The Uncharted Margins of Arabic Philosophy: Challenges and Prospects in Surveying Philosophical Marginalia in Arabic Manuscripts

From Antiquity until the dawn of Modernity, Aristotelian logic and the corpus of texts known as the Organon served as the bedrock of scientific method across a vast geographical area extending far beyond the borders of the Mediterranean. In the Arabo-Islamic tradition, logic appears to have formed a staple part of the curricula of higher-level education until the nineteenth century. However, the contexts and modalities through which the discipline was concretely taught and studied largely elude our understanding to date. This is partly due to the considerable diversity in which education was provided in different geographical and temporal settings. Philosophical and scientific education in the Arabo-Islamic context manifested itself in a variety of non-standardized curricula that changed significantly over the centuries and across the different geographical areas under Islamic influence. Students wishing to educate themselves could rely on educational institutions such as madrasas, travel to join the intellectual circles of renowned experts, or pursue self-directed learning. Information on the curricula and texts studied in different educational contexts is unfortunately somewhat limited, especially when compared to our knowledge of university education in Latinate Europe during the same period. The activities of many scholars, professors, and students who engaged with philosophy across all regions of Europe, North Africa, and Asia under Islamic influence are, therefore, largely inaccessible. A promising strategy to access this large missing part of the history of Arabic philosophy is a novel approach to the “common denominator” of philosophical education and practice throughout the Islamicate world: the manuscript book. This paper delves into the preliminary challenges and the prospects of the analysis of philosophical marginalia in the Arabo-Islamic tradition.