Al-Ghazali  

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"Of the "four branches" of philosophy (geometry and mathematics, logic, theology, and natural sciences), some of the natural sciences "go against shari’ah, Islam and truth" and except for medicine, "there is no need for the study of nature". --Al-Ghazali, The Revival of Religious Sciences, quoted in IslamQA[1]


Al-Ghazali argued that Aristotelianism, especially as presented in the writings of Avicenna, was self-contradictory and an affront to the teachings of Islam. In particular he argued that three philosophical points (viz. a pre-eternal world, God only knowing universal - that is to say, Platonic - characteristics of particulars, and a spiritual rather than physical resurrection) constituted not just heresy, but rather disbelief in Islam itself.

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Al-Ghazali (c. 1058–1111) was a Muslim theologian, jurist, philosopher, and mystic of Persian descent.

His 11th century book titled The Incoherence of the Philosophers marks a major turn in Islamic epistemology. The encounter with skepticism led al-Ghazali to embrace a form of theological occasionalism, or the belief that all causal events and interactions are not the product of material conjunctions but rather the immediate and present Will of God.

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