Notes:
1) Majāl tadāwulī (“discursive field”) is defined as the components of a certain body of knowledge or science as shared by a section of society at a certain time. This includes their language, social worldviews, and political-religious beliefs. This shared knowledge constitutes part of the embedding culture. See Taha’s work, ‘Tajdīd al-Manhaj’.
2) Viewers might find it helpful to supplement the critique of science, particularly in its nature as dominating things by viewing them as means to an end, by reading Heidegger’s essay, ‘The Question Concerning Technology’. Weber’s essay ‘Science as a Vocation’ is also useful.
3) Taha’s focus on creativity (and originality) is because he views the former as one of the three fundamental principles of modernity [ḥadātha]. A genuine Islamic modernity is one of Taha’s intellectual projects, and is a seen as an ideal goal without having contradiction in those two terms, see his work ‘Rūḥ al-Ḥadātha’.
4) Taha’s division of reasons can be classified into three levels, starting with the lowest: denuded/abstracted reason [ʿaql mujarrad], guided reason [ʿaql musaddad], and enhanced reason [ʿaql mu’ayyad]. The exact definitions and characteristics can be found in his al-ʿAmal al-Dīnī.
5) Note the word used in ‘guiding knowledge’ [tasdīd al-maʾrifa] is related to the word used for ‘guided reason’ [ʿaql musaddad].
6) Taha’s usage of technical domination [tiqāniyya] seems to be influenced by Ellul, see his ‘The Technological Society’.
7) It might be interesting to also compare Taha’s concept of denuded reason with the kind of instrumental reason that Adorno & Horkheimer writes about in their work ‘Dialectic of Enlightenment’.
8) Note the relation of these words with each other in Arabic: trusteeship [i’timān], trustworthiness [amāna], the Trustworthy (the Prophet) [al-amīn], all also related to the word ‘to believe’ [āmana], and believer [mu’min], implying an inherently Divine ontological hierarchy.
And God and His Emissary ﷺ knows best.
Lecture delivered by Prof. Dr. Taha Abderrahmane in Istanbul, July 23 2024.
Full video originally uploaded by Islâm Düşünce Enstitüsü [IDE].
20 окт 2024
