Fakhr Rāzī and the Avicennan Heritage in the Problem of the Divine Word

In this paper, I have examined the nature and the process of the Divine Word being sent to the Prophet from the viewpoint of Avicenna and Fakhr Rāzī. We can see a remarkable common ground between the two views. They both ignore the role of a supernatural entity in this process, pointing to the peculiar capacity of the receiver’s soul; they both believe in a “Holy Power” (or faculty), taking the location of the perception to be the hearth of the Prophet which is a stage higher than the Rational Soul (al-nafs al-nāiqa), although they hold that rational truths can only be perceived by the lower stage of the soul, that is the senses, when they turn into words. Thus, it can be said that the Prophet’s rational and imaginative faculties should not be overlooked. We can come to two conclusions from the above: first, given Fakhr Rāzī’s view about the principle, “al-nafs fī wadatihā kull al-quwā” (the soul is, in its unity, all the faculties), Avicenna’s problem initiated by the belief in the Spherical Soul (al-nafs al-falakīyya) will not suggest itself, and thus, the Prophet’s soul can be taken into account both at the general stage and in more detail. Second, the quality of the Prophet’s involvement in the revelation (wahy) will thus be obvious.