1 Introduction
This chapter delves into IḥyÄʾ Ê¿UlÅ«m al-DÄ«n (âThe Revival of the Religious Sciencesâ) by AbÅ« ḤÄmid al-GhazÄlÄ« (d. 505/1111), emphasising its ethical dimensions and the conceptual possibilities it presents. Divided into three sections, the chapter begins by introducing al-GhazÄlÄ« as a significant thinker with an ethical focus and delves into four recurring ethical themes within the book. It then offers brief remarks on the broader context of the IḥyÄʾ, including al-GhazÄlÄ«âs use of sources, the placement of the IḥyÄʾ within al-GhazÄlÄ«âs authorship, and the impact of the IḥyÄʾ.
2 Author
Al-GhazÄlÄ« stands as one of the most influential thinkers in Islamic history. During his early career as a law professor at Baghdadâs NiáºÄmiyya College, al-GhazÄlÄ« gained fame for his brilliance in deploying polemics and dialectic, often in defence of the ShÄfiÊ¿Ä«-AshÊ¿arÄ« establishment. Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs attacks against the IsmÄÊ¿Ä«lÄ«s, a chief ideological and political rival to the SeljÅ«q empire, are remorseless and unsparing.
Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs engagement with Arabic Aristotelianism is more nuanced, as evident in TahÄfut al-FalÄsifa (âThe Incoherence of the Philosophersâ). Al-GhazÄlÄ« purports to isolate twenty philosophical doctrines that do not align with orthodox SunnÄ« Islam and to showâusing only resources internal to philosophyâthat the philosophers are incapable of demonstrating their truth. This leaves other aspects of philosophy uncensored and in principle open to endorsement. Intriguingly for our present purposes, the TahÄfutâs closing remarks indicate that much of the moral psychology of the falÄsifa might be compatible with orthodox Islam as al-GhazÄlÄ« sees it (2000, 208â14). In fact, concurrently with the TahÄfut, al-GhazÄlÄ« produced an exposition of eudaemonistic ethics titled MÄ«zÄn al-Ê¿Amal (âThe Scale of Actionâ), replete with philosophical elements albeit not labelled in those terms (Garden 2014, 30â59).
Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs lasting reputation is built on what happened next. In 488/1095, al-GhazÄlÄ« suffered a life-altering existential crisis. He subsequently left his post, only to emerge a few years later with a radically different public profile. By al-GhazÄlÄ«âs own testimony, whereas previously he had traded in the kind of knowledge that earned its exponent public plaudits, he now taught his readers to devalue fame and worldly fortune (al-GhazÄlÄ« 1967, 123; 1990a, 60â61). Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs subsequent authorship is both prolific and varied, but with a focus always on reforming the existing orders of knowledge in order to restore their God-centeredness. Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs direct prose and keen psychological insight have garnered him countless admirers ever since, and his readers today number in the millions.
What has intrigued many modern scholars is the extent to which al-GhazÄlÄ«âs philosophical fascination shows in his mature theology, cosmology, and epistemology. But such a theoretical orientation risks distorting the picture. We would do well to remember with George Hourani that al-GhazÄlÄ«âs âcentral concern throughout his life ⦠may fairly be described as an ethical one: right conduct and the purification of the soul by the individual, as means to a harmonious relation with God and the attainment of everlasting joyâ (Hourani 1976, 69).
This characterisation may seem so commonsensical as to appear unnecessary. After all, what could be more evident than al-GhazÄlÄ« being invested in how we are to live? There is nary an account of al-GhazÄlÄ«âs life and career that would not emphasise, just as the man himself did, that knowledge (Ê¿ilm) needs to be balanced by action (Ê¿amal) and a thirst for the truth by a commitment to righteous living.
Yet it is worth pausing to consider what it would mean to take seriously what Hourani says. If the ethical imperative was indeed central to al-GhazÄlÄ«, then it would be reasonable to anticipate discovering a substantial body of materials in his works that pertains to âright conduct and the purification of the soul,â as indeed one does. One might also expect to find in the pages put out by al-GhazÄlÄ« reflection on ethics a form of ethical theorising, that matches what he contributed to more theoretical topics (logic, cosmology, philosophical theology, psychology). And one would expect to find among al-GhazÄlÄ« scholars an equivalent interest in engaging with his ethics. To put it differently: if we are serious about the notion that al-GhazÄlÄ« was primarily an ethicist, then should we not seek to understand how his ethics function?
If such is our expectation, then recent scholarship will serve mostly to frustrate. Earlier monograph-length studies on al-GhazÄlÄ«âs ethics, though valuable, veer toward the expository (Umaruddin 1949; Sherif 1975; Abul Quasem 1978). Recent studies add welcome context, insofar as it is now much more common to evoke the full scope of the many debts al-GhazÄlÄ« owes to earlier authors (Platonic, Aristotelian, and Galenic; ShÄfiÊ¿Ä«, AshÊ¿arÄ«, and Sufi) and to acknowledge the inherent tensions in al-GhazÄlÄ«âs authorship. What we lack is a fresh overview.1
3 The Work
Given the earlier discussion, it is helpful to study al-GhazÄlÄ«âs magnum opus, IḥyÄʾ Ê¿UlÅ«m al-DÄ«n, in a frame that foregrounds the ethical component. By common consensus, the IḥyÄʾ is al-GhazÄlÄ«âs principal achievement as an author. Al-GhazÄlÄ« himself elevates the IḥyÄʾ in his later writings, and this is how the IḥyÄʾ has been regarded by Muslim readers ever since. It has been reported that al-GhazÄlÄ« read from the IḥyÄʾ on a brief stop made back in Baghdad in 490/1097.
3.1 General Considerations
The reputation of the IḥyÄʾ rests on its comprehensive and panoptic scope. Across forty books, al-GhazÄlÄ« aims to provide a comprehensive guide to understanding the contours of a Muslimâs religious lifeâwhich is almost to say, a Muslimâs life in general, seeing as he contends that at least for the person aspiring to be counted among the friends of God, nearly everything one does can incorporate a greater or lesser degree of God-consciousness.
Throughout the work, al-GhazÄlÄ« offers glimpses of how those sincerely and wholeheartedly committed to God will be provided divine disclosures or unveilings (kashf) as a result of their striving. Al-GhazÄlÄ« thereby recreates a familiar dichotomy between the common folk and a spiritual elite. However, as al-GhazÄlÄ«âs principal message addresses the whole of a Muslimâs life as containing mysteries and divine gifts for anyone with eyes to see, the IḥyÄʾ in effect acts as an invitation for every reader to appreciate the inner or hidden (bÄá¹in) aspect of outward (áºÄhir) religious practices or commands. Part of the IḥyÄʾâs allure has to do with al-GhazÄlÄ«âs not-so-covert hints at placing precious secrets on the page, the significance of which will become the more apparent the farther along the path the reader advances.
