Before Essence and Existence

Endnotes [^1]: See the discussion of this question in A. Cortabarria Beitia, "À partir de quelles sources étudier al-Kindi?",MIDEO 10 (1970): 83-108.

[^2]: In what follows I shall assume that Himsi was in fact the author of the paraphrase and the source of its deviations from Plotinus, contrary to the earlier supposition that the paraphrase was originally by Porphyry (see, e.g., P. Thillet, "Indices Porphyriens dans la Théologie d'Aristote," inLe Néoplatonisme , Colloques internationaux du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Sciences Humaines, Royaumont 9-13, Juin 1969 [Paris, 1971], 293-302, and S. Pinès, "Les Textes dits plotiniens et le courant 'porphyrien' dans le néoplatonisme grec," in ibid., 303-17). For the case against Porphyry and for Himsi as the sole author, see F. Zimmermann, "The Origins of the So CalledTheology of Aristotle ," in J. Kraye et al., eds.,Warburg Institute Surveys and Texts XI: Pseudo-Aristotle in the Middle Ages (London: Warburg Institute, 1986), 110-240, esp. 131-3. For an update of Zimmermann's views on al-Kindi's circle, generally consonant with his conclusions in this earlier paper, see "Proclus Arabus Rides Again,"Arabic Sciences and Philosophy 4 (1994): 9-51. See further P. Adamson,The Arabic Plotinus: A Philosophical Study of the "Theology of Aristotle" (London: Duckworth, 2002).

[^3]: Because al-Kindi's works are so closely engaged with the translations he commissioned, it is important to consider those translations in any consideration of his philosophy. Often passages in the extant Arabic versions of Aristotle or the Neoplatonists provide a starting-point for understanding his philosophical works, and indeed this will be my strategy below. For a superb analysis of the translation movement under the 'Abbasids, see D. Gutas,Greek Thought, Arabic Culture (London: Routledge, 1998); on al-Kindi's circle in particular 145-50. See also G. Endress, "The Circle of al-Kindi," inThe Ancient Tradition in Christian and Islamic Hellenism , G. Endress and R. Kruk, eds. (Leiden: Research School CNWS, 1997), 43-76.

[^4]:K. fi 'l-Falsafa al-Ula (On First Philosophy ), 98.1-2. All translations from al-Kindi and other texts are my own unless otherwise noted. The Arabic texts for many philosophical works of al-Kindi can be found in al-Kindi,Rasa'il al-Kindial-Falsafiyya , M. Abu Rida, ed. (Cairo: 1950-53). Page and line citations are to Volume One of this work unless otherwise noted.

A most welcome development in al-Kindi studies is the series edited by Roshdi Rashed and Jean Jolivet,Oeuvres Philosophiques & Scientifiques d'al-Kind i, appearing with Brill in five volumes. As yet, only the first two have appeared (Volume One:L'Optique et la Catoptrique [Leiden: Brill, 1997], Volume Two:Métaphysique et Cosmologie [Leiden: Brill, 1998]). But as the Arabic texts provided in this series will undoubtedly be the standard edition in the future, I will give additional page and line citations to Volume Two of this series where applicable, marked in brackets and with the abbreviation RJ.

[^5]:R. fi kammiyya Kutub Aristutalis wa ma yuhtaju ilayhi fi tahsil al-falsafa (On the Quantity of the Books of Aristotle and What is Required for the Attainment of Philosophy ), Abu Rida, 363-84 at 384.9.

[^6]: The Arabic text for theTheology and other parts of the Arabic Plotinus is inAflutin 'inda 'l-'Arab , A. Badawi, ed. (Cairo: 1955). Translations are my own, but for the reader's convenience section numbers are taken from G.Lewis's English translation inPlotini Opera , P. Henry and H.-R. Schwyzer (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1959), vol. 2. I also give references to Badawi's edition by page and line numbers in brackets prefaced by "B." Thus, for example, the passage just quoted is Prologue 11 and 14 [B 6.1 and 6.7-8].

For an argument aimed at showing that al-Kindi was the author of the Prologue to theTheology , see C. D'Ancona Costa, "Al-Kindi on the Subject Matter of the First Philosophy. Direct and Indirect Sources of 'Falsafa-l-Ula,' Chapter

One," inWas ist Philosophie im Mittelalter , J. A. Aertsen and A. Speer, eds., Miscellanea Mediaevalia (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1998), 841-55.

[^7]: For the Arabic text, see O. Bardenhewer,Die pseudo-aristotelische Schrift über das reine Gute (Frankfurt a.M.: Minerva, 1882). The best English translation currently available can be found in St. Thomas Aquinas,Commentary on the Book of Causes , Guagliardo et al., trans. (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University Press, 1996).

