Al-Farabi’s Political Philosophy in the Abbasid Era: A Historical-Contextual Analysis of the Virtuous

Abstract

This article offers a comprehensive examination of the historical, political, religious, and intellectual factors that shaped the formation of Abu Nasr al-Farabi’s philosophy, while also addressing the major issues involved in the contemporary study of his intellectual legacy. The principal aim of the study is to demonstrate that al-Farabi’s worldview should not be understood merely as an abstract theoretical system, but rather as an intellectual phenomenon formed within the framework of a concrete historical reality marked by social crisis, religio-ideological conflict, and the wider movement of scholarly translation. From this perspective, the scientific milieu of Baghdad, the crisis of power during the Abbasid era, polemics among religious currents, debates in kalam and fiqh, military and political instability, and processes of cultural synthesis are analyzed as factors that directly influenced the content and structure of al-Farabi’s philosophical system. In addition, the article highlights the significance of Arabic primary sources, manuscripts, biobibliographical works, and the classical tabaqat tradition in the study of al-Farabi’s heritage. The fact that information about al-Farabi is dispersed across a wide range of sources and at times appears in mutually contradictory forms reinforces the importance of source-critical methodology in Farabi studies. In this regard, the article argues that a proper understanding of al-Farabi’s philosophy requires not only an examination of his own treatises, but also a parallel consideration of the accounts of Arabic authors who wrote about him, the historical context, the terminological apparatus, and the manuscript tradition. As a result, al-Farabi’s philosophy is evaluated both as a rational response to the socio-political crises of his age and as a profound intellectual project concerning the relationship between reason and revelation, philosophy and religion, power and virtue within Islamic civilization.