23 Facts About Al-Farabi

Al-Farabi is credited with preserving the original Greek texts during the Middle Ages via his commentaries and treatises, and influencing many prominent philosophers, such as Avicenna and Maimonides.

Al-Farabi's name was Abu Nasr Muhammad b Muhammad Farabi, sometimes with the family surname al-Tarkani, i e, the element Tarkan appears in a nisba.

Al-Farabi's grandfather was not known among his contemporaries, but a name, Awzalag, suddenly appears later in the writings of Ibn Abi Usaibi?a, and of his great-grandfather in those of Ibn Khallikan.

Al-Farabi studied in Tetouan, Morocco and lived and taught for some time in Aleppo.

Al-Farabi discussed the topics of future contingents, the number and relation of the categories, the relation between logic and grammar, and non-Aristotelian forms of inference.

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Al-Farabi is credited with categorizing logic into two separate groups, the first being "idea" and the second being "proof".

Al-Farabi considered the theories of conditional syllogisms and analogical inference, which were part of the Stoic tradition of logic rather than the Aristotelian.

Al-Farabi had great influence on science and philosophy for several centuries, and was widely considered second only to Aristotle in knowledge in his time.

Al-Farabi's work, aimed at synthesis of philosophy and Sufism, paved the way for the work of Ibn Sina.

Al-Farabi wrote a commentary on Aristotle's work, and one of his most notable works is Al-Madina al-Fadila where he theorized an ideal state as in Plato's The Republic.

Al-Farabi argued that religion rendered truth through symbols and persuasion, and, like Plato, saw it as the duty of the philosopher to provide guidance to the state.

Al-Farabi incorporated the Platonic view, drawing a parallel from within the Islamic context, in that he regarded the ideal state to be ruled by the prophet-imam, instead of the philosopher-king envisaged by Plato.

Al-Farabi argued that the ideal state was the city-state of Medina when it was governed by the prophet Muhammad as its head of state, as he was in direct communion with Allah whose law was revealed to him.

Al-Farabi wrote a short treatise "On Vacuum", where he thought about the nature of the existence of void.

Al-Farabi wrote Social Psychology and Principles of the Opinions of the Citizens of the Virtuous City, which were the first treatises to deal with social psychology.

Al-Farabi stated that "an isolated individual could not achieve all the perfections by himself, without the aid of other individuals, " and that it is the "innate disposition of every human being to join another human being or other men in the labor he ought to perform.

Al-Farabi's ideas are marked by their coherency, despite drawing together of many different philosophical disciplines and traditions.

Al-Farabi's cosmology is essentially based upon three pillars: Aristotelian metaphysics of causation, highly developed Plotinian emanational cosmology and the Ptolemaic astronomy.

Al-Farabi says that it cannot be known by intellectual means, such as dialectical division or definition, because the terms used in these processes to define a thing constitute its substance.

Al-Farabi says it is composed of four faculties: The appetitive, the sensitive (the perception by the senses of corporeal substances), the imaginative (the faculty which retains images of sensible objects after they have been perceived, and then separates and combines them for a number of ends), and the rational, which is the faculty of intellection.

Al-Farabi compared the philosopher's role in relation to society with a physician in relation to the body; the body's health is affected by the "balance of its humours" just as the city is determined by the moral habits of its people.

Al-Farabi divided those "vicious" societies, which have fallen short of the ideal "virtuous" society, into three categories: ignorant, wicked and errant.

Al-Farabi argues that al-Farabi was using different types of society as examples, in the context of an ethical discussion, to show what effect correct or incorrect thinking could have.