Figures
Al-Ghazali
Also Known As Ghazali
Sages
Citation Formats
General Reference
APA Style
BibTeX
Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (c. 1058-1111), known in the Latin West as Algazel and honoured in Islam by the title Hujjat al-Islam, the Proof of Islam, was among the most influential theologians, jurists and mystics of the tradition. A Persian by birth, he rose to teach at the celebrated Nizamiyya college in Baghdad before a spiritual crisis led him to abandon his post for years of ascetic withdrawal, an episode he recounts in his spiritual autobiography, Deliverance from Error. In The Incoherence of the Philosophers he mounted a searching critique of the Aristotelian philosophers, and in his masterwork, the Revival of the Religious Sciences, the Ihya Ulum al-Din, he wove law, theology and Sufi devotion into a comprehensive vision of the religious life. Working within the Ash'ari school of theology and the Shafi'i school of law, he did much to reconcile Sufism with mainstream Sunni orthodoxy. He is counted a renewer of the faith whose thought shaped Islamic learning for centuries.
Facts
Scholarship
How Its Legacy Is ContestedHis Incoherence of the Philosophers provoked a rebuttal a century later from the Andalusian philosopher Ibn Rushd, Averroes, whose reply, The Incoherence of the Incoherence, defended Aristotelian philosophy against al-Ghazali's critique, and the exchange remains a touchstone in debates over reason and revelation in Islamic thought. 1 Life
Lifespan or Floruit Place of ActivityNishapur, Baghdad, Damascus, Jerusalem and Tus 1 Manner of DeathDied at Tus in 1111 Veneration
Shrine or Burial PlaceHe died and was buried in his native city of Tus, to which he had returned in his final years after decades of travel and teaching across the Islamic world. 2 Origins
Place of Origin Position Profile
Key TextHis autobiographical Deliverance from Error, al-Munqidh min al-Dalal, recounts his own spiritual crisis and his search through the various claimants to certain knowledge before he settled on the mystical path of the Sufis. 2 Publications
Notable PublicationHis Ihya Ulum al-Din, The Revival of the Religious Sciences, is regarded as one of the most influential works of Islamic spirituality ever written, synthesizing Islamic law, theology and Sufi practice into a single guide to religious life. 3 Learn More
The Incoherence of the Philosophers
Al-Ghazali (c. 1058-1111), known in the Latin West as Algazel and honoured in Islam as Hujjat al-Islam, "the Proof of Islam," is among the most consequential thinkers in the history of the faith. His most famous philosophical work, the Tahafut al-falasifa ("The Incoherence of the Philosophers"), is a searching critique of the Islamic Aristotelians, above all al-Farabi and Avicenna (Ibn Sina), whose Neoplatonised philosophy he judged to have overstepped the bounds of reason and religion. He argued that on twenty points the philosophers had failed to demonstrate their claims, and that on three they had fallen into outright unbelief: holding the world to be eternal rather than created, denying God's knowledge of particulars, and denying the bodily resurrection.
Notably, Ghazali attacked not by rejecting logic but by using it, and his discussion of causality, questioning whether the "necessary connection" between cause and effect is anything more than God's habitual ordering, is one of the classic statements of theological occasionalism and drew a celebrated reply from Averroes (the Incoherence of the Incoherence).
The Crisis, and the Revival of the Religious Sciences
At the height of his fame as a jurist and theologian in Baghdad, Ghazali underwent a personal and intellectual crisis around 1095: seized by doubt about the foundations of certain knowledge and by the conviction that his learning had become worldly ambition, he abandoned his prestigious teaching post, left the city, and spent years in withdrawal and Sufi practice.
Out of this came his masterwork, the Ihya ulum al-din ("The Revival of the Religious Sciences"), a vast synthesis that sought to breathe inner, spiritual life back into the outward observances of Islamic law, reconciling the jurist's and the theologian's learning with the heart-knowledge of the mystics, and giving Sufism a securely orthodox place at the centre of Sunni piety. His autobiography, al-Munqidh min al-dalal ("Deliverance from Error"), narrates the whole journey through the claims of theology, philosophy, Ismaili authority and Sufism.
A later and much-repeated thesis, that Ghazali's critique dealt a lasting blow to science and philosophy in the Muslim world, is contested among historians, who note that philosophical and scientific work continued vigorously after him; the claim should be treated as a debated interpretation rather than a settled fact.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
This source names Al-Ghazali directly: "study of the thought of Abu Hamid al-Ghazali, the eleventh century Islamic theologian and philosopher."
This source names Al-Ghazali directly: "Ihya Ulum al-Din is Abu Hamid al-Ghazali's own primary Islamic theological and spiritual text, composed across the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries, and this record states honestly that no..."
This source names Al-Ghazali directly: "Later writers, al-Ghazali most influentially, folded akhlaq into a broader spiritual programme, so the genre runs from courtly advice literature through philosophical ethics to Sufi self discipline."
This source names Al-Ghazali directly: "niche take their meaning as ornament. Al-Ghazali wrote a whole treatise on it."
Belongs to Tradition
Critiqued
Al-Ghazali's Tahafut al-Falasifa (The Incoherence of the Philosophers) is a book-length refutation of the Falsafa tradition, a direct refutation rather than a weaker affiliation.
Works Attributed
Written by al-Ghazali after he abandoned his chair at Baghdad, and the work through which Sufi practice was made acceptable to mainstream Sunni jurisprudence.
Sources
1. The Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd edition
P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C. E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel and W. P. Heinrichs (eds.), Brill, 2005s.v. Al-GhazaliView the Source 2. Al-Ghazali's Philosophical Theology
Frank Griffel, Oxford University Press, 2009On al-Ghazali's philosophical theologyView the Source 2. Al-Ghazali's Philosophical Theology
Frank Griffel, Oxford University Press, 2009The philosophical theology of al-GhazaliView the Source 2. Al-Ghazali's Philosophical Theology
Frank Griffel, Oxford University Press, 2009Critiqued: FalsafaView the Source 3. Ihya Ulum al-Din (The Revival of the Religious Sciences)
Abu Hamid al-GhazaliThe Ihya Ulum al-Din, al-Ghazali's Revival of the Religious SciencesView the Source Encyclopaedia Britannica (online academic reference)
Encyclopaedia Britannica editors, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc., 2024View the Source Encyclopedia of Religion
Mircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.), Macmillan Reference, 2005View the Source Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)
No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.
Sign in to dispute this or suggest a correction.
View At A Past Year
The atlas records no dated fact of its own for this entry, so there is no other year to choose.