A Treatise on the Immortality of the Soul by Ibn Suwār

Abstract

This article presents an edition and translation of the Treatise on the Immortality of the Rational Soul of Man According to Aristotle’s Opinion (M. fī baqāʾ al-nafs al-nāṭiqa min al-insān ʿalā raʾy Arisṭūṭālis) by the Christian philosopher and physician Abū al-Ḫayr al-Ḥasan ibn Suwār (942-post 1017). Its importance lies in the fact that: (i.) it provides the sole testimony concerning the doctrine of the immortality of the soul developed by a philosopher who was a significant representative of the intellectual and exegetical life of his day; (ii.) it constitutes concrete evidence of the fact that the philosophical activity of the Baghdad Aristotelians did not concern only Aristotle’s logic, physics, and metaphysics, but also psychology and noetics; and (iii.) it transmits literal quotations from lost Arabic translations, representing their earliest testimony: three lemmata from Aristotle’s De anima and one from Alexander of Aphrodisias’ De anima in Isḥāq ibn Ḥunayn’s (830-911) translations.