In December of 1995, in Paris, Brussels, and Ghent, I read Montgomery Watt's translation of al-Ghazali's Munqidh. His account of the application of systematic doubt in order to arrive at an understanding of how we "know" that which we claim to "know," and his positioning of this exercise as a prerequisite to accepting or rejecting religious claims, flew straight like an arrow into my Wittgensteinian heart. "If one is to embrace a religious tradition or to 'be religious' in any cognizable sense," I thought, "this is the way to approach it." Al-Ghazali's reasoning led him to reject the search for "first principles"-- rendering Descartes's later Meditations quaint by comparison. Quaint and superfluous.
Moreover, he anticipates Kierkegaard's position insofar as S.K. regarded any appeal to first principles as self-deception.
According to al-Ghazali, S.K., and Wittgenstein, the chain of justifications ends not on its own but through intervention: the light of the Divine enters the heart (al-Ghazali), or the Knight of Faith steps out in trust (S.K.), or one eventually grows weary of the chase and declares "This is simply what I do" (Wittgenstein).
If one desires to be religious, one decides to be religious.
Such an explanation of human religiosity dissatisfies most religious people because it does not offer marching orders to anyone but to those who are already predisposed to be "on the march." It is an unfortunate state of affairs for sectarian apologists but al-Ghazali--at least at this point in his autobiographical narrative--was disinclined to offer any aid or comfort to sectarian apologists.
Al-Ghazali did not leave the matter there, however. For once one has decided to be religious, one must determine how to be religious. Here al-Ghazali's arguments tend to be circular as circularity is all that one can reasonably expect from someone who has abandoned the search for first principles. What remains useful in his approach is his desire to be thoughtful about his decisions. Al-Ghazali is a deliberate religionist; he is unwilling to embrace a belief or engage in a practice simply because other members of his community do so.
In this respect, al-Ghazali's approach is far less novel than it might appear at first blush. As Watt points out in his full-length study of al-Ghazali (Muslim Intellectual, 1963), al-Ghazali's teacher, Abu-'l-Ma'ali al-Juwayni (d. 1085 CE), had declared in his own autobiographical reckoning: "At an early age I fled from the acceptance of others' opinions..." (Watt, p. 24).
According to Watt, al-Juwayni's position commanded considerable respect: he was "the first theologian of his time" (Watt, p. 23). Al-Ghazali's trademark scepticism was, therefore, not unique nor was it unprecedented. It was a respected and familiar trait among thinking Muslims of the Age.
