Approximately in the year 1311 – shortly after the controversial Ḥanbalī scholar Ibn Taymiyya (d. 1328) returned to Damascus from his seven-year exile and imprisonment in Egypt – he composed Darʾ taʿāruḍ al-ʿaql wa-l-naql (Averting the Incongruity between Reason and Revelation; henceforth the Darʾ). This work was his most ambitious endeavour to create an overall reform of Arabic language and Islamic theology. The Darʾ presented 38 reasoned arguments that Ibn Taymiyya developed to refute Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī's (d. 1210) “universal law” (al-qānūn al-kullī). Al-Rāzī, one of the most influential proponents of rationalism in Islam, determined that whenever a contradiction exists between reason (al-ʿaql) and the divine revelation (al-naql, a term which applies to both the Quran and the ḥadīth), the revelation should be interpreted so that its content reconciles with the dictates of reason.

Al-Rāzī's universal law expressed the position held by rationalists throughout the ages. This law was considered the centrepiece of Ashʿarism, the theological trend which prevailed among the intellectual elite in Mamluk Damascus and Cairo. Ibn Taymiyya identified the logical flaws in the main arguments of the universal law and proposed an alternative doctrine that gave precedence to the scriptures over human reason. The Darʾ presented Ibn Taymiyya's attempts to resolve the conflict between reason and revelation, in light of similar attempts made by his predecessors Ibn Sīnā (d. 1037), Ibn Rushd (d. 1198), and al-Ghazālī (d. 1111). A unique blend of traditionalism and rationalism, the Darʾ reflected Ibn Taymiyya's remarkable mastery of all areas of the Islamic sciences as well as his astonishing command of Greek philosophy. One may assume that the Darʾ which became Ibn Taymiyya's tour de force against Ashʿarism, added to the growing animosity of the Ashʿarīs towards Ibn Taymiyya, an animosity which finally led to his tragic death.

Western scholarship was not oblivious to the eminent place of the Darʾ in Taymiyyan thought, especially after the illustrious Egyptian scholar Muḥammad Rashād Sālim (d. 1986) published his excellent critical edition of this work (Ibn Taymiyya, Darʾ taʿāruḍ al-ʿaql wa-l-naql, Riyadh, first ed. 1979–1983, second ed. 1991). Yet, apart from occasional mentions in relevant studies (e.g. Farid Suleiman, Ibn Taymiyya und die Attribute Gottes, Berlin and Boston, 2019), small-scale analyses, or translations of specific passages, the Darʾ has remained understudied. Now, with the publication of Carl Sharif El-Tobgui's Ibn Taymiyya on Reason and Revelation: A Study of Darʾ taʿāruḍ al-ʿaql wa-l-naql we have an authoritative guide which makes a significant contribution to the thriving field of Taymiyyan studies.

Ibn Taymiyya on Reason and Revelation comprises six chapters which are divided into two parts. Part 1, “Reason vs. revelation” (chapters 1–3, pp. 23–176), provides three introductory surveys which enable lay readers to acquire the theological and historical background of the Darʾ. Chapter 1 surveys the transformation that the concept of supremacy of human reason over the written scriptures underwent since the inception of Islamic rationalism at the end of the eighth century until the times of Ibn Taymiyya. Chapter 2 surveys Ibn Taymiyya's biography and contextualizes the Darʾ as part of Ibn Taymiyya's intrepid attacks on his Ashʿarī contemporaries. Chapter 3 analyses Ibn Taymiyya's 38 arguments against the universal rule. Here El-Tobgui excels in distilling Ibn Taymiyya's precepts from the cumbersome prose of the Darʾ. Ibn Taymiyya's complex theories are intertwined with deliberations on the Quran and ḥadīth, Arabic grammar and lexicography, classical poetry, and history. El-Tobgui compartmentalizes, regroups, and reconstructs Ibn Taymiyya's arguments into a readable and coherent text.

As Part 1 primarily addresses the refutation of the universal rule, Part 2, “Ibn Taymiyya's Reform of Language, Ontology, and Epistemology” (chapters 4–6, pp. 179–299) presents Ibn Taymiyya's positive and reconstructive theories (chapters 4 and 5) which are the building blocks of his original hermeneutical system. His fundamental approach was to bypass the Ashʿarī methodology of non-literal reading (taʾwīl) of the divine attributes (ṣifāt Allāh) and the anthropomorphic descriptions of God in the scriptures (chapter 6). Ibn Taymiyya claimed that because there was no incongruity between reason and revelation, there was no need to apply taʾwīl – a “false”, “innovative” and “foreign” methodology – to the scriptures. Seeing the scriptures as self-explanatory, Ibn Taymiyya proposed that linguistic evidence for the true meaning of the anthropomorphic descriptions should be found in the scriptures themselves. El-Tobgui also includes a summary and detailed synopsis of the Darʾ (pp. 301–22). In addition, the author's glossary of Arabic terms provides a guide to Taymiyyan terminology (pp. 323–46).

El-Tobgui's research in providing “a detailed and systematic exposition of the philosophy of Ibn Taymiyya as it emerges from the Darʾ” (p. 13), is truly admirable. Nonetheless, El-Tobgui could have enhanced his study by consulting the following four works: first, Al-Sawāʾiq al-mursala ʿalā l-jahmiyya wa l-muʿaṭṭila (The Unleashed Thunderbolts against the Ashʿarīs and the Negators of the Divine Attributes, the Muʿtazilīs). This cohesive and systematic rewording of the Darʾ is the magnum opus of Ibn Taymiyya's foremost disciple Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya (d. 1350). Second, Miriam Ovadia's Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya and the Divine Attributes. Rationalized Traditionalistic Theology (Leiden and Boston, 2018). Ovadia's study of Al-Sawāʾiq emphasizes the dichotomy between ḥaqīqa (the true and essential meaning of a word) and majāz (its metaphorical or figurative meaning), a frequent discussion in the Darʾ. Third, Binyamin Abrahamov's Islamic Theology. Traditionalism and Rationalism (Edinburgh, 1998) – this important monograph would benefit the discussion on reason and revelation in chapter 1. And fourth, Yahya Michot's Muslims under Non-Muslim Rule (Oxford and London, 2006); Michot provides an excellent chronology of Ibn Taymiyya's life (pp. 149–69).

El-Tobgui's reading of the Darʾ line-by-line is such an immense project that flaws inevitably occur. One such is El-Tobgui's incoherent treatment of tafwīḍ, a term that the Ashʿarīs used to denote the acceptance of the anthropomorphic texts without further interpretation. On p. 103, and based on a passage in the Darʾ which is irrelevant to tafwīḍ (vol. 4, pp. 23–4), El-Tobgui considers the Ashʿarī tafwīḍ equivalent to the Muʿtazilī nafy, a straightforward negation of the divine attributes. Yet, tafwīḍ is the Ashʿarī equivalent to the traditionalistic formula bi-lā kayfa (without asking how). Such minor flaws do not discredit El-Tobgui's excellent work. El-Tobgui produced an erudite and thoughtful analysis of the Darʾ, while making it accessible to a broad readership.