Despite all this, al-GhazÄlÄ«âs prose remains punchy and his mode of address is direct. The author wears his erudition lightly; the IḥyÄʾâs practical deliberations reveal an insightful observer of the everyday (Ormsby 2008, 111â138). Although al-GhazÄlÄ« draws on a range of sources, he digresses and meanders less than many of the authors from whom he borrows, whether in the literary genres of theology, law, or Sufi handbooks. Readers and scholars alike praise the IḥyÄʾâs organisation and the way it catalogues and highlights the contributions made by five centuries of Muslims to the understanding of their religion. It is thanks to this that one finds hyperbolic statements to the effect that if all other books of Islam were lost but the IḥyÄʾ preserved, that would suffice to preserve Islam itself.
3.2 Structure
The IḥyÄʾ is divided into four quarters of roughly equal length. The first two quarters illuminate two categories of acts that bear upon our relation to God and the way our worldly affairs and interactions are arranged. These are the acts of worship (Ê¿ibÄdÄt) and our mundane customs (Ê¿ÄdÄt), respectively. The third and fourth quarters deal with the cultivation of character, which is to say, the imperative for us to divest ourselves of those traits that threaten to destroy our spiritual integrity (muhlikÄt) and attain those that contribute to our salvation (munjiyÄt).
According to al-GhazÄlÄ«, the first two quarters relate to what is external or manifest (áºÄhir), i.e., outward actions, while the latter two target what is interior or hidden from plain sight (bÄá¹in), i.e., character (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 1:14â15; al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:11). The IḥyÄʾ as a whole presents the basics of the âscience of actionâ (Ê¿ilm al-muÊ¿Ämala), which in itself forms the first half of the âscience of the path of the hereafter,â the second half being the âscience of unveilingâ (Ê¿ilm al-mukÄshafa). In their basic uses, these two terms mirror Aristotelian practical and theoretical philosophy, respectively (GilÊ¿adi 1989). While the scope and ambit of the âscience of unveilingâ is left deliberately ambiguous by al-GhazÄlÄ«, all four quarters of the IḥyÄʾâworship, customs, destructive character traits, salvific character traitsâcan, in perfectly ordinary terms, be seen as falling under the rubric of ethics.
Terminologically speaking, what al-GhazÄlÄ« appears to have done is replace the standard term âscience of character traitsâ (Ê¿ilm al-akhlÄq) with his preferred âscience of the states of the heartâ (Ê¿ilm aḥwÄl al-qalb). Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs Ê¿ilm al-muÊ¿Ämala, meanwhile, becomes the broader and more universal term, as it encompasses concrete acts as well as moral psychology. Al-GhazÄlÄ« takes pains to underline that the science of action as he understands it encompasses both knowledge about right conduct, and action in accordance with that knowledge (2011, 1:13). For al-GhazÄlÄ«, as for Aristotle, the deep grammar of ethical knowledge contains the imperative to practice what one takes to be right (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 6:636â637, 6:694). Alongside Aristotle, al-GhazÄlÄ« additionally contends that authentic ethical knowledge can only be arrived at through practice of what one purports to examine.
The titles of the forty books of the IḥyÄʾ give an idea of the breadth of materials it treats. Where current Islamic Texts Society or Fons Vitae translations exist or have been announced, these have been marked with an asterisk and their translated titles are used in the following list. For untranslated volumes, an attempt has been made to retain terminological consistency.
Al-RubÊ¿ al-Awwal: al-Ê¿IbÄdÄt (âFirst Quarter: Acts of Worshipâ)
1. KitÄb al-Ê¿Ilm (âThe Book of Knowledgeâ)*
2. KitÄb QawÄÊ¿id al-Ê¿AqÄʾid (âThe Principles of the Creedâ)*
3. KitÄb AsrÄr al-ṬahÄra (âThe Mysteries of Purificationâ)*
4. KitÄb AsrÄr al-á¹¢alÄt (âThe Mysteries of Prayerâ)*
5. KitÄb AsrÄr al-ZakÄt (âThe Mysteries of Charityâ)*
6. KitÄb AsrÄr al-á¹¢awm (âThe Mysteries of Fastingâ)*
7. KitÄb AsrÄr al-Ḥajj (âThe Mysteries of Pilgrimageâ)*
8. KitÄb ÄdÄb TilÄwat al-QurʾÄn (âOn Proper Conduct for the Recitation of the QurʾÄnâ)*
9. KitÄb al-AdhkÄr wa-l-DaÊ¿awÄt (â[On] Invocations and Supplicationsâ)*
10. KitÄb TartÄ«b al-AwrÄd wa-Tafṣīl IḥyÄʾ al-Layl (âOn the Assigned Timesâ)
Al-RubÊ¿ al-ThÄnÄ«: al-Ê¿ÄdÄt (âSecond Quarter: Customsâ)
11. KitÄb ÄdÄb al-Akl (âOn the Manners Relating to Eatingâ)*
12. KitÄb ÄdÄb al-NikÄḥ (âOn Marriageâ)
13. KitÄb ÄdÄb al-Kasb wa-l-MaÊ¿Äsh (âOn Acquiring and Earningâ)
14. KitÄb al-ḤalÄl wa-l-ḤarÄm (âOn the Lawful and the Unlawfulâ)*
15. KitÄb ÄdÄb al-Ulfa wa-l-Ukhuwwa wa-l-á¹¢uḥba wa-l-MuÊ¿Äshara (âOn Friendship and Brotherhoodâ)
16. KitÄb ÄdÄb al-Ê¿Uzla (âOn Seclusionâ)
17. KitÄb ÄdÄb al-Safar (âOn Conduct in Travelâ)*
18. KitÄb ÄdÄb al-SamÄÊ¿ wa-l-Wajd (âOn Responses Proper to Listening to Music and the Experience of Ecstasyâ)*
19. KitÄb al-Amr bi-l-MaÊ¿rÅ«f wa-l-Nahy Ê¿an al-Munkar (âOn Enjoining Right and Forbidding Wrongâ)
20. KitÄb ÄdÄb al-MaÊ¿Ä«sha wa-AkhlÄq al-Nubuwwa (âThe Book of Prophetic Ethics and the Courtesies of Livingâ)*
Al-RubÊ¿ al-ThÄlith: al-MuhlikÄt (âThird Quarter: Destructive Character Traitsâ)
21. KitÄb Sharḥ Ê¿AjÄʾib al-Qalb (â[On] the Marvels of the Heartâ)*
22. KitÄb RiyÄá¸at al-Nafs (âOn Disciplining the Soulâ)*
23. KitÄb Kasr al-Shahwatayn (âOn Breaking the Two Desiresâ)*
24. KitÄb ÄfÄt al-LisÄn (âOn the Evils of the Tongueâ)*
25. KitÄb Dhamm al-Ghaá¸ab wa-l-Ḥiqd wa-l-Ḥasad (âOn Condemnation of Anger, Malice, and Envyâ)
