Ibn Khaldun's Philosophy of History: A Study in the Philosophic Foundation of the Science of Culture

328 Pages·2017·16.122 MB·English

by  Muhsin Mahdi

ROUTLEDGE LIBRARY EDITIONS:
ISLAMIC THOUGHT IN THE MIDDLE AGES
Volume 2
’
IBN KHALDÛN S PHILOSOPHY
OF HISTORY
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IBN KHALDÛN’S PHILOSOPHY
OF HISTORY
A Study in the Philosophic Foundation of the
Science of Culture
MUHSIN MAHDI
Firstpublishedin1957byGeorgeAllen&UnwinLtd
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Ibn Khaldün's
Philosophy oE History
A STUDY IN THE PHILOSOPHIC
FOUNDATION OF THE SCIENCE
OF CULTURE
BY
MUHSIN MAHDI
George Allen and Unwin Ltd
RUSKIN HOUSE
MUSEUM STREET LONDON
First published in 1957
This book is copyright under the Berne Convention.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of
private study, research, criticism or review, as per
mitted under the Copyright Act 1911, no portion
may be reproduced by any process without written
permission. Enquiry should be made to the publisher.
Printed in Great Britain
in lI-pt Imprint
by Purnell fs! Sons Ltd. (Paulton) Somerset fs! London
FOR MARY LOUISE
Nauta rudis pelagi ut saevis ereptus ab undis
in portum veniens pectora laeta tenet . .•
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PREFACE
It is a curious fate that history should for a long time have been
considered and treated as the most humble form of knowledge,
while philosophy was considered as the highest, and that now it
not only ia superior to philosophy hut annihilates it.
BENEDETTO CROCE1
I. In no other field has the revolt of modern Western thought
against traditional philosophy been so far-reaching in its conse
quences as in the field of history. The case between the ancients
and their modern critics in its extreme form can be formulated
as follows: For the ancients, 'historical knowledge is impos
sible ';2 while for their modern critics all knowledge is historical.
For the ancients, history means the description and explanation
of actual events which are useful both as examples for men of
action, and as material for the practical and theoretical sciences.
Since the end of philosophy or science is the demonstration of
necessary and explanatory conclusions which claim universal
validity, history is, at best, the most humble of sciences because
its conclusions are necessarily relative to particular events. For
their modern critics, philosophy par excellence is the philosophy
of history or the 'complete philosophy conceived from an
historical point of view'. 3 The modern critics of traditional
philosophy assert, not only that all facts are historical, but also
that all reality is historical.
Thus the issue between the ancients and the modems seems
to raise the deeper issue of the nature of scientific knowledge and
of Being. The ancients assert that behind the facts of history and
experience there are universal and objective essences, natures,
and causes, to which the concepts and judgments of the mind
should correspond. These essences, natures, and causes are
intrinsically and logically prior to the mutable facts of history
and experience despite the fact that, in the order in which they
are known, they are posterior to these: for they are the principles
that underlie them and give them their intelligibility. The
1 History as the Story of Liberty, trans. Sylvia Sprigge (George Allen & Unwin
1941) 35·
2 R. G. Collingwood The Idea of History (Oxford 1946) 6.
3 Ibid. 7.
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