The revolutionary 12th century Qur'an commentary by Fakhr al-Razi

Razi, Fakhr al-Din al-. Al-Tafsir al-Kabir [The Great Commentary].

€ 4,500.00

The second volume of the greatest work of the Iranian theologian and pioneer of conceptual cosmology and inductive logic, Fakhr al-Din al-Razi (1150-1209 CE). His Great Commentary on the Qur'an is now also known as "Tafsir al-Razi", and was originally titled "Mafatih al-Ghayb", "The keys to the unknown".

Himself barely known in the West, al-Razi was a famed theologian, passionate alchemist, and one of the finest minds in the medieval world on topics of theoretical physics and cosmology, where he trailblazed concepts which would not be widely entertained for centuries. Criticizing Aristotle and even occasionally Ibn Sina (Avicenna), he rejected the concept of a single universe rotating around the Earth and described instead the possibility of a multiverse, and of infinite void space beyond our own Universe. He was among the first to suggest heliocentrism, and also posited that the Classical philosophers were correct and some of his fellow theologians wrong, and that the Universe was temporally infinite, without beginning and end in time. However, al-Razi and his contemporaries saw no tension between his religion as a devout Muslim and his philosophical cosmology; indeed, his theology and his cosmology were one and the same, part of a continuous examination of Creation.

Though the first section lacks its usual title and introduction (owing to the lack of the first 5-7 leaves), this can be assumed to be the second volume of a massive two-volume set of "Mafatih al-Gayb". This is an impressive feat by a particularly steady-handed scribe; modern publications of Mafatih al-Gayb can run to eight volumes. The first complete section in the work is on Surah 18, al-Israa, following a partial section on Surah al-Nahl. Al-Nahl would be a sensible place to split a Qur'an commentary, as it is just over halfway through the text of the Qur'an itself. From the commentary on Surah al-Israa, al-Razi's work continues steadily in the scribe's small and tidy naskh script, through over eight hundred pages to the final Surah of the Qur'an.