To this fact was due the wide
influence of Islam upon Christian civilisation, which is evidenced
even to-day by the numerous words of Arab origin to be found in modern
European languages; it is in fact an influence the strength of which
can hardly be exaggerated. Not only the commercial products of the
East, but important economic methods, the ideals of our so-called
European chivalry and of its love poetry, the foundations of our
natural sciences, even theological and philosophical ideas of high
value were then sent to us from the East. The consequences of the
crusades are the best proof of the enormous superiority of the
Muhammedan world, a fact which is daily becoming more obvious. Here we
are concerned only with the influence exerted by Muhammedan
philosophy. It would be more correct to speak of post-classical than
of Muhammedan philosophy. But as above, the influence of Christianity
upon Islam was considered, so now the reverse process must be
outlined. In either case it was the heir to the late classical age, to
the mixed Graeco-Oriental culture, which influenced Islam at first in
Christian guise. Islam is often able to supplement its borrowings from
Christianity at the original sources, and when they have thus been
deepened and purified, these adaptations are returned to Christianity
in Muhammedan form.
Christian scholasticism was first based upon fragments of Aristotle
and chiefly inspired by Neo-Platonism: through the Arabs it became
acquainted with almost the whole of Aristotle and also with the
special methods by which the Arabs approach the problem of this
philosophy.
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