Philosophy in the Islamic World: A Very Short Introduction by Peter Adamson

Author:Peter Adamson
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780199683673
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Published: 2015-08-05T04:00:00+00:00

Box 12 The influence of the stars

Aristotle’s idea that God directly causes celestial motion, and only indirectly affects our lower world, was taken on in a surprising way in the Islamic world. It became a rationale for the science of astrology, which could now be presented as the study of God’s providential care for the universe. When we study the motions of the stars, we are examining the instruments through which God brings about His cosmic plan. This can already be found in al-KindI and his colleague Abī Maʿshar, a major figure in the history of astrology. By associating the Aristotelian theory with astrology, they departed from the view of earlier exegetes like Alexander of Aphrodisias. Alexander too thought that God influences our world through heavenly motion, but only at the level of species. In other words, heavenly motion providentially ensures that humans, giraffes, and sunflowers are propagated from generation to generation, without being designed to cause particular events involving this or that individual. Yet precisely these sorts of events were at stake in astrological prediction. Philosophical debate would continue in subsequent centuries, for instance among Jews in Andalusia. Here Abraham ibn Ezra was a strong proponent of astrology, who even explained the misfortunes of the Jewish people with reference to the malign influence of Saturn. Similarly Abraham ibn Daud wrote of the stars as the ‘servants of God’s decree’. Not long after, though, Maimonides was highly critical of astrology. In a letter on the topic written to a Jewish community in Provence, Maimonides went so far as to blame the destruction of the Jewish temple on the fact that Jews were distracted by astrological pursuits. He preferred Alexander’s position that heavenly motion gives rise to the continuity of species, rather than individual events.

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