The Concept of God in Al-Kindi’s Reflections

Al-Kindi is the first contemporary Mu’tazilite Muslim Philosopher, who has translated various works from Greek into Arabic during the translation movement period. Al-Kindi’s impression of metaphysics has been entangled with theology in such a way that in his definition of philosophy he considers it as knowledge about truth and causes and discusses it with a theological approach. On this basis, the present paper is intended to examine Al-Kindi’s impression of God and the writer attempts to clarify the limits of the independence of his thought from the Greek thought and the impact of the Islamic and Qur’anic approach concerning the concept of God. According to Al-Kindi’s definition of primary philosophy, “what status does God have in Al-Kindi’s philosophy?” Is Al-Kindi’s God a philosophical God affected by an Islamic-Qur’anic outlook or a God affected by the Greek outlook? Either as the Cause or as the Truth, God has an important status in philosophy for al-Kindi. Al-Kindi’s philosophical outlook and his definition of philosophy are to some extent affected by Greece and the Islamic approach. “Truth” and the “One” are two features of the Qur’anic God in Al-kindi’s view; and “pure is-ness”, “primal cause”, and “prime agent” are also the features of the philosophical God affected from Greek philosophy in Al-Kindi’s view. In this research, we would examine the concept of God given the definition of primary philosophy and Al-Kindi’s impression of it.