.10: “Una est eorum quae sunt prima et vera ad quae inducit eum natura eius ut imprimatur ei sine inquisitione.” A plural eis would obscure the meaning, as it would be unclear as onto what besides the intellect the forms could possibly be imprinting themselves.Google Scholar

14 Algazel, , Physics 4.5.23: “Et sic caro pars partes sunt caro et os et sanguis quorum nullum est caput.” Again, this is a comparison, and sicut is simply the wrong word to use here.Google Scholar

15 Algazel, , Physics 4.5.11: “Tunc enim non est quasi sapiens oblitus cogniti, sed potens scire cum voluerit.” V supplies non, while AENOP omit it. But the comparison makes more sense with the non, which is why I left it in.Google Scholar

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17 A new hand begins numbering — the folio numbers given here continue to use the older system, according to Schum's catalogue.Google Scholar

18 The table of contents is incorrect about several works of Alkindi and does not mention Thomas Aquinas at all.Google Scholar

19 This is the first work that does not have headers on the recto pages. From here on out, there are no more headers, but there are still titles written in a later hand at the top or side of the page on which the work begins.Google Scholar

20 Lacombe distinguishes this as a separate work of Gundissalinus, but the manuscript does not, and I cannot find an incipit for it.Google Scholar

1 Cf. supra 4.1.1.Google Scholar

2 Margo sinistra male secatur in P, fol. 162ra .Google Scholar

3 Cf. infra 4.5.19.Google Scholar

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6 N: nota marginalis in secunda manu: “nota?” cum lineis cinctis.Google Scholar

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9 Alhacen, , Libro de aspectibus VI, 18–39 (ed. Smith, , vol. I, 20–21).Google Scholar

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11 Cf. supra, 4.3.9.Google Scholar

12 Cf. supra 4.3.7.Google Scholar

13 Cf. supra 4.5.2.Google Scholar

14 Cf. supra 4.3.6, 9.Google Scholar

15 Isti dativi eveniunt de arabico.Google Scholar

16 Cf. supra 4.5.1, 4.Google Scholar

17 Hic “secunda” refert ad secundam speciem (species formarum intelligibilium).Google Scholar

18 Algazel, , Metaph. I. i. (ed. Muckle, , 6).Google Scholar

19 Cf. Blund, Iohannes, IX. 101 (ed. Callus, and Hunt, 92) “Et ideo virtus activa ethicae subiacet speculationi, quoniam ab ea perficiuntur mores,” quamquam ethica hic est absurdum.Google Scholar

20 Cf. supra 4.5.26–27.Google Scholar

21 Cf. supra 4.5.30.Google Scholar

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