[^8]: It is now well established that three separate texts represent an original, united Arabic Plotinus paraphrase: theUthulujiyya (Theology of Aristotle ); theSayings of the Greek Sage , which assembles various texts attributed to "the Greek Sage" (al-Shaykh al-Yunan i); and the pseudo-FarabianR. fi 'l-'Ilm al-Ilahi (Letter on Divine Science ). See Zimmermann (1986), 113.

[^9]: M.-Th. D'Alverny, "Anniyya-Anitas," inMélanges offerts a Étienne Gilson (Toronto: Pontifical Institute, 1959), 65. See also R. M. Frank, "The Origin of the Arabic Philosophical TermAnniyya ,"Cahiers de Byrsa 6 (1956): 181-201, which argues for a Syriac derivation.

[^10]: G. Endress,Proclus Arabus: Zwanzig Abschnitte aus der Institutio Theologica in arabischer Übersetzung (Beirut and Wiesbaden: Steiner Verlag, 1973), 80.

[^11]:Theology of Aristotle , VIII.125.

[^12]: The translation is referred to above in n. 6. Thathuwiyya andanniyya are in fact synonyms in this work can be verified by comparing, for example,Letter on Divine Science (100), where the paraphrase refers to God ashuwiyya faqat , with our text (C) below, where God is calledanniyya faqat . Similarly, we find intellect referred to as bothhuwiyya andanniyya (e.g.,Theology X.3 and VIII.122-4, 135, respectively).

[^13]:Sayings of the Greek Sage IX.3 andTheology of Aristotle VII.19. See below for further discussion of this usage.

[^14]: Foranniyya andhuwiyya as "being" in the abstract sense, see, e.g., al-Kindi, FP 117.4 [RJ 31.22] and 113.2 [RJ 27.9], respectively. Foranniyyat , "beings," see FP 97.14 [RJ 9.13]. Jolivet, incidentally, translates both terms with the French "existence."

For further comment on the termanniyya , see G. Endress and D. Gutas,A Greek-Arabic Lexicon (Leiden: Brill, 1997), Fasc. 4, 428-[^36]:

[^15]: For references to the range of usage in al-Kindi, see the comments onays in Endress (1973), 104-5.

[^16]: See further Endress (1973), 104-5. Again, Jolivet translatesaysiyya as "existence," and usually rendersays as "un existant." In the short physical treatiseR. fi'l-Jirm al -Hamil bi-Tiba'ihi al-Lawn min al-'anasir al-Arba'a wa alladhihuwa 'Illa al-Lawn fiGhayrihi (On the Body that is by Nature the Bearer for the Color of the Four Elements, and which is the Cause of the Color in Things Other than Itself ), Abu Rida, vol. II, 64-8, al-Kindi equatesays with "the existent" (al-mawjuda ), 66.3.

[^17]: Cf. Proclus,Elements of Theology , Proposition 70.

[^18]: See especially R. Taylor, "Aquinas, thePlotiniana Arabica and the Metaphysics of Being and Actuality,"Journal of the History of Ideas 59 (1998): 241-64.

[^19]: SeeEnneads V.4.2, V.6.6; Plato,Republic 509b.

[^20]:Theology of Aristotle III.47 [B 51.13].

[^21]: See especiallyAl-Fa'il al-Haqq al-Awwal al-Tamm wa 'l-Fa'il al-Naqis alladhi huwa bi-'l-Majaz (On the True, First Complete Agent and the Deficient Agent that is Metaphorically [an Agent ]) Abu Rida 182-4. In Arabic, as in English, the word for "act" or "actuality,"fi'l , has the same root as the word "agent,"fa'il .

[^22]:Theology of Aristotle V.14, 40, X.2, 88, 175-81,Letter on Divine Science 107,Sayings of the Greek Sage I.27-28. The thrust of these passages is often that, since God is simple, He does not have a will or thought process external to His essence that He uses in creation. Thus, He creates "through being alone." See further below, n. 27.

[^23]: The same conclusion is reached by C. D'Ancona Costa in her article "Causa prima superior est omni narratione. Il tema delle sifat Allah nel primo neoplatonismo arabo," forthcoming inOriente Moderno . I defend the claim in Adamson (2002), 5.4.4.

