The Dominant Islamic Philosophy of Knowledge

Abstract The Arab-Islamic culture is certainty-oriented, such that most Arabs and Muslims consider their beliefs to be certainties. This enabled the traditionalist philosophical school of knowledge to be dominant in the Arab-Islamic world. Both Muslim philosophers Al-Ghazali and Ibn Taymiyyah articulated the dominant philosophical theory of knowledge. While Al-Ghazali claimed that God creates knowledge in us, Ibn Taymiyyah held that knowledge is justified true belief or a set of beliefs presented by an infallible person, such as the prophet Muhammad. Both philosophers provided a traditionalist account of knowledge, according to which, God is the ultimate source of any genuine belief. Their conceptions of knowledge became dominant in the Arab-Islamic world because their theories of knowledge cohere with the fact that the Arab-Islamic culture is certaintyoriented. The best way to maintain that one's beliefs are certainties, i.e. absolutely true and unchangeable, resides in holding that they are the products of God Himself. In addition, one's theory of meaning and causation is related to one's conception of knowledge. While Ibn Taymiyyah's account of meaning paved the way for his endorsement of his unique theory of knowledge, Al-Ghazali's conception of causal relationships, as being unnecessary, led him to accept the traditionalist view that God creates knowledge in us