26. KitÄb Dhamm al-DunyÄ (âOn Condemnation of the Worldâ)*
27. KitÄb Dhamm al-Bukhl wa-Dhamm Ḥubb al-MÄl (âOn Condemnation of Greed and the Love of Wealthâ)
28. KitÄb Dhamm al-JÄh wa-l-RiyÄʾ (âOn Condemnation of Fame and Ostentationâ)
29. KitÄb Dhamm al-Kibr wa-l-Ê¿Ajab (âOn Condemnation of Pride and Self-Admirationâ)*
30. KitÄb Dhamm al-GhurÅ«r (âOn Condemnation of Delusionâ)
Al-RubÊ¿ al-RÄbiÊ¿: al-MunjiyÄt (âFourth Quarter: Saving Character Traitsâ)
31. KitÄb al-Tawba (â[On] Repentanceâ)2
32. KitÄb al-á¹¢abr wa-l-Shukr (âOn Patience and Thankfulnessâ)*
33. KitÄb al-Khawf wa-l-RajÄʾ (â[On] Fear and Hopeâ)3
34. KitÄb al-Faqr wa-l-Zuhd (âOn Poverty and Abstinenceâ)*
35. KitÄb al-Tawḥīd wa-l-TawkÄ«l (â[On] Faith in Divine Unity and Trust in Divine Providenceâ)*
36. KitÄb al-Maḥabba wa-l-Shawq wa-l-Uns wa-l-Riá¸Ä (â[On] Love, Longing, Intimacy, and Contentmentâ)*
37. KitÄb al-Niyya wa-l-IkhlÄá¹£ wa-l-á¹¢idq (âOn Intention, Sincerity, and Truthfulnessâ)*
38. KitÄb al-MurÄqaba wa-l-MuḥÄsaba (âOn Vigilance and Self-Examinationâ)*
39. KitÄb al-Tafakkur (âOn Contemplationâ)*
40. KitÄb Dhikr al-Mawt wa-MÄ BaÊ¿dah (â[On] the Remembrance of Death and the Afterlifeâ)*
The depth and breadth of the issues treated in the IḥyÄʾ resist easy summary. While a few books stand outâbook 1 for knowledge, 21 for cognitive psychology, 22 for character formation, 36 for love, 40 for eschatologyâpassages that carry systematic weight are strewn across the IḥyÄʾ. These are leavened with reams of text dedicated to what the foregone tradition has said about the essentials of a particular practice or character trait. Four ethical themes that carry through the entire work are highlighted in what follows.
3.2.1 Divine Command and Human Happiness
It is worth tackling, first, the metaethical question regarding the source of normativity, that is, what defines the good and what is to be done. On one level, al-GhazÄlÄ« holds fast to the classical AshÊ¿arÄ« analysis, which amounted to a kind of divine command ethics: the obligatory (wÄjib) simply is that which God has commanded, and obedience is due to God simply because of His absolute sovereignty over that which He has created. In the so-called al-RisÄla al-Qudsiyya (âJerusalem Epistleâ), a self-standing treatise interpolated into the second book of the IḥyÄʾ, al-GhazÄlÄ« affirms in customary AshÊ¿arÄ« fashion Godâs absolute freedom to act. Specifically, (prop. 4) God was in no way obligated to create anything, let alone create beings who would be held responsible for their actions; (prop. 5) God is not constrained to place upon humans only such burdens as they can bear; (prop. 6) God can do what He wills with that which is His, which is everythingâspecifically, he can impose pains and torments on creatures without those being somehow merited; (prop. 7) God is under no obligation to bring maximal benefit to humans. To claim that it would be bad (qabīḥ) of Him to do anything other, or contrary to wisdom, as the MuÊ¿tazilÄ«s had done, is to misuse and misunderstand both terms (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 1:408â411). In the domain of creatures, it may make sense to use âgoodâ as shorthand for what benefits a thing and âbadâ for what harms it (or, to frame the matter in subjectivist rather than relativist terms, that which one finds agreeable and repugnant). But neither of these applies to God, who stands beyond harm and benefit.
Taken together, these proclamations look like a straightforward affirmation of divine voluntarism in metaethics. As the proof text favoured by al-GhazÄlÄ« would have it, âHe is not questioned about what He does, but they will be questionedâ (Q 21:23). There is a more extensive treatment, closely resembling contemporaneous accounts in theology (kalÄm) and Islamic legal theory (uṣūl al-fiqh), in the third treatise in al-Iqtiá¹£Äd fÄ« l-IÊ¿tiqÄd (âMean in Beliefâ), which al-GhazÄlÄ« himself recommends as a companion piece on creedal matters.
However, on another level, al-GhazÄlÄ« affirms in several places that the prescribed acts of worship do have a telos (ghÄya). They prepare the heart for intimate acquaintance and insight into the realities of the Real, i.e., God (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:302). Put another way, pious deeds are the nourishment of the hearts (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 9:26). Godâs commandments relating to peopleâs social relations and customs (Ê¿ÄdÄt) likewise have numerous and discernible salutary effects. Thus, Godâs commandments are not wholly inscrutable, rather, they have been posited for the improvement of humankind, both individually and collectively.
In terms of legal theory, some have dubbed al-GhazÄlÄ«âs stance âsoft natural law,â on account of al-GhazÄlÄ«âs willingness to entertain the notion of the law having purposes (maqÄá¹£id), even if such purposes are created freely by God (Emon 2010, 131â146). Al-GhazÄlÄ« furthermore contends, in the IḥyÄʾ and elsewhere, that âthere is in possibility nothing better, more complete, or more perfectâ than what God has created (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 8:244). This is not the place to delve into the theological and metaphysical puzzles engendered by any of these formulations (see Ormsby 1984; Frank 1992). In the present context, it suffices to underline that a certain metaphysical optimism and ethical naturalism pervades the IḥyÄʾ project. Al-GhazÄlÄ« paints a picture of a God who has set humans on their earthly journey so that they may acquire the means to achieve this worldly safety and ultimate happiness (saÊ¿Äda) in the hereafter. But how is this to be understood? And why do so many people go astray?
