Avicenna and the Aristotelian Tradition: Introduction to Reading Avicenna’s Philosophical Works

Through close study of Avicenna’s statements and major works, Dimitri Gutas traces Avicenna’s own sense of his place in the Aristotelian tradition and the history of philosophy in Islam, and provides an introduction to reading his philosophical works by delineating the approach most consistent with Avicenna’s intention and purpose in philosophy. The second edition of this foundational work, which has quickened fruitful research into the philosopher in the last quarter century, is completely revised and updated, and adds a new final chapter summarizing Avicenna’s philosophical project. It is also enlarged with the addition of a new appendix which offers a critical inventory of Avicenna’s authentic works, updating the work of Mahdavi (1954) with additional information on all manuscripts and important editions and translations. Its usefulness enhanced, the book provides primary orientation to Avicenna’s philosophy and works and constitutes an indispensable research tool for their study.

Winner of the I. R. Iran World Award for the Book of the Year 2014

Dimitri Gutas, Ph.D. 1975 in Arabic and Islamic Studies, Yale University, is Professor of Arabic at Yale. He has published on the medieval Graeco-Arabic translation movement and its lexicography, the transmission of Greek philosophical texts into Arabic, and Arabic philosophy. Most recently he published the Greek text and medieval Arabic translation of Theophrastus, On First Principles (2010), and, with Leonardo Taran, the editio maior of Aristotle’s Poetics (2012).