A Bit Of A Diversion

29 Ramadhan, 1446

During the vacation week, some fourteen days ago, I realised I would be easily able to complete the reading I'd planned for Fasting Month. Isa Kamari's Pilgrimage was proving an easy, quick read, and, if anything, I needed to slow myself down in my second encounter with Ziauddin Sardar's fascinating Reading The Qur'an in order to have time to genuinely reflect on ideas that powerfully resonated with me. I deliberately spun out my reading, finishing the book yesterday, happily musing upon its interpretation in its final sections of the role of Science and the Arts in Islamic thought. But this meant I had ample time to get on with something else of reasonable substance over the second half of the month - and I wondered whether to simply get back to my 'on-going' reading of fiction (which meant resuming my chunky The Penguin Complete Sherlock Holmes.)

In the event I hit upon a neat solution to this mild dilemma. It struck me that having come to  the conclusion some time back that I could more than happily buy into the proofs for the existence of God offered by Prof Ed Feser, I wasn't capable of explaining any of the proofs in genuine detail to anyone who might be foolhardy enough to ask me to do so. Basically this reflected lazy thinking on my part. Having completely accepted Aristotelean metaphysics - indeed, having felt their illuminating power - I couldn't give a coherent outline of Aristotle's system even to myself.

So it was that I decided a reread of Prof Feser's The Last Superstition was in order. In addition to providing the exposition of Aristotelean ideas I needed to reacquaint myself with and thoroughly take on board, I thought I might enjoy the writer's indulgence in what is often a bracingly funny polemic against the self-styled New Atheists who were so vocal and full of themselves at the onset of this century. In the event I thoroughly enjoyed re-visiting all the jokes and, this time round, I reckon I have a good chance of really internalising the key ideas that kept escaping me. And just to make sure they lodge in this tired old brain of mine I've decided to reread the other two key works by the prof that sit on my shelves ahead of Ramadhan 1447, insy'allah.