3.2.2 Knowledge and Pleasure, Vice and Error
Throughout the IḥyÄʾ al-GhazÄlÄ« falls back on a basic anthropological principle: each person loves what she or he knows (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 7:527, 8:372). Growing familiarity with some aspect of reality, anything that conforms to an aspect of our basic nature, will lead us to enjoy it more and more, as habituation breeds comfort. This, according to al-GhazÄlÄ«, is entirely natural. All facets of our constitution have been created for a purpose, whether this be our basic appetites of nutrition and reproduction, the more evolved drive for self-defence and recognition, or our various cognitive capacities. Al-GhazÄlÄ« thus affirms the basic Platonic tripartite division of the soul into appetite, spirit, and reason. To this is added the Peripatetic explanatory framework of the cognitive and motive psychic faculties as powers or potentialities (dunamis/quwwa, see Kukkonen 2012). Beginning with raw sensation and proceeding through our powers of discernment, deliberation, and (finally) insight, the exercise and actualisation of these capacities is coupled with a concomitant pleasure (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 8:372â386; Kukkonen 2015, 141â145).
Al-GhazÄlÄ« maintains that for anyone with eyes to see, the pleasures of knowledge both outweigh and outlast the pleasures of sensation, appetite, and spirit. He further claims that ultimately, only knowledge of God brings true and everlasting happiness (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 6:288, 8:387â408). Al-GhazÄlÄ« construes such knowledge in a fairly expansive manner as including Godâs attributes and acts. Much of the work done in the sciences can thereby be salvaged under the heading of praising God through praising His creation (El Shamsy 2016). Even undertakings such as travel can be meritorious if undertaken in the cause of learning about the wonders of Godâs creation or seeking out a spiritual instructor (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 4:333â339).
The same naturalistic framework helps to explain why Godâs original purpose for usâto sojourn through our earthly existence with an eye always on our otherworldly destinationâcan become clouded from our sights. Al-GhazÄlÄ« weds the emerging neo-AshÊ¿arÄ« analysis of how humans subjectively define good and evil (i.e., as that which they find agreeable and disagreeable) to the Aristotelian and Galenic picture of habituation. The ancient standby of the apparent vs. the real good allows al-GhazÄlÄ« to explain how people can perceive something as desirable that in reality will prove detrimental or destructive to their long-term happiness. Love of this world, in whatever shape it takes, evolves naturally alongside an individualâs deepening engagement with it (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 6:90â93). But the process may leave no room for the love of God, since the human heart cannot be set on two things at once (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 8:51â52, 185, 433). Further, the non-evident nature of the immaterial pleasures may lead to a lack of appreciation for them or even a denial of their existence (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 8:422â432). Some even deny the afterlife entirely; overestimate grossly their own goodness; or choose to gamble on Godâs forgiveness rather than take seriously the need to relinquish the present world (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 6:611, 625â635, 643â644, 7:197â198).
This may well be wilful delusion (ghurÅ«r). The mere conceivability of a Day of Judgment is enough to refute any purported rational calculus that privileges finite pleasure over infinite joy or condemnation (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 6:611â618, 9:206â224). But heedlessness (ghafla) plagues humankind nonetheless, from the simplest people to the most exalted scholars. In fact, it is a snare of Satanâs to turn even a love of knowledgeâwhether frivolous like chess, useful like medicine, or religious like the minutiae of lawâinto a distraction from a God-oriented life. Knowledge that is sought for the sake of the world is by definition worldly knowledge (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 6:82), a condemnation that is multiplied for those who desire to lord it over others or to win debates rather than earnestly seek the truth (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 6:655â656). Such a subjugation of the rational impulse to the temptations of power and fame represents a rank perversion of the natural order of things. In the use of reason, therefore, as much as in indulging oneâs appetite and spirit, there is excess as well as defect. Moderation, courage, and wisdom represent the healthy mean for each of these; they, together with justice (which, rather than being located in a single part of the soul, is manifested in the soulâs proper ordering, and which only has a single opposing vice, tyranny (jawr)), form the four cardinal virtues, as per the Platonic tradition (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:188â198).
The IḥyÄʾ contributes to the Islamic analysis of how reason can be put to evil ends (Kukkonen 2016a, 12â20). Ratiocination in service to self-deception and delusion is labelled by al-GhazÄlÄ« as the true Satanic impulse within us. The whisperings of Satan, evoked in the QurʾÄn, are a combination of false presentations of the apparent good and its worth, brought on by the workings of the so-called inner senses (imagination, estimation, and memory), plus the motivated reasoning that allows the soul to cling to its own mistaken evaluations (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:96â144). Individual misdeeds therefore occur, not because humans would not constantly be involved in ethical reasoning (they are), but because ethical premises are inescapably contingent and vulnerable to misstatement, arising out of a mixture of subjective predilections and learned responses. Even ethical precepts communicated through religion have this character (Marmura 1969; see al-GhazÄlÄ« 1961, 193â198).
Of the lower soulâs drives, appetite is the more foundational since it is associated with those functions from which no one can ever be entirely free. The spirited part of the soul is at once more refinedâit requires discernment (tamyÄ«z) and responds to the demands of reason, meaning that it can be harnessed to rein in the demands of the baser appetitesâbut at the same time it is the âghoul of reasonâ because of its ability to twist reason to do its bidding (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:114; 1998, 42). Much of the IḥyÄʾâs third quarter details the excesses of the soulâs spirited part and the resulting evils: rancour, envy, pride, ostentation, vanity, and the rest. Al-GhazÄlÄ« has trouble fitting the religious virtue of humility into a Greek framework in which the greatness of the soul is the virtuous mean (Vasalou 2019, 30â48). But in general, much of the IḥyÄʾâs most incisive ethical work is done in cataloguing the kinds of ethical pitfalls to which a man of al-GhazÄlÄ«âs own kenâknowledgeable, educated, self-assured, covetous of honours more than possessionsâis naturally subject.
Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs explanation of ethical lapse, then, encompasses both rational and non-rational aspects: it is about erroneous judgments as well as unhealthy proclivities. It also involves both individual experience and a societal component. The formation of misguided attachments receives a boost, oftentimes decisive, from the way individuals associate with others of their kind and support one anotherâs prejudices, so that soldiers can learn to revel together in aggression, death, and destruction; criminals in their resilience to just punishment; and so on (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:210â211). âEach party rejoices in what it has,â as al-GhazÄlÄ«âs preferred QurʾÄnic proof text has it (Q 23:53, 30:32), even if this is ultimately based on corrupt fantasies (al-khayÄlÄt al-fÄsida: al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 6:103â106).
3.2.3 Character and Action
Against these depredations, al-GhazÄlÄ« positions the IḥyÄʾ squarely in the spiritual medicine genre, positing that its program leads to the health of heart and soul, which enjoys vast preference over the health of the body. As per the workâs title, the crucial distinction is that al-GhazÄlÄ« claims his fourfold treatment to provide the blueprint for religious practice in particular (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 1:15). According to al-GhazÄlÄ«, the art of religious practice was the Prophetâs original mission and was well attested in early Islamic times but had since fallen into disrepair with the scholarsâ growing love of the world (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 7:171â173). The evocation of Prophets as the proper physicians of the soul, specifically in the context of arguing for the incompleteness of philosophical education for attaining salvation and/or felicity, goes back at least to the time of al-TawḥīdÄ« (d. 414/1023) (Griffel and Hachmeier 2010â2011). A steady undercurrent of the IḥyÄʾ and al-GhazÄlÄ«âs mature authorship, as a whole, is to underline how the practices disclosed by God through His Messenger are uniquely capable of effecting the reformation of the soul (Kukkonen 2016b).