[^24]: This has also been suggested with regard to passage (C) in a brief remark by J. Jolviet,L'Intellect selon Kind i (Leiden: Brill, 1971), 121. The close analogy between being and matter, both simple and immediate effects of a simple God, is underscored by the similar vocabulary applied literally to matter in the contemporaneous Arabic version of Proclus'sElements of Theology , Proposition 72: "The first bearer of predication (hamil), namely matter, bears all things and is an intellectual substrate. The First Agent makes it, and He is the Agent of all things." See Endress (1973), 25, lines 7-9 of the Arabic edition.

[^25]: Aristotle,Metaphysics 1029a13-26. One part of the passage in particular could have inspired the view we find in (A) and (C): "by matter I mean what in itself is not a 'something' (ti ) or a quality, nor anything else by which being (to on ) is defined. For there is something of which each of these is predicated (katêgoreitai ), for whom 'to be' (to einai ) is other than it is for each of the predicates (tôn katêgoriôn )" (1029a20-24).

[^26]:K. fi 'l-Ibana 'an al-'Illa al-Fa'ila al-Qariba li-'l-Kawn wa-'l-Fasad (On the Explanation of the Proximate Cause of Generation and Corruption ), Abu Rida 214-37, at 215.4.

[^27]: FP 162.3 [RJ 97.10]. The same claim is found frequently in the Arabic Plotinus. See, for example,Theology of Aristotle V.46 (bi-huwiyyatihi ), X.88 (bi-anniyya faqat ).

[^28]: The same conclusion is drawn by J. Janssens, "al-Kindi's Concept of God,"Ultimate Reality and Meaning 17 (1994): 7.

[^29]: For a similar line of thought on al-Kindi's part in a very different context, compare a passage from his treatise against the Christian doctrine of the Trinity. (The treatise is preserved by Yahya Ibn 'Adi, who quotes it piece by piece in order to refute it. See A. Périer, "Un traité de Yahya ben 'Adi. Défense du dogme de la Trinité contre les objections d'al-Kindi,"Revue de l'Orient Chrétien , 3rd series, 22 [1920-21]: 3-21. The text is now also available at RJ 123-7.) Here al-Kindi writes that "everything composed is caused (kull murakkab ma'lul )" (Périer, 4 [RJ 123.16]). The point, again, is that God's primacy is incompatible with multiplicity in any form.

The same point appears in the cosmological treatiseR. fi Wahdaniyya Allah wa Tanahi Jirm al-'Alam (On the Oneness of God and the Finitude of the Body of the World ), Abu Rida 201-7: "Therefore [the Agent] is not multiple, but one, without multiplicity—may He be praised—and He is much higher than the attributes of the heretics" ([^207]:14 [RJ 147.2-3]).

[^30]: O. Bardenhewer (1882), 65.4, 65.10. CompareTheology of Aristotle X.9, which says that God creates the "being (huwiyya ) of intellect." See also the analysis provided by C. D'Ancona Costa in "La doctrine de la création 'mediante intelligentia' dans leLiber de Causes et dans ses sources,"Revue des sciences philosophiques et théologiques 76 (1992): 209-33, repr. inRecherches sur le Liber de Causis , Études de philosophie médiévale, vol. 72. (Paris: J. Vrin, 1995).

[^31]: The main distinction between the view as I have presented it and what we find in Greek Neoplatonists like Plotinus and Proclus is that, for the Greek thinkers, the First Principle transcends being. Treating the Neoplatonists' One as the principle of being helps al-Kindi and his translators with their project of making the First Principle of the philosophers into the Creator of Christianity and Islam.

[^32]:FiHudud al-Ashya' wa Rusumiha (On the Definitions and Descriptions of Things ), Abu Rida 165-79 at 165.11. For this treatise, which seems to be a storehouse of technical definitions culled largely from Greek sources, see F. Klein-Franke, "Al-Kindi's 'On Definitions and Descriptions of Things,'"Le Muséon: Revue des Études Orientales 95 (1982): 191-216.

[^33]: In the Arabic Plotinus this thought is sometimes expressed by saying that God is "above (fawqa )" the attributes, but can be said to have them paradigmatically with this qualification. See for example theLetter on Divine Science , 117-9 [B 175.11-15]: "Even though we say that He is other than them, and other than substance, other than intellect, and other than all other things, we do not say that He is not a substance, nor do we say that He is lacking intellect, lacking sight, and lacking knowledge. But we say that He is above substance, and above intellect, above sight, and above knowledge . Therefore He is the knowledge that is above every knowledge, because He is the First Knowledge. . ." This is one of many features of the Arabic Plotinus materials that have led C. D'Ancona Costa to argue that the author was influenced by the Pseudo-Dionysius. See the articles collected in D'Ancona Costa (1995), and more recently her article "Divine and Human Knowledge in the Plotiniana Arabica," inThe Perennial Tradition of Neoplatonism , J. L. Cleary, ed. (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1997), 419-42.

