How the Human Arrived in Islam and Then Disappeared

From Athens to Baghdad

Series: 

Author:
Houari Touati
Translator:
Gwendolin Goldbloom
This book argues that while the concept of the human being was a Greek invention, its reinvention was Arab before it was European. Born in Greece in the fourth century BCE, this concept of the human being disappeared at the end of Late Antiquity, before reappearing in the Abbasid Near East. It was Muslim rationalist theologians who revived it in their theodicy of a just God who can only be just by recognizing the agency of human beings in their voluntary acts. Later, Arabic-speaking philosophers gave it a space of its own under the name of ‘human sciences,’ in the 9th century. But a traditional theology got the better of it. Its reappearance had to wait for the European Renaissance, while retaining its Arab origins.
Copyright Year:
2026
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978-90-04-70044-4
Publication:
12 Jan 2026
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ISBN:
978-90-04-70043-7
Publication:
12 Feb 2026
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Houari Touati is a professor at EHESS, Paris. He is editor of Studia Islamica and a member of the Academy of Europe. He is the author of numerous books, some of which have been translated into English, Italian, Turkish and Albanian.
Gwendolin Goldbloom read Islamic Studies and English at Hamburg University. She has translated several books and numerous articles in the fields of Islamic Studies and the intellectual and political history of both Europe and the Middle East.
Abbreviations
Introduction: How the Concept of ‘Human Being’ Arrived in Islam and Disappeared Again – from Athens to Baghdad

1 The Rational Biped: the Intersectionality of the Human Being
 1 The Rational Mortal Living Being
 2 Endowed with Science and Intelligence
 3 The Walking Biped Animal

2 The Being with a Double Language
 1 What Is logos/nuṭq?
 2 Logos and Free Will

3 Becoming Human
 1 Human History in the Womb
 2 Human Plasticity
 3 Education
 4 Character and Education
 5 Practical and Theoretical Virtues
 6 Will, Free Will, and Self-Awareness

4 Women and Men Are Equally Human
 1 Is Hind a Human Being?
 2 Woman Is a Human with Her Genitals Turned Inwards
 3 Women Are Mutilated Males
 4 Women Are Equal to Men

5 Humans Are Their Laughter
 1 Logical Laughter
 2 The Ticklish Animal That Laughs
 3 The Blood of Laughter
 4 From the Chest to the Spleen
 5 Laughter and Astonishment

6 Hands That Have No Equal
 1 Aristotle’s Hand
 2 Galen’s Hand
 3 The Hand of Anaxagoras

7 Human Diversity
 1 Humans Are Each Other’s Equal
 2 Human Individuals
 3 Climate and People
 4 The Genetics of Diversity
 5 Language

8 The Political Animal
 1 The Philology of a Formula
 2 Humans Are More Political than Other Animals
 3 Humans, Rather than Animals, Are Political

9 The Capable Living Being
 1 The Rational Living Being
 2 Capacity and Power

10 The End of the Human Being
 1 Fire on Porphyry
 2 An Anti-concept of the Human Being
 3 The Impossible Unity of the Human Being
 4 Final Efforts to Save the Human Being

Epilogue: the Impossibility of the Human Being
Bibliography
Index
In addition to specialists in Islam, the book is likely to be of interest to historians, anthropologists, and philosophers.
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