Some of the efficacy of these practices is readily explicable, such as the direction of prayer calming the body and focusing attention so that singular intent (niyya) has a better chance at emerging and taking hold (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 1:615). Some of their secrets will remain known only to God; while others may become disclosed to His saints in the fullness of time and with the insight afforded to the purified soul. What seems safe to conclude is that if even a ritual practice such as the obligatory giving of alms is explained primarily in terms of bolstering faith, combatting covetousness, and engendering gratitude in the giverâs soul (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 2:31â35), rather than duty or benefit (both are evoked in the IḥyÄʾ, but neither is presented as the overriding principle), then al-GhazÄlÄ« must be a virtue ethicist above everything else (Sherif 1975; Farina 2015; Zargar 2017, 79â105).
Rather than virtue and vice (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:196), al-GhazÄlÄ« prefers to speak of good and bad character traits as the target of the Prophetic program of improvement (iḥsÄn). Following Galen (d. 216 CE) by way of Miskawayh (d. 421/1030) and al-RÄghib al-Iá¹£fahÄnÄ« (d. fifth/eleventh century), he defines character (khulq) as a âstable disposition of the soul from which actions issue without deliberation or forethoughtâ (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:190). At the same time, al-GhazÄlÄ« stands firm on the point that character is formed through repeated action and habituation (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 1:442). It is due to this feedback loop that (a) moral improvement is possible in the first place, in a manner that goes deeper than a forcible policing of outward words and deeds (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:199â206). (b) One also needs guidance by parents, society, spiritual teachers, and ultimately the prophets, to ensure that the formation of character gets on the right track.
The reciprocal nature of acts and character can be construed as inviting a question regarding which one is more foundational in the end. Is âgenerosityâ analysable simply as shorthand for a pattern of generous behaviour, and âgenerous characterâ at most an explanatory scheme for the kind of psycho-physiological makeup that will reliably produce favourable outcomes? If so, virtue would not be good in itself. Alternatively, should one wish to foreground an Islamic ethics of duty, one might argue that âgood characterâ is to be commended and pursued only insofar as it can be shown to secure obedience to the divine command. Here, too, virtue would be a means rather than an end.
Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs views on these issues may be gleaned from the IḥyÄʾâs treatment of avarice, niggardliness, and generosity. Al-GhazÄlÄ« first defines liberality (sakhÄʾ) and generosity (jÅ«d) as the praiseworthy mean between spending too little (i.e., miserliness) and spending too much (extravagance). To spend in a praiseworthy manner is to spend when that is called for and to save when that is required. Now, although any mention of a praiseworthy mean immediately calls to mind Aristotleâs definition of virtue, it bears noting that all that al-GhazÄlÄ« has said thus far still has to do exclusively with acts. Generosity is about spending according to the correct degree, neither extravagantly nor tightfistedly. Al-GhazÄlÄ«, however, next changes tack: simply following the law is not enough, instead, if one spends generously but still feels a pull in oneâs soul to withhold from spending, then this is a matter of making a show of liberality rather than truly being liberal (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 6:208). In line with the Aristotelian distinction between acting out of virtue and merely acting in accordance with virtue, al-GhazÄlÄ« repeatedly emphasises the point that intentional action is more laudable than unreflective or externally motivated enactment of what is expected or legislated (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, book 37).
This time, however, al-GhazÄlÄ« circles back to a counterargument. Does a correct calibration between stinginess and extravagance nonetheless not rely on a prior understanding of what is required (maÊ¿rifat al-wÄjib)? In other words, does not the divine decree still remain paramount? Al-GhazÄlÄ« does not deny this, instead, he leans into a distinction between what is required by law and what is required by wholesomeness (murūʾa) and insists that true liberality must fulfil both requirements. While what is legally required may be more or less universally fixed, what wholesomeness dictates will depend on âstates and individualsâ (aḥwÄl wa-ashkhÄá¹£), so that what is required of the rich person is different from the poor; what one should readily spend on family members is different from what oneâs duty is to strangers; what liberality looks like in sharing food is different from other possessions; and so on and so forth. All these situational factors add up to something that looks like civic virtue along Aristotelian lines (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 6:208â209).
Additionally, Al-GhazÄlÄ« insists that no one can truly be regarded as liberal or generous if they do not surpass both legal and societal expectations. This supererogatory component (ziyÄda) is chosen for the sake of pursuing virtue and the attainment of higher degrees (al-faá¸Ä«la wa-nayl al-darajÄt): it consists of giving and keeping for the sake of God and the hereafter, not for any worldly recompense or reputation. While utterly disinterested giving may be beyond the ken of humankind and only applicable to God, who alone is truly deserving of the epithet âGenerous,â giving for the sake of drawing close to God is the height of praiseworthiness in human terms. Both al-GhazÄlÄ«âs remarks in the IḥyÄʾ and his treatment of the subject in al-Maqá¹£id al-AsnÄ fÄ« Sharḥ MaÊ¿ÄnÄ« AsmÄʾ AllÄh al-ḤusnÄ (âThe Best Goals in Explaining the Meanings of the Beautiful Names of AllÄhâ) help to clarify that such an effort has to do with imitating and taking on Godâs noble attributes, to the extent that this is possible for a human being (al-GhazÄlÄ« 1982, 87â88, 127â128, 156).
Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs ethical commitments run in the direction of virtue, then, with the twin provisos that (a) his is a eudaemonistic project and that (b) without the divine command to set humanity on the right track and keep it on the straight path, the virtuous cycle of acts and character formation would never be possible. What remains to be resolved is whether the different degrees of happiness obtainable by different people connote different degrees or even sets of virtue.
3.2.4 Perfection and Moderation
The perfectionist streak in al-GhazÄlÄ«âs ethics is plain to see. Al-GhazÄlÄ« elevates exemplars of spiritual athleticism in the foregone ascetic-contemplative tradition. At such lofty heights, even âthe virtues of the pious are sins to those who draw nearâ to God (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 1:470). This is pointedly not an endorsement of religious antinomianism (ibÄḥiyya), a fatal mistake against which al-GhazÄlÄ« warns repeatedly (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 6:107â108; see also al-GhazÄlÄ« 1998, 32â34; al-GhazÄlÄ« 1967, 118â120; cf. al-GhazÄlÄ« 2000, 1â2). But al-GhazÄlÄ« uses the key concept of a God-directed life to organise a series of responses to questions about how certain rituals and acts are to be carried out.
