THE CONTRIBUTIONS OF AL FARABI, AL KINDI, ABU ZAKARIYA, IBN RUSHD AND IBN SINA TO ISLAMIC CIVILIZATION AND PHILOSOPHY (ENGLISH AND LINGUISTIC PROJECT TOPICS AND MATERIALS)
INTRODUCTION
In every society many people has contributed in one way or the other to civilization, as far as the globe is concerned, every nation, tribe, society had attained a drastic form of civilization. The world today is growing faster in science and technology which is the cornerstone of civilization. In as much as, no nation want to struggle with development, every nation had actively or passively indulge in the propagation, promotion and elevation of civilization, and the Muslim Ummah {societies or nations} are no exception to this tussle.
Islamic or Muslim Philosophy is also another area of focus, at the initial stage of Islam, there was nothing like Islamic philosophy, but as time goes on, the early Islamic elite or scholars, i.e. scholars of the Umayyad dynasty who really started the Islamic philosophy. These scholars came across philosophy as a discipline, during the course of proliferating, disseminating and propelling Islam to other part of the world. These scholars came across philosophy precisely in Greece. At the initial stage of their contact with the Greek philosophy, they became eager, curious, and enthusiastic to know about this foreign knowledge, that was how they began to study deep into the Greek Philosophy, which they don’t just accept unless if compatible with the doctrines and teachings of Islam. They will scrutinize those ideologies and take and accept the favourable ones and repudiate the irrelevant ones. The collective effort of the early Muslim scholars, i.e. their study, scrutinizing and their rational proclivity towards the Greek philosophy, had culminated to the emergence of the discipline known as the “Islamic Philosophy”.
The early Islamic scholars who were mentally outstanding, studied philosophy to the climax, to the extent that even the Greek philosophers would come to consult or seek knowledge from them, even though they were the pioneer founders of philosophy. The rational reason one can think of, which has contributed meaningfully to the profound knowledge of the Muslim philosophers, is that the holy Qur’an a divine revelation from God, already entails virtually all the bases of philosophy, which the Muslims where initially ignorant of. When the Muslim scholars began to study philosophy, they became conversant with the intricacies of philosophy, to the extent that they subvert, submerge, surmount, surpass and suppress the Greek philosophers in philosophy, scientists in science, astronauts in astronomy etc.
The sole area of focus, is to recognize and establish some of those early Muslim philosophers who had contributed meaningfully either individually or collectively to civilization and Islamic philosophy.
WHAT IS CIVILIZATION?
Civilization simply means the improvement, development and advancement in every aspect of human society.
Civilization can also be defined as a state of human society that is very developed and organised.
More so, civilization can also be seen as the comprehensive development of the physical, intellectual, spiritual, psychological and moral potential of man.
Again, civilization is also considered to be a place where there is an organised form of leadership and ways to represent themselves; they have government to lead, writing to record events, art and architecture to show their culture and religion to show what they believe.
Civilization is an advanced state of human society in which a high level of culture, science, industry and government has been reached.