[^34]: From a passage in Ash'ari'sMaqalat , cited in Richard M. Frank, "The Divine Attributes According to the Teaching of Abu 'l-Hudhayl al-'Allaf,"Le Muséon 82 (1969): 453. Other Mu'tazilites held similar positions and, like Abu 'l-Hudhayl, juxtaposed them with a largely apophatic theology. Thus it is reported that Najjar and Dirar held that God possesses the attributes "by Himself" (li-nafsihi ), while Ibn Kullab is ascribed the statement that "the attributes of God are essential to Him (li-dhatihi )." See H. A. Wolfson,The Philosophy of the Kalam (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976), 208 and 223.

[^35]: This is often called the difference between the "is of predication" and the "is of identity." I am not focusing on the role of the verb "is" here, as has been done in scholarship on ancient philosophy, for example in discussions of Plato'sSophist . (See G. E. L. Owen, "Plato on Not-Being," and L. Brown, "Being in the Sophist: a Syntactical Enquiry," both inPlato 1: Metaphysics and Epistemology , G. Fine, ed. [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999], 416-54 and 455-78. See more generally C. Kahn, "The Greek Verb 'to Be' and the Concept of Being,"Foundations of Language 2 [^1966] and the response by M. Matten, "Greek Ontology and the 'Is' of Truth,"Phronesis 28 [1983]: 113-35.) I avoid this because of the disanalogies between verbs for "to be" in Arabic and those in Greek or English. For example there is no infinitive and no present tense copula in Arabic. Indeed it is worth emphasizing that the words al-Kindi and his translators use for "being" are exclusivelynouns , even though they translate verbs.Anniyya , for example, is a noun that often translateseinai , which is an infinitive. See further F. Shehadi,Metaphysics in Islamic Philosophy (Delmar, NY: Caravan Books, 1982), 5-9 for discussion of the similar distinction between the "complete" and "incomplete" uses ofkana , 31ff. for the absence of the copula.

[^36]: D'Alverny (1959), esp. 73-4. See also A. Ivry,Al-Kindi's Metaphysics (Albany: The State University of New York Press, 1974), 120-1 and note on FP 97.13.

[^37]: D'Alverny, op. cit., 72-3.

[^38]: Similar uses ofanniyya appear in two treatises by al-Kindi that directly parallel the text of FP,R. fi Mahiyya ma la Yumkinu an Yakuna la Nihaya wa ma alladhi yuqalu la Nihaya lahu (On the Quiddity of what Cannot be Infinite, and What is Said to Have Infinity ), Abu Rida 194-8, and the aforementionedOn the Oneness of God and the Finitude of the Body of the World (see n. 29).

[^39]: There would be a problem of individuation if we wanted to take the "beings" to be simple, since by definition they would have no features or predicates by which they could be distinguished. With this in mind we should note the ambiguity of the definition of

"generation" cited above, where al-Kindi said that it is the "coming-to-be of being (ays ) from non-being." Hereays could refer to a sheer existence that has been generated, and that will underlie an essence predicated of it. But given the cognate definition of creation that invokes the coming-to-be of a plurality of "beings," we should perhaps translate the earlier definition as the "coming-to-be ofa being from non-being."

[^40]: Likewise, the very question al-Kindi is considering, namely whether a thing can be the cause of its own essence, may more intuitively be seen as the question of whether something can be the cause of itself. One might therefore raise the question whetherdhat should be translated as "self," not "essence," throughout the passage in question. The problem with such an interpretation is that the argument proceeds by making a conceptual distinction betweenal-shay' , the thing, and itsdhat . But ifdhatuhu here means "itself," then there is no such distinction to be made. Hence other translations of FP also takedhat to signify essence throughout this passage; indeed, this translation is defended on similar grounds at RJ 105-6,ad n. 36.

[^41]:R. fi annahu Tujadu Jawahir la Ajsam (That There Exist Incorporeal Substances ), Abu Rida 265-9 at 266.1-3.