Every God-fearing person will naturally seek to fulfil all that religious law requires. Yet the person whose true purpose is to draw closer to God will not be overly distracted by the minutiae of ritual or custom. The advanced aspirant will not obsess even over asceticism, since a negative concern with oneâs appetites still signals a concern with self rather than God (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 8:15â16). The purpose of quieting oneâs own desires and submitting to the will of God is that this allows the soulâs mirror to be stilled, clarified, and polished, so that Godâs truth may find clear reflection on it.
This brings al-GhazÄlÄ« to an unconventional interpretation of virtue as the mean. Al-GhazÄlÄ« likens this to skin-temperature water that one barely feels. The implication is that an optimal calibration of the worldly virtues is one that will interfere minimally with oneâs pursuit of God and the life to come: for instance, virtuous generosity and asceticism are actually about utter indifference to wealth (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:224, 8:49). This is clearly very different from the Peripatetic ideal, which has to do with learning to care the correct amount about the right kinds of things at the appropriate times, as befits the worldly gentleperson (Kukkonen 2015, 151â156). In contrast, al-GhazÄlÄ«âs would-be saint appears dispassionate and imperturbable (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 6:290â291), reserving genuine passion solely for the love of God. As for the genuinely virtuous individual, mastering the balance initially demands meticulous calibration by adapting to varying degrees of discomfort on either side of the optimum (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:223â225, 6:435). Over time, this equilibrium evolves into second natureâseamless to the extent of being imperceptible, if not actively pleasurable. Those who have reached the highest station are no longer preoccupied with the self at all, only with God and with doing Godâs will (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 8:127â131, 9:256â257).
For all this, in al-GhazÄlÄ«âs providential view of creation, the appetitive and spirited parts of the soul play a positive role in peopleâs ordinary lives, and so the primary emotional manifestations of these twoânamely appetite and angerâeach must have a useful place, too (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:345, 358, 596â597, 8:409). Any attempt to extirpate the passions will prove not only futile but counterproductive: such a feat is impossible and therefore liable to produce desperation and (paradoxically) result in ethical slackness (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:604â605). Moderation of the passions and attenuated striving provides a realistic path for the majority of people. Al-GhazÄlÄ« is committed to the Islamic standby of religionâs practical requirements being reasonable and responsive to what human nature requires: marriage not only protects the family unit but provides a healthy and ethical framework for sexual needs to be met, and so on. Even the rhythms of religious services, with their assigned times and frequencies, and their shifts between mental focus and bodily gestures, have been set so as not to overburden the soul or strain the average personâs concentration. This applies equally to the ordinances of individual religious acts such as the ritual prayer and to the way that rituals and mundane life alternate at intervals (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 2:459â460).
The tiered approach to religious observance has profound eschatological consequences. According to how seriously people take their religion, they will be divided on the Day of Judgment into those who sit on Godâs left hand and those who sit on the right. While the latter, too, will be saved, there is no felicity promised to them such as awaits âthose who draw near.â Significantly, al-GhazÄlÄ« explains this separation based on the ethical naturalism developed across the IḥyÄʾ. As long as the fulfilment of the lawâs requirements happens on the basis of a faith adopted on the basis of authority (taqlÄ«d)âthat is, through an external execution of the command without an effort to understand its significance or perfect its practiceâthe purification of the soul simply cannot get properly underway, let alone be completed to the point that the divine disclosures would have occasion to descend on the heart. For those to whom such gifts can flow, an infinite progression of grades is on offer (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 7:94â96). Those consigned to suffer the pains of hellfire, whether for a short or a long time or all eternity, also have effectively condemned themselves by their disbelief and misdeeds. The very worst off have turned away from God; others, while retaining a modicum of faith, allow their sins to tarnish the mirror of their soul to the point that their happiness becomes fatally entwined in the enjoyment of the present world. Peopleâs own benighted state, in other words, causes their suffering.
While acknowledging these stratifications, it is important not to lose sight of the way al-GhazÄlÄ«âs prose unsettles any preconceptions readers may have about their own standing in the eyes of God and how his chief aimâthat of dislodging any false moral complacencyâtranslates into a fluid field of action. On the one hand, al-GhazÄlÄ«âs tireless exposure of the lowly motives underlying high-minded behaviour follows in the footsteps of Sufismâs school of blame (malÄmatiyya). On the other hand, his habit of always outlining further steps on the ladder to perfection has the tantalising effect of putting each and every reader in the shoes of the would-be saint, whatever their concrete station in life may be, and allowing imaginative projection. Perfection in this life in any case will prove elusive: and because there is no way to uproot altogether the occurrent notions (khawÄá¹ir) in the course of this life, Satan always retains a ledge from which to resume his attack with evil suggestions. Even the most advanced aspirant therefore must remain vigilant and on guard until the end of her or his days (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, 5:154â159, 9:206â224).
4 Broader Context
Contextualising al-GhazÄlÄ«âs IḥyÄʾ at a minimum must encompass three dimensions: (a) al-GhazÄlÄ«âs use of his sources, (b) the placement of the IḥyÄʾ within al-GhazÄlÄ«âs authorship, (c) the impact of the IḥyÄʾ. Any of these topics would merit a major study. Only minimal remarks can be offered here.
4.1 Sources
Al-GhazÄlÄ« weaves philosophical and Sufi ethics themes throughout the fabric of the IḥyÄʾ. The crucial difference is that al-GhazÄlÄ« never evokes any of the philosophers by name, whether Greek or Arabic, whereas foregone Muslim authorities are foregrounded in al-GhazÄlÄ«âs treatment both of acts and of spiritual states and character traits. These follow a set sequence, in descending order of priority: first the QurʾÄn, then the ḥadÄ«ths, then the Prophetâs companions, then the saints and scholars. Al-GhazÄlÄ« also incorporates large swathes of actual text from the emerging Sufi literature, above all AbÅ« ṬÄlib al-MakkÄ«âs (d. 386/996) QÅ«t al-QulÅ«b (âNourishment of Heartsâ) (see Gramlich 1984; 1991â1995). Traces of al-QushayrÄ« (d. 465/1075), al-MuḥÄsibÄ« (d. 243/857), and numerous others have also been identified. All in all, it is clear that al-GhazÄlÄ« wishes us to see his ethics as drawing on the practices of the Prophet and the early Muslim community most of allâthis notwithstanding his somewhat shaky reputation as a ḥadÄ«th scholar.
