Ikhwan al-safa’ (the Brethren of Purity) are the authors of the Rasa’il al-Ikhwan al-safa’ (Treatises of the Brethren of Purity), an Islamic encyclopedia consisting of fifty-two treatises and an additional comprehensive treatise (Risalat al-jami‘a) on various philosophical sciences interpreted by Isma‘ili Shi‘i scholars. It covers the mathematical, natural, psychological/rational, and theological sciences and was written in the tenth or eleventh century C.E. The Ikhwan al-safa’ were an anonymous group of authors who resided in Basra (current day Iraq), influenced by Neoplatonic and Aristotelian thought and linked to the early Isma‘ili da‘wa (literally: to call; missionary preaching), which belongs to Shi‘i Islam. The group’s attempt at maintaining anonymity does not come as a surprise given that the distinguishing aspect of Isma‘ilism (branch from Shi‘ism) is a deep esotericism concerned with the inner dimensions of Islam.
This Isma‘ili esotericism fused with ancient Greek philosophy and produced the Ikhwan’s unique analysis of mathematics, epistemology, and metaphysical cosmology. The Ikhwan drew from Pythagorean thought to explain the Isma‘ili belief in a hierarchal world, Hellenistic metaphysical concepts of actuality and potentiality to describe how the human soul acquires knowledge, and they were inspired by Democritus’ worldview.
The present article provides an outline to assist readers in attaining a bird’s eye-view of this vast encyclopedia composed by brilliant Muslim scholars, who mastered all branches of knowledge in its manifold external and internal aspects.
Table of Contents
- Historical Background
- Short Description of the Work
- Philosophical Sciences
- Twofold in the Creation
- References and Further Reading
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