Al-Kindī is famously known as “the first philosopher of Islam” (Kevin Staley, “Al-Kindi on Creation: Aristotle’s Challenge to Islam,” Journal of the History of Ideas 50/3 (1989): 355–370). Among his works, Fī al-falsafa al-ūlā—concerned, as its title indicates, with metaphysics or “first philosophy”—arguably belongs to the most influential ones, and it is certainly the work that has received the greatest attention in academic scholarship on al-Kindī. Yet, al-Kindī was a prolific writer who penned works on a variety of other subjects as well, among them psychology, physics, cosmology, and mathematics, to name but a few. On al-Kindī’s life and works, see:
Gerhard Endress and Peter Adamson, “§4. Abū Yūsuf al-Kindī,” in Grundriss der Geschichte der Philosophie, Philosophie in der islamischen Welt, Band 1: 8.‒10. Jahrhundert, ed. Ulrich Rudolph (Basel: Schwabe Verlag, 2012), 92–147.
Fī al-falsafa al-ūlā, the first chapter is concerned with the proof that “it is impossible that there is an eternal body” (Al-Kindī, “Fī al-falsafa al-ūlā,” 122), by which al-Kindī also means the universe, “the body of it all” (jirm al-kull). Al-Kindī proves this, on the one hand, by pointing to his definition of the eternal as that which has no genus, which allows him to conclude that “inasmuch as body has genus […] body is not eternal” (Al-Kindī, “Fī al-falsafa al-ūlā,” 113–114). On the other hand, he shows that a body cannot in actuality be infinite in terms of quantity and quality, which means that its time and duration also have a beginning. Since the universe has hence been proven to have a beginning for its existence, in the next chapter al-Kindī turns to the proof that nothing can actualize its own existence: “the thing [that enters existence] cannot be the cause of the actualization of its [own] essence (ʿillat kawn dhātihi).”
Peter Adamson, who has extensively written on al-Kindī’s thought, locates his proof of God’s existence in the discussion of what caused the association of unity and multiplicity in sensible things. Referring to the conclusion al-Kindī reaches there that “[t]herefore, there is necessarily a true One, caused in unity,” Adamson argues: “[a]l-Kindī first establishes the existence of God via an analysis of types of utterance. He […] explains that in fact all […] fall under two main classes: the substantial and the accidental.” He then adds: “[t]his distinction between the substantial or ‘essential’ and the accidental is crucial to al-Kindī’s first, brief argument for the existence of God” (Adamson, “Al-Kindī and the Muʿtazila,” 50). Elsewhere, Adamson remarks, in reference to the very same conclusion reached by al-Kindī, that “[s]ince it is God who is the ‘true One’ in question, this is nothing short of a proof for God’s existence” (Adamson, Al-Kindī, 50).
A different reading of al-Kindī’s argument: he does take God Himself, that is, Allāh, for granted. God’s existence is hence not at stake and even cannot be at stake. When al-Kindī concludes that there must be a “true One,” he means to say this: it is known that the aforementioned association requires a cause. God/Allāh, thus, needs to be identified as this cause, that is, we need to say of Him that He is the cause. Adamson and Endress proffer a similar reading of al-Kindī’s arguments, with the only difference that, unlike Atiyeh, they consider this second proof put forward by al-Kindī an implicit proof of God’s existence. Yet, they also argue that his proof is based on the idea that the world, in being originated, requires a cause. This proof of God’s existence is considered an implicit one only as al-Kindī does not actually state, after having proved the world’s beginning in time, that this necessitates the existence of its creator (Endress and Adamson, “§4. Abū Yūsuf al-Kindī,” 129).
Mustafa Cerić has likewise argued that al-Māturīdī proves God’s existence “through its [i.e. the world’s] nature and function [in which we] find indisputable proof of the existence of its Creator, i.e., God” (Mustafa Cerić, Roots of Synthetic Theology in Islām: A Study of the Theology of Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī (d. 333/944), 108). Cerić furthermore writes: “[w]e know that the world exists because we see it with our eyes […]. However, we do not see God. So the question is: Does God exist? ‘Yes, God does exist,’ al-Māturīdī would answer, and, he would prove that by the fact of the world’s existence which must have been created by an agent” (Cerić, Roots, 141–142). Finally, in his study of al-Māturīdī’s work entitled Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī: Ḥayātuhu wa-ārāʾuhu al-ʿaqdiyya, Bilqāsim al-Ghālī dedicates a major section to “al-Māturīdī’s proofs of the existence of God” (Bilqāsim al-Ghālī, Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī: Ḥayātuhu wa-ārāʾuhu al-ʿaqdiyya, 102-134). Al-Ghālī remarks: “the kalām schools of the Ashʿarīs and the Muʿtazilīs were well-versed in proving the existence of God (wujūd Allāh) […] and we encounter this also in the Māturīdī school and in particular at the hands of its founder, Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī” (Al-Ghālī, Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī, 102). Cerić: “[a]l-Māturīdī’s arguments for the existence of God are by and large Cosmological [sic]” (Cerić, Roots, 144).
Al-Māturīdī’s argument runs as follows: the proof that there is for the world an originator is […] that if the world existed due to itself, there would be no point in time which is truer for it than any other, and no state which is more appropriate for it than any other, and no characteristic which is more suitable for it than any other. But since it is characterised by different points in time, states, and attributes, it is established that it does not exist due to itself—for if it did, it would be possible (jāza) that everything gives itself states which are most beautiful and the best, and this entails that evil and horrendous things would not exist (fa-yabṭul bihi al-shurūr wa’l-qabāʾiḥ), but their existence proves the world’s existence due to another (Al-Māturīdī, Kitāb al-Tawḥīd, 17).
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