Correspondence, philosophical - Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE
[Article]
Akasoy, Anna
Leiden
Brill
(4,018 words)
Scholars disagree about the existence and nature of a genre of philosophical correspondence in the Islamicate world and its history and purpose. In addition to actual exchanges of letters, philosophical literature sometimes captures a variety of viewpoints in the communication that occurs in debates. Such conversations often took place between teachers and disciples for didactic purposes, between colleagues and rivals in a dialectic spirit, and between rulers and philosophers as part of a courtly ritual. While some interchanges are disjointed lists of questions and answers on a variety of topics,