ALGHAZALI, ABU HAMID MUHAMMAD

(1059–1111)

Primarily a theologian, Al-Ghazali taught in Baghdad, but in 1095 after a breakdown abandoned academic fields for a life of contemplation. He valued the insight given by mystical comprehension of things above that achieved by logic or reason. HisSelf-destruction of the Philosophersis an attack on the Aristotelian doctrines of Al-Farabi and Avicenna . Generally speaking Al-Ghazali attacks the range of knowledge claimed by philosophers, particularly through a critique of knowledge of causation, about which he defends occasionalism . The certainty of his own reasoning opened him to counterattack by Averroës (The Self-destruction of the Self-destruction). Al-Ghazali is also remembered as the author of theRevival of the Religious Sciences, an important influence on Sunnite Islam.