[^42]: Al-Kindi acknowledges that substances corrupt through the loss of their essential properties inThat There Exist Incorporeal Substances . Indeed this is the distinguishing feature of essential, as opposed to accidental, properties: " . by 'essential' I mean what is such that, when it is separated from the thing, the thing corrupts. The accidental is what may be separated from what it is in, without the latter corrupting" (266.10-11). This renders puzzling a second definition of "substance" given inOn the Definitions and Descriptions of Things (see n. 32): "It is also said: [substance] is what does not admit of generation and corruption . in what is proper to its substance (fikhass jawharihi )." This definition seems to state unequivocally that substance doesnot corrupt. I would suggest that the difficulty may be resolved either by supposing that the second definition refers only to separate, incorruptible substances (like God), or, more likely, that we are meant to read a great deal into the phrase "in what is proper to its substance." That is, al-Kindi may be saying that substance does not admit of generation or corruption and remain the same substance. So this is just to reiterate that substances undergo only accidental change.

[^43]: This is suggestedby the fact that the attributes removed from "man" in passage (A) are the standard examples of essential predicates: living and rationality.

[^44]: For example, he beginsMetaphysics Z.1 by observing that "of the many ways of saying 'being' (tou ontos ) it seems that the primary one is what something is (to ti estin ), which refers to substance (ousian )" (1028a). Thus, to return to the distinction between what a thing is and that it is, being in the primary sense is for Aristotle associated with what a thing is, not merely that it is. Even though Aristotle

is aware of the distinction, he is not particularly interested in it. His lack of interest seems to stem from the fact that it does not in his viewadd anything to our notion of substance. For example, inMetaphysics G.4, Aristotle says that "existing man and man are the same, since nothing else is clarified about an utterance by saying it twice, once about a man, and again about an existing man" (1003b).

[^45]: Here I am simply assuming that the distinction does not appear earlier—in Plotinus himself, for example. Others have claimed, wrongly I think, that Plotinus does distinguish existence from essence, for example K. Corrigan, "A Philosophical Precursor to the Theory of Existence and Essence in St. Thomas Aquinas,"The Thomist 48 (1984): 219-40. If we were to find the distinction in al-Kindi and his translators, those who hold that the distinction is made by Plotinus might simply think of the Kindi circle texts as providing an accurate interpretation of theEnneads . (My thanks to Verity Harte for this erenic proposal.)

[^46]: Ibn Sina,Isharat wa 'l-Tanbihat , S. Dunya, ed. (Cairo: Dar al-Ma'arif bi-Misr, 1957-60), vol. 3, 443.3-5.

[^47]: Ibn Sina,al-Shifa': al Ilahiyyat , G. Anawati, ed. (Cairo: Organisation Générale des Imprimeries Gouvernementales, 1960), 347.10.

[^48]: See, for example,al-Shifa': al Ilahiyyat , 38.11-39.4.

[^49]: FP 123.3-124.16 [RJ 41.3-43.7].

[^50]: See A. M. Goichon,La Distinction de l'Essence et de l'Existence d'après Ibn Si na (Paris: de Brouwer, 1937), 41-4. In G. Anawati,La Métaphysique du Shifa' (Paris: J. Vrin, 1978),anniyya is variously translated as "essence" and "être" depending on the context (see, e.g., 85 and 87, respectively).

[^51]:al-Shifa': al-Nafs , G. C. Anawati and S. Zayid, eds. (Cairo: 1975), V.7, 225. (Also seeAvicenna's De Anima , F. Rahman, ed. [London: Oxford University Press, 1959], 255.9.) For Ibn Sina's terminology here, see D'Alverny,Anniyya-Anitas , 81. On the different versions of the argument, see M. Marmura, "Avicenna's 'Flying Man' in Context,"Monist 69 (1986): 383-95.

[^52]: Ibn Sina,Isharat wa 'l-tanbihat , vol. 3, 460.1-462.1. Translation from L. E. Goodman,Avicenna (New York: Routledge, 1992), 78.

[^53]: F. Rahman, "Essence and Existence in Avicenna,"Mediaeval and Renaissance Studies 4 (1958): 1-16. For a more recent defense of the same position, see D. Burrell, "Aquinas and Islamic and Jewish Thinkers," inThe Cambridge Companion to Aquinas , N. Kretzmann and E. Stump, eds. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), esp. 65-70.

[^54]: See especially Ibn Sina's commentary on theTheology of Aristotle , in A. Badawi, ed.,Aristu 'inda 'l-'Arab (Cairo: Maktaba al-Nahda al-Misriyyah, 1947), 37-84; G. Vajda, French trans. "Les notes d'Avicenne sur la 'Théologie d'Aristote,'"Revue Thomiste 51 (1951): 346-406.

[^55]: I am grateful for comments and suggestions from David Burrell, Richard Taylor, members of the Philosophy Department at King's College London, and the anonymous referees at the Journal.

Source: Journal of the History of Philosophy [^40]:3 (2002) 297-312