Qutb al-Din al-Razi and His Logical Views: A Study in Lexis and Utterances

Abstract

Qutb al-Din al-Razi (1295-1365 A.D.) was a prominent Muslim philosopher, theologian, and logician in the middle ages. Al-Razi was born in modern-day Iran and he endeavored to seek knowledge and search for meaning in his works. He, additionally, had many views on logic, wisdom, knowledge, and science. He, also, wrote several treatises, commentaries, and interpretations to review contemporary philosophies, dialogic debates, and problematic issues, especially the Greek and Muslim views on existence and reasoning. This paper, therefore, examines Al-Razi’s contribution to such philosophical issues in terms of meaning and form, that is, the formal structure of these logical contributions. Like his contemporaries, Al-Razi based his philosophies on the scholarly interpretation of the Koranic verses as well as other Muslim traditions. Al-Razi, having problematized concepts and views on philosophy, set to define logic and wisdom out of the existing reviews and interpretations. For Al-Razi, logic is not only a group of problematic terminologies, but it is also a wider concept of words and meanings. Based on these views, this paper reviews the Razian philosophy of concepts and logical interpretations.