Avicenna The Physics Of The Healing ( Kitāb Al Shifāʾ) A Parallel English Arabic Text In Two Volumes

1131 Pages·1999·4.7 MB·English

by  Jon McGinnis

THE PHYSICS
OF THE HEALING
※
BOOKS I & II
BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY
MIDDLE EASTERN TEXTS INITIATIVE
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Daniel C. Peterson
T r anslati
o
ic n
m S
e
a r
lsI(cid:2) sie
(cid:2)
Al–Hik m a
EDITOR
D. Morgan Davis
ASSOCIATE EDITOR
Muḥammad Eissa
ACADEMIC BOARD
Charles E. Butterworth
William C. Chittick
Farhad Daftary
Majid F. Fakhry
Michael E. Marmura
Ismail K. Poonawala
John Walbridge
Hossein Ziai
CO-FOUNDING EDITOR
Parviz Morewedge
※
This publication was funded through the support
of the U.S. Congress and the Library of Congress
Avicenna
The Physics of The Healing
يعيبﻄﻟﺍ ﻉامﺴﻟﺍ :ﺀافﺸﻟﺍ
ﹼ
Books I & II
A parallel English-Arabic text
translated, introduced, and annotated by
Jon McGinnis
Brigham Young University Press ※ Provo, Utah ※ 2009
©2009 by Brigham Young University Press. All rights reserved.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.
ISBN: 978–0–8425–2747–7 (alk. paper)
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 15 14 13 12 11 10 09
First Edition
To
EVERETT ROWSON
and
JAMES ROSS
for teaching me how to read Avicenna’s Physics
and how to appreciate what I read
Contents
Volume 1
Foreword to the Series xiii
Foreword to the Volume xv
Acknowledgments xix
Translator’s Introduction xxi
A Note on the Source Texts xxxi
Sigla and Conventions xxxiv
※ ※ ※
First Book
On the Causes and Principles of Natural Things
Chapter One 1
E xplaining the means by which to arrive at the science
of natural things from their first principles
Chapter Two 13
Enumerating the principles of natural things by assertion
and supposition
Chapter Three 27
How these principles are common
Chapter Four 33
Examination of what Parmenides and Melissus said regarding
the principles of being
– vii –
viii Contents
Chapter Five 37
On defining nature
Chapter Six 45
On nature’s relation to matter, form, and motion
Chapter Seven 50
Of certain terms derived from nature and an explanation of their status
Chapter Eight 54
On how the science of physics conducts investigation and what,
if anything, it shares in common with the other sciences
Chapter Nine 61
On defining the causes that are of the greatest interest to the
natural philosopher in his investigation
Chapter Ten 64
On defining each of the four kinds of causes
Chapter Eleven 71
On the interrelations of causes
Chapter Twelve 74
On the divisions of causal states
Chapter Thirteen 81
Discussion of luck and chance: The difference between them and
an explanation of their true state
Chapter Fourteen 91
Some of the arguments of those who were in error concerning
chance and luck and the refutation of their views
Chapter Fifteen 103
How causes enter into investigating and seeking the why-question
and the answer to it
※ ※ ※
Second Book
On Motion and That Which Follows It
Chapter One 107
On motion
Contents ix
Chapter Two 128
The relation of motion to the categories
Chapter Three 136
Concerning the list of those categories alone in which motion occurs
Chapter Four 152
Establishing the opposition of motion and rest
Chapter Five 157
Beginning the account of place and reviewing the arguments
of those who deny and those who affirm it
Chapter Six 163
The various schools of thought about place and a review
of their arguments
Chapter Seven 170
Refuting the view of those who say that place is matter or form
or any indiscriminate contacting surface or an interval
Chapter Eight 177
The inconsistency of those who defend the void
Chapter Nine 201
The essence of place and its confirmation and the refutation
of the arguments of those who deny and are in error about it
Chapter Ten 219
Beginning the discussion about time, the disagreement of people
concerning it, and the refutation of those erring about it
Chapter Eleven 229
Identifying and affirming the essence of time
Chapter Twelve 237
Explaining the instant
Chapter Thirteen 248
The solution to the skeptical puzzles raised about time and
the completion of the discussion of things temporal, such as being
in time and not in time, everlasting, eternity, [and the expressions]
suddenly, right away, just before, just after, and ancient
x Contents
Volume 2
※ ※ ※
Third Book
Concerning What Belongs to Natural Things Owing to Their Quantity
Chapter One 260
The manner of investigation peculiar to this book
Chapter Two 262
On succession, contiguity, following immediately, interpenetration,
cohesion, continuity, intermediate, limit, being together, and
being separate
Chapter Three 273
The state of bodies with respect to their division and a report
of the various arguments on which the detractors rely
Chapter Four 281
Establishing the true opinion and refuting the false
Chapter Five 302
Solution to the puzzles of those who prattle on about the atom
Chapter Six 311
On the interrelations of distances, motions, and times with respect
to this topic, and an explanation that no first part belongs to them
Chapter Seven 320
The beginning of the discussion about the finitude and infinitude
of bodies and people’s opinions concerning that
Chapter Eight 325
On the impossibility that either a body or magnitude or number
in an ordered series is infinite, and that it is impossible that there
be some infinite body that is moved either in its entirety or partially
Chapter Nine 337
An explanation of the way that the infinite does and does not enter
into existence, and a refutation of the arguments of those who defend
the existence of an actual infinite
Chapter Ten 344
That bodies are finite with respect to influencing and being influenced