The Process Philosophy of Sir Muhammad Iqbal

With this should be read the collection of Iqbal’s articles and speeches edited with notes by Syed Abdul Vahid entitled Thoughts and Reflections of Iqbal (Lahore: Sh. Muhammad Ashraf, 1964). Nos. I, VIII, X, and XXII of Part I of this work are of particular importance for a clear understanding of Iqbal’s philosophical prejudices and presuppositions. Of lesser importance but more personal interest is a notebook written by Iqbal during the late spring and summer of 1910 which was found among his papers after his death. These brief notes show forth in germ many of the ideas elaborated in the works remarked above. Iqbal called them Stray Reflections, and these, edited by his son, Javid Iqbal, have been published under that title by Sh. Ghulam Ali Sons, Lahore (1961).Google Scholar

“Iqbal’s Panentheism,” Review of Metaphysics, IX (1956), pp. 681–699.Google Scholar

Of books about the teachings of Iqbal there are at once more than enough and too few. More than enough has been written about his greatness of person; there are more than enough tributes to the sublimity of his poetry. But rare indeed in the burgeoning Iqbal literature is the book combining scholarship and objectivity. The few that come close to this ideal have already been noted; a few others are deserving of mention. One such is K. G. Saiyidain’s little book entitled Iqbal’s Educational Philosophy, 3rd edition (Lahore: Sh. Muhammad Ashraf, 1945). The author, a state minister of education in pre-partition India, writes from the vantage point of a personal acquaintance with Iqbal and provides a synoptic view of the latter’s work from an important yet neglected standpoint. Ishrat Hasan Enver, The Metaphysics of Iqbal (Lahore: Sh. Muhammad Ashraf, 1944) is another book (or better, booklet, since the whole consists of but 84 pages of large print) that requires our notice if only because it is primarily concerned to expound the metaphysics of the Reconstruction. Unfortunately, the exposition is throughout elementary and on occasion uninformed. There is, for example, a refutation of panentheism based upon the incredible assumption that panentheism means the holding of the Many in the imagination of the One, and the author’s understanding of Iqbal’s early pantheism and later organicism is equally far from the true denotation of these terms. More accurately to the point is Bashir Ahmad Dar, A Study in Iqbal’s Philosophy (Lahore: Sh. Muhammad Ashraf, 1944). See also L. C. Maitre, Introduction to the Thought of Iqbal, translated from the French by M. A. M. Dar (Karachi: Iqbal Academy, 1961). Finally, there is the uneven collection of essays on various aspects of Iqbal’s thought entitled Iqbal as a Thinker (Lahore: Sh. Muhammad Ashraf, 1945). For those wishing to learn something of the cultural background out of which the reconstruction arises the best book by far is M. Mujeeb, The Indian Muslims (London: Allen & Unwin, 1967). Chapter XX of this work contains a brief treatment of Iqbal’s religious philosophy set in the context of his times. Of an earlier vintage but still useful is Wilfred Cantwell Smith, Modern Islam in India (Lahore: Sh. Muhammad Ashraf, 1943).Google Scholar