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Individuation and Identity in Islamic

This document discusses theories of individuation in Islamic philosophy after Avicenna. It focuses on two figures: Bahmanyār b. Marzbān, Avicenna's disciple, and Suhrawardī. Bahmanyār's discussion of individuation in his major work stands in close connection to Avicenna's works and finds additional principles of individuation beyond matter, including motion, time, and position. Suhrawardī presents a revolutionary attempt to break from the Aristotelian tradition by arguing that individuality is a primitive state and not reducible to other principles. While their approaches differ, both point to something irreducibly individuated - for Bahmanyār it is particular properties

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81 views2 pages

Individuation and Identity in Islamic

This document discusses theories of individuation in Islamic philosophy after Avicenna. It focuses on two figures: Bahmanyār b. Marzbān, Avicenna's disciple, and Suhrawardī. Bahmanyār's discussion of individuation in his major work stands in close connection to Avicenna's works and finds additional principles of individuation beyond matter, including motion, time, and position. Suhrawardī presents a revolutionary attempt to break from the Aristotelian tradition by arguing that individuality is a primitive state and not reducible to other principles. While their approaches differ, both point to something irreducibly individuated - for Bahmanyār it is particular properties

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INDIVIDUATION AND IDENTITY IN ISLAMIC PHILOSOPHY AFTER AVICENNA: BAHMANYĀR

AND SUHRAWARDĪ

Scholarship on medieval philosophy has rightfully acknowledged the historical and


systematical merit of Avicenna’s (d. 1037) thought in all divisions of philosophy. His insights
in metaphysics are particularly famous: the essence-existence distinction; the neutrality of
essences towards universality and particularity; the notion of God as the Necessary
Existent. There is however a gap in Avicenna’s metaphysics that cannot be overlooked: a
systematic theory of individuation. Although Avicenna devotes dozens of pages in all of his
major summae to the problem of universals, looking for a single chapter on individuation of
these universals would be in vain. This has already been shown by Deborah Black’s analysis
of individuation in Avicenna (Black, ‘Avicenna on Individuation’). Black moves between
short passages in Avicenna’s De anima, Isagoge and Metaphysics, none of which provides a
full-blown theory of individuation. Her conclusion is that Avicenna – being a good
Aristotelian – ascribes to (designated) matter an important role in individuation, especially
when he talks about the individuation of human souls. He argues that human souls, being
one in species, may only be individuated as concrete humans when they are attached to
matter (cf. Healing, On the Soul, 223.11–224.9; see also Druart, ‘Soul’s Individuation’). On other
occasions, however, he mentions, for instance, existence or “individual intentions” (Black’s
translation of al-išāra ilā maʿnā šaḫsī) as alternatives to the dismissed bundle-theory of
individuation (Healing, Isagoge, 70.9–20). The result is rather unsatisfying: Avicenna does not
give to any of these notions the privilege of being the principle of individuation (henceforth
PI).
This gap was to be filled in post-Avicennian Islamic philosophy. In this paper, I will
focus on two figures: Avicenna’s disciple Bahmanyār b. Marzbān (d. 1066) and a major
thinker of the twelfth century Islamic East, Šihāb al-Dīn al-Suhrawardī (d. 1191), the
founder of what has come to be called Islamic Illuminationism. As I will show, Bahmanyār’s
discussion of individuation in his major work, The Attainment (al-Taḥṣīl), stands in close
connection to Avicenna’s Marginal Notes (al-Taʿlīqāt). 1 It can hence be read as an early source
for an Avicennist view on the issue. We will see that Bahmanyār, inspired by Avicenna, finds
even more candidates for PIs: in addition to matter, Bahmanyār lists motion, time, and
position. Suhrawardī in his turn will present a revolutionary attempt to break with the
Aristotelian-Avicennian tradition of connecting individuation with spatiotemporally
designated matter. His position, as I will show, comes close to what we nowadays call
primitive individuation.

1
This treatise might have had its origins in Avicenna’s oral discussions with his other disciple Ibn Zaylā, who
wrote them down as notes, which were then transmitted by Bahmanyār. It is of little wonder, then, that
Bahmanyār shows close affinity with the work (cf. Gutas, Avicenna and the Aristotelian Tradition, 162–63; Janssen,
‘Les Ta’liqat’; but Reismann, Avicennian Tradition, 203).
Conclusion

How do abstract things become concrete? We have seen and followed two different
approaches to this question. Bahmanyār’s approach seeks to find the principle of
individuation in the spatiotemporal position of the outmost sphere. By contrast,
Suhrawardī’s approach abandons the task of finding the PI, since individuality is a primitive
and irreducible state of affairs. Despite these apparent differences, both approaches also
reveal a degree of similarity in their solutions to the problem of individuation. In whatever
way we want to solve it, we will always need something that is irreducibly individuated. For
Bahmanyār and Avicenna it is a particular property of objects, namely, their spatiotemporal
position. For Suhrawardī these are just the objects themselves.
As a final remark, I would like to draw some attention to the historical philosophical
background of the debate between Suhrawardī and Bahmanyār. The twelfth century is
known as the encounter between two different traditions of metaphysics. One comes from
Avicenna’s philosophy. The other comes from the traditional ontology of kalām. As I
mentioned in the introduction, the main focus of Avicenna’s metaphysics was on explaining
the status of universals, neutral essences, natures etc. On the other hand, mainstream
kalām metaphysics instead focuses on concrete particulars (cf. Frank, ‘Ašʿarite Ontology’,
Benevich, ‘Theory of Aḥwāl’). The clash of the two ontologies may shed light on the reasons
for disagreement between Bahmanyār, following Avicenna, and Suhrawardī. On the one
hand, Avicennists start from universals and therefore are in need of finding something, a
magical property that would turn universals into particulars. On the other hand, kalām
ontology and therefore Suhrawardī start from particulars. That is why they do not need to
explain particulars through anything else. There is no wonder then that the idea of
extramental things being distinct in themselves rather than through a certain property
may first be found in mainstream kalām metaphysics (Benevich, ‘Theory of Aḥwāl’, 163). It
has already been suggested elsewhere that some aspects of Suhrawardī’s metaphysics
correspond to the kalām ontology of bare particulars, given his argumentation against
extramental universals (cf. Wisnovsky, ‘Essence and Existence’, Benevich, ‘Essence-
Existence’). My final hypothesis, which certainly requires further research, is then that
Suhrawardī’s theory of individuation has its roots in kalām ontology as well. 2

2
This paper is a result of my research conducted in the “Heirs of Avicenna” project, funded by DFG. I am
grateful to Peter Adamson, Andreas Lammer, and anonymous reviewers for their helpful remarks on the first
draft of this paper.

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