The Political Writings: "Political Regime" and "Summary of Plato's Laws"

Alfarabi

Published by Cornell University Press 2015

The Political Writings

"Political Regime" and "Summary of Plato's Laws"

Alfarabi
Translated by: Charles E. Butterworth

In the series Agora Editions

https://doi.org/10.7591/9780801456329

Overview
Contents

About this book

Butterworth richly deserves to be congratulated for providing advanced students and scholars with authoritative, reliable, and readable translations of Alfarabi's important political writings. ― Choice

Alfarabi (ca. 870–950) founded the great tradition of Aristotelian/Platonic political philosophy in medieval Islamic and Arabic culture. In this second volume of political writings, Charles E. Butterworth presents translations of Alfarabi's Political Regime and Summary of Plato's Laws, accompanied by introductions that discuss the background for each work and explore its teaching.

In addition, the texts are carefully annotated to aid the reader in following Alfarabi's argument. An Arabic-English/English-Arabic glossary allows interested readers to verify the way particular words are translated. Throughout, Butterworth's method is to translate consistently the same Arabic word by the same English word, rendering Alfarabi's style in an unusually faithful and yet approachable manner.

Author / Editor information

Charles E. Butterworth is Emeritus professor of Government and Politics at the University of Maryland, College Park.

Reviews

The translation on the whole is clear and very readable.... Readers with neither knowledge of Arabic nor familiarity with al-Farabi's writings will find the text easy to understand and follow, and the book will be useful for students.

Butterworth's splendid introduction to the first of these two texts provides the best introduction to Alfarabi's metaphysics that one is likely to find. In briefly sketching the life of Alfarabi, he also draws attention to the often forgotten major centers of learning in the ancient world.

Butterworth richly deserves to be congratulated for providing advanced students and scholars with authoritative, reliable, and readable translations of Alfarabi's important political writings.

Butterworth here offers... a commendable, skilled rendition of the Summary of Plato's Laws.

Butterworth brilliantly combines in one volume the theoretical agenda of the Political Regime and the practical concerns of the Summary. This volume is an excellent contribution to Alfarabi scholarship and should be most welcome to anyone interested in Islamic philosophy.

Accurate and very readable.... [Butterworth] was a student of Muhsin Mahdi, the leading scholar of Alfarabi of our time (and perhaps of all time), whose many editions, translations, and studies of Alfarabi's writings have enriched our understanding of this most influential philosopher. Butterworth is Mahdi's intellectual heir.... We are much indebted to Butterworth, who has undertaken this mission with admirable responsibility.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Preface Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	ix
Political Regime, Nicknamed Principles of the Existents
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	3
The Text Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	27
Summary of Plato’s Laws
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	97
The Text Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	129
Appendix A Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	175
Appendix B Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	177
Glossary A Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	183
Glossary B Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	189
Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	195
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	201

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