The Theologico-Scientific Research Program of the Mutakallimun: Intellectual Historical Context and Contemporary Concerns with Special Reference to Fakhr Al-Din Al-Razi‪.‬

Situating kalam in its full intellectual historical context reveals it as a systematic theocentric scientific research program possessing of objective cognitive content. On the one hand kalam is about understanding God, and on the other it is about understanding Creation, and in between lies the rational mind mediating between the two poles of Being: one absolute, the other contingent, relating one to the other and integrating them within the framework of a comprehensive and coherent Qur'anic worldview. Unsurprisingly, the investigative nature of this research program demands of the mutakallimun a mastery of the revealed, rational, and empirical sciences which enables them to critically engage the scientists and philosophers with a view toward the formulation of a sophisticated, empirically rich, theocentric counter-science. Fakhr al-Din al-Razi plays a central role in the conceptual and empirical maturation of this research program, thus serving as an intellectual beacon for Muslim scientists in their systemic quest for a contemporary counter-science "powerful and elaborate enough to function as a substitute" for modern Western science. Keywords: Fakhr al-Din al-Razi, al-Ghazali, Ibn Sina, 'ilm, kalam, al-kalam al-jadid, mutakallimun, falasifah, scientific research program, falsafah, Tahafut al-Falasifah, al-Mabahith al-Mashriqiyyah, al-Matalib al-Aliyyah, Mafatih al-Ghayb, Ibn Khaldun, Abu al-Barakat al-Baghdadi, science, philosophy, theology.