Ibn Taymiyya:Islam - Weg der Mitte

Ibn Taymiyya combines idealism and realism into an Islamic humanism. Ibn Taymiyya - a name that is on everyone's lips. He appears in all possible and impossible places. Some justify their actions with him, while others explain the misdeeds of those who commit them in his name. Islamists, Salafists, extremists, terrorists, Orientalists, Islamic experts, extremism researchers, and other terrorism specialists - a colorful group that uses him and confirms each other. This discourse creates saints and monsters - holy monsters.

But what do they really know about and from this great scholar and thinker? What evil dream gives birth to these monstrosities? Who has ever read anything by him? We certainly do not wish to oppose any veneration of saints, which Ibn Taymiyya himself would have despised, as he undoubtedly considered himself and everyone else fallible and all too human. No, we only mean that judgments, both positive and negative, about a person and his thoughts should not merely be based on prejudices but should be supported by a certain level of knowledge.

Our humble contribution to this task is a small collection of texts: to break down prejudices and impart knowledge, in order to enable proper and reasonable judgments, as well as to objectify the discourse. One can only be astonished at the breadth of Ibn Taymiyya's scholarship - the most significant reader of the falasifa (philosophers) in the Sunni world after Fakhr ad-Din ar-Razi. His virtuosity and accuracy in his treatment of the works he studied shed particularly enlightening light on the development of Muslim thought and social life. Should I dare to add that the duty to now include the intellectual father of contemporary Islamism into the esteemed lineage of commentators on Aristotle is certainly not lacking in a certain wit or charm?.