Religious and philosophical doctrine of Ibn Al-Moqaffa (Based on the material of the treatise answer to Ibn Al-Moqaffa, the heretic by Al-Qasim Ar-Rasi)

Abstract

This article examines religious and philosophical views of Ibn Al-Moqaffa, the Arabic-Persian poet, writer, translator of the periods of the Omayyads and Abbasids (died ca. 757). The basis for the study is made up of the treatise Answer to Ibn Al-Moqaffa, The Heretic (Arab. ar-Radd ala az-zindiq Ibn al-Moqaffa) by the founder of the Rassids' dynasty, the first remarkable Zaydi theologian al-Qasim ibn Ibrahim ar-Rasi (d. 860). The treatise is the largest extant heresiographical text which contains excerpts from the lost mystical works of the free thinker. For the first time in the history of modern oriental studies, the article shows that the dualistic doctrine of Ibn al-Moqaffa, generally dependent on Manichaeism, contains a range of new, irreducible to Manichaeism, mystical and cosmological theories. For example, the poet postulates the essential innocence of the initial matter, describes the reasons which induced the Demiurge to start the creation of the world, develops his own onomatodoxic theological model. Besides, the mystical doctrine of Ibn al-Moqaffa is based on a belief in overcoming the Fall of the created being by means of the uniting the "names of light" in the "new" man. This precedes the eschatological victory of God over the impious forces in the day of resurrection; the latter, as the theologian claims, try to disrupt the search for the "path of Light" and "build" around those gone astray "impenetrable walls", i.e. existing religious doctrines. Of special interest to historians of religion are the apologetic constructions of the thinker, who saw in the Islamic Revelation and prophet Muhammad's sermon a sui generis victory of the dark powers and at the same time made references to the Holy Scripture of Muslims in order to support his cosmological conceptions. The article is preceded by a brief introduction with a biography of Ibn Al-Moqaffa and circumstances of his death.