In terms of philosophical ethics, the largest influence is Galen, the second- century CE philosopher-physician. Galenâs treatises Peri EthÅn (De Moribus, âOn Character Traitsâ) and Peri DiagnÅseÅs kai TherapeÃas tÅn en tÄ Hekástou PsychÄ IdÃÅn PathÅn (De Propriorum Animi Cuiuslibet Affectuum Dignotione et Curatione, âOn the Affections and Errors of the Soulâ) furnished Muslim readers with a synthesis of Platonic and Aristotelian themes: al-GhazÄlÄ« most likely came to them via al-RÄghib al-Iá¹£fahÄnÄ«âs adaptation of Miskawayhâs TahdhÄ«b al-AkhlÄq (âOn Reformation of Characterâ) (Mohamed 2006). Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs readings in Ibn SÄ«nÄ (d. 427/1037), al-FÄrÄbÄ« (d. 339/950), and the RasÄʾil IkhwÄn al-á¹¢afÄ (fl. third-fourth/ninth-tenth century) (âLetters of the Brethren of Purityâ)âpossibly, too, the school of al-KindÄ«âprovided tools for generating the theoretical matrix in which to thread the necessary connections between human physiology, cognitive psychology, character formation, epistemology, and even politics. It is in al-GhazÄlÄ«âs description of contemplative bliss that Ibn SÄ«nÄâs influence is most keenly felt (Kukkonen 2012; Treiger 2012).
Yet to label al-GhazÄlÄ«âs thought a composite ethics, as Mohamed Abul Quasem (1978) and others have done, can obscure from sight the sui generis nature of al-GhazÄlÄ«âs IḥyÄʾ. The IḥyÄʾ is not a Sufi work, nor does it read as an exercise in crypto-philosophy. Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs subversion of existing disciplinary expectations and boundaries is felt no less keenly in his appropriation of philosophical and Sufi ethics than in the way he undercuts kalÄm and Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh). While al-RÄghib al-Iá¹£fahÄnÄ« provided al-GhazÄlÄ« with a partial model for how aspects of philosophical ethics can be presented under the Islamic guise of the soulâs purification, KitÄb al-DharÄ«Ê¿a ilÄ MakÄrim al-SharÄ«Ê¿a (âThe Path to Virtueâ) comes nowhere close to al-GhazÄlÄ«, either in terms of panoptic vision or systematic innovation. The IḥyÄʾ cannot be simply distilled from its source materials, despite numerous attempts to do so (see section 4.3 Impact).
4.2 Internal Comparisons
A second perspective is to situate the IḥyÄʾ within al-GhazÄlÄ«âs own authorship. While the MÄ«zÄn al-Ê¿Amal, published in 488/1095, previews many of the IḥyÄʾâs more systematic aspects, the IḥyÄʾ forms the foundation for al-GhazÄlÄ«âs mature career. Most of al-GhazÄlÄ«âs later writings can be classified under the rubrics of either reworking the IḥyÄʾ, expanding on it, or responding to its critics. That is to say:
The KÄ«mÄ«yÄ-yi SaÊ¿Ädat (âChemistry of Happinessâ) essentially rearranges the IḥyÄʾâs raw materials for a Persian readership. KÄ«mÄ«yÄ-yi adds a lengthy introductory section; it also places the book on love (al-GhazÄlÄ« 2011, book 36) at the culmination of the salvific virtues, adjacent to a consideration of the afterlife and the soulâs final fate. The KitÄb al-ArbaÊ¿Ä«n (âBook of Fortyâ), an add-on to the JawÄhir al-QurʾÄn (âJewels of the QurʾÄnâ), summarises many of the IḥyÄʾâs central themes. Finally, the al-LubÄb min al-IḥyÄʾ (âKernels of the Revivalâ), an epitome sometimes ascribed to al-GhazÄlÄ«âs brother Aḥmad (d. 520/1126), appears to have been authored by AbÅ« ḤÄmid himself (Griffel 2009, 306n7).
Most of al-GhazÄlÄ«âs own expansions on the IḥyÄʾâs themes proceed in a more theoretical direction, intimating that he regarded the IḥyÄʾâs ethics as being largely complete. The one significant exception is al-Maqá¹£id al-AsnÄ, a treatise in which al-GhazÄlÄ« explores the tradition of reflecting on and imitating Godâs ninety-nine revealed names (Casewit 2020). Al-GhazÄlÄ« restates many of the IḥyÄʾâs core tenets, including a gradated scale of excellences and the human beingâs ultimate inability to comprehend or to manifest the divine qualities in full, to say nothing of attaining to the divine essence (Kukkonen 2010). Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs conception of takhalluq (acquiring moral character traits) in al-Maqá¹£id al-AsnÄ nonetheless expands considerably on the IḥyÄʾâs list of desirable character traits. And because the divine perfections provide a hortatory framing device, the tone struck by al-Maqá¹£id al-AsnÄ is more in line with the tradition that treats virtue as an ethics of excellence. This amplifies an elision in the Greek sources between the beautiful and the good (Gr. to kalon kai to agathon), a conflation further bolstered by the multivalence of the Arabic term ḥasan. Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs Naṣīḥat al-MulÅ«k (âCounsel for Kingsâ), an exemplar in the âmirrors for princesâ genre, can reasonably be considered an extension of the IḥyÄʾ as it concentrates on the virtuous attributes of a pious ruler.
Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs response pieces centre on the theological and cosmological controversies generated by the IḥyÄʾ since these dominated the IḥyÄʾâs earliest reception. However, al-GhazÄlÄ«âs semi-autobiographical al-Munqidh min al-á¸alÄl (âDeliverer from Errorâ) includes a section that explicitly argues for the religious provenance of what ostensibly looks like philosophical ethics. Al-Munqidh min al-á¸alÄlâs argument for the unique efficacy of the Prophetâs mission supplies a more explicit post facto rationale for the IḥyÄʾâs overall shape than the IḥyÄʾ itself provides (Kukkonen 2016b). Apparently, sometime between writing the IḥyÄʾ and the publication of al-Munqidh min al-á¸alÄl, al-GhazÄlÄ« was made aware of the need to burnish his ethical theoryâs and especially its attendant moral psychologyâs Islamic credentials.
