Islamic Philosophy from Its Origin to the Present: Philosophy in the Land of Prophecy (Suny Series in Islam) Seyyed Hossein Nasr
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Islamic Philosophy from Its Origin to the Present offers a comprehensive overview of Islamic philosophy from the ninth century to the present day. As Seyyed Hossein Nasr attests, within this tradition, philosophizing is done in a world in which prophecy is the central reality of life—a reality related not only to the realms of action and ethics but also to the realm of knowledge. Comparisons with Jewish and Christian philosophies highlight the relation between reason and revelation, that is, philosophy and religion.
Nasr presents Islamic philosophy in relation to the Islamic tradition as a whole, but always treats this philosophy as philosophy, not simply as intellectual history. In addition to chapters dealing with the general historical development of Islamic philosophy, several chapters are devoted to later and mostly unknown philosophers. The work also pays particular attention to the Persian tradition.
Nasr stresses that the Islamic tradition is a living tradition with significance for the contemporary Islamic world and its relationship with the West. In providing this seminal introduction to a tradition little-understood in the West, Nasr also shows readers that Islamic philosophy has much to offer the contemporary world as a whole.
About the Author Seyyed Hossein Nasr (born April 7, 1933, in Tehran, Iran) is one of the world’s leading scholars of Islamic thought, philosophy, and spirituality. A philosopher, theologian, and cultural historian, Nasr is renowned for bridging traditional Islamic wisdom with contemporary intellectual challenges. Educated at MIT and Harvard, where he earned his Ph.D. in the history of science, he became the first Iranian to receive a doctorate from Harvard University.
Nasr’s academic career includes serving as a professor at Tehran University, where he founded the Imperial Iranian Academy of Philosophy, and later at several prestigious American institutions, including George Washington University, where he remains University Professor of Islamic Studies. His scholarly work covers a wide range of disciplines—philosophy of science, metaphysics, Sufism, art, and the dialogue between religion and modernity.
He is the author of more than fifty books and hundreds of essays, including Knowledge and the Sacred, The Heart of Islam: Enduring Values for Humanity, Islamic Life and Thought, and Religion and the Order of Nature. Through these works, Nasr advocates for a return to the sacred worldview that once unified reason, revelation, and nature—a vision he calls “the perennial philosophy.”
Recognized as a key figure in the Traditionalist School, Nasr’s writings emphasize harmony between faith and reason, ecology and spirituality, and the urgent need to recover the transcendent dimension of human existence in a secularized world. His works continue to inspire readers seeking intellectual depth and spiritual clarity in an age of fragmentation.
