Page:Arabic Thought and Its Place in History.djvu/129

 In a modified form some of the resultant principles gathered from these two sources finally entered into orthodox Muslim scholastic theology.

The main points of this neo-Platonic doctrine as it figures in Muslim theology present the teaching of the active intellect or  ' aql fa  al'', the Agent Intellect of Alexander Aph. as an emanation from God, and the 'aql hayyulani or passive intellect in man only aroused to activity by the operation of this Agent Intellect, which is substantially the doctrine of Alexander Aph.: the aim of man is to attain a union or ittisal in which his intellect becomes one with the Agent Intellect, although the means of attaining this union and the nature of the union differ in the doctrines of the philosophers and the mystics, as we shall see in due course.

Next to philosophy proper medical science is the most important heritage received by the Arabic world from Hellenism. But this science derived through an Alexandrian medium had a serious defect in the accretions which the later Egyptian school had added to the pure teaching of Galen and Hippocrates. As we have already noted this accretion is of a quasi magical character and shows itself in talismans, etc., and theories which are based on ideas which are now classed as "sympathetic magic."

The real impetus came ultimately from transmitted Hellenism, but this influence was derived immediately from the Nestorians in philosophy proper, and from the Nestorians and the Zoroastrian school at