4.3 Impact
The European fixation on al-GhazÄlÄ«âs autobiography and on TahÄfut al-FalÄsifa has had a distorting effect on the Western perception of al-GhazÄlÄ«, one that undervalues al-GhazÄlÄ« as a virtue ethicist. Any face-value reading of al-GhazÄlÄ«âs mature authorship, by contrast, and certainly of the IḥyÄʾ, will readily foreground al-GhazÄlÄ«âs ethical preoccupation. Yet the IḥyÄʾâs placement in the broader history of Islamic ethics presents us with multiple paradoxes. The workâs spectacular successes are inextricably conjoined to the ways in which its impact also became blunted. Consider the following:
Part of the mystique of the IḥyÄʾ derives from its status as the work with which al-GhazÄlÄ« emerged from his self-imposed wilderness years, a âfrom the mountaintopâ narrative that did much to enhance al-GhazÄlÄ«âs standing as a religious reformer. Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs relative devaluation of the established disciplines (fiqh and kalÄm above all, see Gianotti 2011) positions the work as a new kind of intervention. But while the IḥyÄʾ allowed al-GhazÄlÄ« to reinvent himself as a public intellectual with a reforming mission (Garden 2014), the institutional resilience of the traditional disciplines meant that no thoroughgoing upheaval of the religious sciences was ever on the cards. Instructive is the early Andalusian controversy. Sixth-twelfth-century Maghrebi scholars rightly perceived a challenge to their authority in the IḥyÄʾâs overtones of Ê¿amal and the purification of the soul being privileged over science (Ê¿ilm) as a painstakingly built-up body of knowledge and expertise. Countermeasures ranged from book burnings, through censure, to an eventual domestication of al-GhazÄlÄ«âs ideas (Casewit 2017, 50â56).
It is doubtful that al-GhazÄlÄ« expected any overt revolution. Even his own students each went in different directions; none carried forward the IḥyÄʾ project in any straightforward sense (Griffel 2009, 61â95). What happened instead is that the uses to which credentialed Muslim experts put the IḥyÄʾâs materials tended to reflect their needs precisely as credentialed experts. For instance, a Sufi writer would find in the IḥyÄʾ a validation of the supremacy of the Sufi path, while a theologian would seek confirmation either of al-GhazÄlÄ«âs orthodoxy or his heresy (whatever that meant to the scholar in question). The dozens of epitomes of the IḥyÄʾ written by different hands each represent re-inscriptions and re-imaginings of various sorts (BadawÄ« 1961, 114â18). Even a Christian reworking of the IḥyÄʾâs themes exists in the Ktobo d-Itiqun (âEthiconâ) of Barhebraeus (d. 685/1286), a Syrian Orthodox bishop (Takahashi 2015, 309â314).
The pattern repeats up to the present day. Modernising Muslims find in al-GhazÄlÄ« a proto-modernist; historians of philosophy persistently pick up on the IḥyÄʾâs Avicennian underpinnings; while even a re-inscription of the IḥyÄʾ that hews close to the original, aiming to integrate Sufism with the Muslim everyday life, still finds occasion to tweak the material to suit twenty-first- century sensibilities (Garden 2016). Meanwhile, the elements in al-GhazÄlÄ«âs synthesis that are less palatable to a reader of a given background continue to confound and intrigue. If, for instance, al-GhazÄlÄ«âs place in the history of Islamic metaethics was to bridge classical AshÊ¿arÄ« deontology with the neo-AshÊ¿arism that under Fakhr al-DÄ«n al-RÄzÄ« (d. 606/1210) took on consequentialist characteristics, as has been suggested (Shihadeh 2016), then one can readily understand how neither virtue ethicists, nor consequentialists, nor again proponents of divine command ethics will easily make the IḥyÄʾâs materials wholly fit their respective agendas.
But what has proved equally as important is the way the IḥyÄʾ provides individual readers, regardless of background and training, the tools with which to reimagine their place in the existing religious order(s). Scholars have spoken in this connection about the prominence of âtechnologies of the selfâ in al-GhazÄlÄ« (Moosa 2005). By this, it is meant first, a certain reciprocity between knowledge and (em)power(ment). Paradoxically, it is through subjecting oneself to the project of disciplining oneself, in the framework of an existing discipline, that one gains access to subjecthood and the possibility of personal re-creation.
Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs legacy in this regard points in two directions. Some readers have picked up on al-GhazÄlÄ«âs deployment of the ages-old Platonic trope of self-knowledge as a recognition of oneâs higher self, and consequently linked up the IḥyÄʾ with various orders of rational mysticism. But because the IḥyÄʾ encourages the reader to focus on the movements of her or his own lower soul, said motions being endlessly variegated and personalised, and because al-GhazÄlÄ« insists that Satan will find ever cleverer ways to ensnare the practitioner and that unceasing vigilance, his project takes on an ever-evolving and perpetually self-overcoming quality (Kukkonen 2008). This is one way to read the IḥyÄʾ âas a scriptâ: reinterpretation through performative realisation (Ormsby 2008, 115â116).
The IḥyÄʾ also invites a similar reaction to weighing elements of oneâs inherited traditions against one another, as more or less helpful tools to assist in the crucial task of self-examination. Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs ideal religious aspirantâthe one for whom he provides a model in his own al-Munqidh min al-á¸alÄlâextends her or his critique inside, but also out. The fleet-footed way with which al-GhazÄlÄ« wields his vast knowledge, and the deftness with which he executes his perspectival shifts between the granular and the general, the exalted and the mundane, practically invites the reader to engage actively with the many traditions on which the IḥyÄʾ relies the same way al-GhazÄlÄ« does.
5 Conclusion
There is a dimension to all this with which it is appropriate to close this chapter. Ken Garden has remarked that in the IḥyÄʾ al-GhazÄlÄ« âtruly stands philosophyâs Practical Science on its headâ by prioritising individual perfection over the right ordering of the household or the political order (Garden 2014, 54). And it is certainly true that the latter two are only treated obliquely in the IḥyÄʾ. Garden views the turn taken by al-GhazÄlÄ«âs thought in terms of the upheaval of the SeljÅ«q period. In Gardenâs telling of the story, disillusionment with the possibilities of political power led al-GhazÄlÄ« to privilege the private domain over the communal and societal. Yet, as Michael Cook points out and as Garden himself acknowledges, in the nineteenth book of the IḥyÄʾ, which takes as its subject the injunction KitÄb al-Amr bi-l-MaÊ¿rÅ«f wa-l-Nahy Ê¿an al-Munkar (âOn Enjoining Right and Forbidding Wrongâ), al-GhazÄlÄ« views moral responsibility as expanding from querying oneâs own conduct and motivations (which always comes first) to oneâs household and neighbours, city, potentially until the ends of the world (Cook 2000, 445). This picture is confirmed by al-GhazÄlÄ«âs self-presentation in al-Munqidh min al-á¸alÄl (al-GhazÄlÄ« 1967, 123); it can help to explain the continued appeal of al-GhazÄlÄ«âs demanding ethical vision in an age characterised by the contending forces of globalism and solipsism. We have only begun to understand what the reception history of the IḥyÄʾ as ethics may look like, once we appreciate the conceptual possibilities it opens up in this regard.
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As this essay was being completed, I was made aware of a new study by Dhibī (2018), which, however, I have not been able to consult.
Marc S. Stern released an English translation of this book in 1990 under the title of Al-Ghazzali on Repentance. There have since been unauthorised reprints of the translation.
Willam McKane released an English translation of this book in 1965 under the title of Al-GhazÄlÄ«âs Book of Fear and Hope. There have since been unauthorised reprints of the translation.