HAMID AL-DIN AL-KIRMANI: ISMAILI THOUGHT IN THE AGE OF AL-HAKIM. By Pa,ut. E. WALKER. Ismaili Heritage Series. London, I. B. Tauris in association with the Institute of Ismaili Studies, 1999. 168 pp. 25.00, (hb), 14.95 (pb).

Those who are familiar with Paul Walker's books on Ismaili thinkers will have looked forward to the appearance of this book, and they will not be disappointed. It really is well done. AI-Kirmani is a remarkable thinker, and far too little known, and there is also a distinct shortage of reliable information about the ruler with whom his career is strongly linked, the Fatimid caliph al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah (386-411/996-1021). AlKirmani seems to have been summoned from the east to help son out theoretical problems in Ismailism which were causing difficulties in Egypt. Interestingly, he not only participated in the debate with non-Ismailis, but also established a different philosophical approach from his Ismaili predecessors such as al-Sijistani and al-Nasafi. Although al-Kirmani was critical of many of the leading ideas of the philosophers, he presents metaphysical ideas in enormous theoretical detail, and clearly has a very solid grasp of contemporary philosophy. As Walker suggests, the prime influence on him appears to be al-Farabi, but I am not sure that it is correct to see the latter, together with Ibn Sina and al-Kirmani himself, as more Aristotelian than Neoplatonic. A better description of all these thinkers is that they are all Neoplatonists, albeit frequently with different views on aspects of the theory, and that they in turn often differ from earlier and later Neoplatonists. The philosophical curriculum of the time was Neoplatonic, and there is no way that any thinker could avoid it if he was going to be able to enter the general debate.

Of particular interest is the way in which al-Kirmani deals with the debate between the batin and the whir in Ismaili thought; between those who thought that public religious duties should be carried out even where one understood the real meaning of the ritual, and those who thought that the ritual could be abandoned once its deeper meaning was grasped. Al-Kirmani presents his doctrine as that of the ahl al-`ibadatayn (those of double observance), and the arguments he provides are really powerful. Often when one reads such Ismaili arguments one wonders whether taqiyya (dissimulation) is in operation, but with al-Kirmani it is difficult to think in this way, since he clearly feels that he has established a satisfactory middle position between those who stress ritual and those who prioritize the inner meaning of that ritual. He makes a real contribution here to the long discussion in Islamic theology about the nature of iman (belief). In his skilful translations of passages from al-Kirmani Walker brings out nicely the mixture of passion and analysis which characterizes his style, and which makes him such a formidable thinker. Towards the end of the book he describes the architectonic structure of al-Kirmani's Rahat al-`Aql (Comfort of Reason) in which al-Kirmani lays out in splendid and comprehensive detail his metaphysical views, informed as these are both by contemporary philosophy and by his interpretation of Ismaili thought.

It is difficult within a relatively short space to encapsulate the major aspects of the theories of such a complex thinker as al-Kirmani, and Walker succeeds in showing why he is worth discussing. Those of his works which have survived are those which were collected by the Yemeni Tayyibis in the sixth/twelfth century, and one wonders how many remarkable works by him and by his contemporaries must have totally disappeared. This excellent series on Ismaili thinkers has produced yet another good book on an important intellectual figure.