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Ibn Taymiyya on theistic signs and knowledge of God

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 May 2021

Jamie B. Turner Open the ORCID record for Jamie B. Turner [Opens in a new window]
Jamie B. Turner*
Affiliation:
Department of philosophy, Ibn Haldun University Ordu Cad. F-05 Blok, No. 3, 34480 Başakşehir, Turkey
*
e-mail: jamie.turner@ibnhaldun.edu.tr
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Abstract

This article aims to draw on the ‘Qur'anic Rationalism’ of Taqī al-Dīn Ibn Taymiyya (1263–1328) in elucidating an Islamic epistemology of theistic natural signs, in the lens of contemporary philosophy of religion. In articulating what Ibn Taymiyya coins ‘God's method of proof through signs (istidlāluhu taʿālā bi'l-āyāt)’, it seeks aid in particular from the work of C. Stephen Evans and other contemporary philosophers of religion, in an attempt to understand the relevance and force of this alternative to natural theology within the Islamic tradition. In doing so, it aims to respond to existing criticisms of Ibn Taymiyya's perspective in the literature, and to consider the implications of a Taymiyyan reading of theistic natural signs, on the epistemic function of Qur'anic āyāt as theistic evidence.

Keywords

Ibn Taymiyyatheistic natural signsReformed epistemologyIslamic philosophyreligious epistemologynatural theology
Type
Original Article
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 58 , Issue 3 , September 2022 , pp. 583 - 597
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

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