Jamal al-Din al-Afghani
Muslims must unite against imperialism and embrace reason and science, which belong to Islam as much as to Europe.
Placement
Itinerant activist from Iran to Egypt, India and Paris: called for Islamic unity against imperialism and for reason and science within Islam – and answered Ernest Renan in 1883.
Key ideas
- Pan-Islamic anti-imperialism
- Reason and science in Islam
- Reply to Renan
Students: Muhammad Abduh
Influence
Influenced by 1
Ibn Sina (Avicenna)
influenced by
Schooled in the philosophical tradition of Avicenna, al-Afghani taught Islamic philosophy, including Avicenna’s works, in Cairo in the 1870s to a circle that included Muhammad Abduh. N. R. Keddie, Sayyid Jamal ad-Din “al-Afghani”: A Political Biography (1972); A. Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age 1798–1939 (1962)
Evidence: AI draft
Ibn Sina (Avicenna) › 980–1037
Influenced 2
Muhammad Abduh taught
taught ✓
Abduh joined al-Afghani’s circle in Cairo around 1871–72 and studied philosophy, theology and mysticism with him outside al-Azhar; in exile they published the journal al-Urwa al-Wuthqa together in Paris (1884). N. R. Keddie, Sayyid Jamal ad-Din “al-Afghani”: A Political Biography (1972); EI² “Muḥammad ʿAbduh”
Evidence: also in Wikidata · Wikidata
Muhammad Abduh › 1849–1905
Muhammad Iqbal
influenced
Iqbal took up al-Afghani’s call to reawaken and unite the Muslim world and gave him a speaking part in the sphere of Mercury in his Javid Nama (1932). M. Iqbal, Javid Nama (1932), tr. A. J. Arberry (1966); The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam (1930); A. Schimmel, Gabriel’s Wing (1963)
Evidence: AI draft
Muhammad Iqbal › 1877–1938
Criticism
Criticizes 1
Charles Darwin
criticised
Al-Afghani’s Refutation of the Materialists (1881) ridiculed Darwin’s theory among the ‘naturalist’ doctrines that, in his view, dissolve religion, morality and society. Jamāl al-Dīn al-Afghānī, al-Radd ʿalā al-dahriyyīn (1881), tr. N. R. Keddie, An Islamic Response to Imperialism, 1968
Evidence: AI draft
Charles Darwin › 1809–1882
Works
Written in Persian in India: the materialists, from Democritus to Darwin, undermine the religious virtues on which civilisations rest.
Position
Al-Afghani wanted to rouse the Muslim world against European, above all British, domination. Muslims, he argued, had declined not because of Islam but because they had neglected reason and science; they must unite and renew their religion from within. In India he wrote The Refutation of the Materialists against the “naturalists” around Sayyid Ahmad Khan, whom he accused of serving the British. Yet in his 1883 reply to Ernest Renan he conceded that all religions, Islam included, had hindered science, and hoped Islam might undergo a reform like Christianity’s. Scholars still debate his sincerity and consistency. Through Abduh and Rashid Rida he shaped both Islamic modernism and later political Islam.
Life & context
Sayyid Jamal al-Din, called al-Afghani, was born in 1838 or 1839. His origin is disputed: he himself claimed birth in Afghanistan, but much evidence points to Asadabad near Hamadan in Iran and a Shia upbringing. He was active in Afghanistan, Istanbul, Egypt (1871–1879, where Muhammad Abduh became his pupil), India, Paris, London, Russia and Iran, and was expelled from several countries. He died in Istanbul in 1897.
Further main works
- Reply to Renan (Journal des Débats, 1883)
- The Firmest Bond (al-ʿUrwa al-wuthqa, journal, with Muhammad Abduh, 1884)
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