Aquinas and the ‘Arabs’ International Working Group Conference

The 2025 Aquinas and the ‘Arabs’ International Working Group (AAIWG) Summer Conference is hosted by Dr Daniel DeHaan, Frederick Copleston, Campion Hall, and Blackfriars Hall . The event is organized by Dr DeHaan, Prof Luis X. López-Farjeat (Universidad Panamericana) and Prof Richard C. Taylor (Marquette University & KU Leuven), with the assistance of Prof Brett Yardley (DeSales University) and Prof Nathaniel Taylor (The Catholic University of America).

The entire event will take place over four days. The first day will be devoted to graduate student mentoring. The Conference itself will be 29-31 May. The second of the three days is specifically devoted to the topic of philosophy’s influence in the lands of Islam, and its effect on the development of philosophical and theological thought in Europe.

For more information about the AAIWG and the conference, please see the link

Conference Schedule

Day ONE – 28th of May, at Campion Hall

8:45 Welcome and Introductions

Morning Session Chair: Prof. Richard C. Taylor, Marquette University & Katholieke Universiteit Leuven

• 9:00-9:45 (1) Zahra Nayebi, University of Freiburg, “Being, Non-Being, and Essential Possibility: A Metaphysical Perspective on al-F?r?b?’s Refutation of Parmenides”

• 9:45-10:30 (2) Saad Ismail, Oxford, “Avicenna and Knowledge-First Epistemology.”

• 10:30-11:15 (3) Keramat Varzdar, University of Tehran, & Sajad Amirkhani, University of Jyväskylä, Finland, “Individuation Misread: A Critical Study of Mull? ?adr?’s Interpretation of al-F?r?b?”

11:15-11:45 Break

• 11:45-12:30 (4) Ivonne María Acuña Macouzet, Universidad Panamericana, Mexico City, “The Relationship between Philosophical Ta’w?l and Averroes’s Jurisprudence

• 12:30-13:15 (5) John G. Antturi, University of Helsinki, “Aquinas on the individuality, universality, and incorporeality of human intellectual cognition”

13:15-14:45 Lunch

Afternoon Session Chair: Prof. Luis López-Farjeat, Universidad Panamericana, Mexico City

• 14:45-15:30 (6) Doha Tazi Hemida, Columbia University, “An Ash?arite Theology of Ownership: God as Owner (m?lik), God as Generous (jaw?d)”

• 15:30-16:15 (7) Alexander Schmid, Louisiana State University, “Dante, Islamic-Judaic Rationalism, and the Doctrine of Double Truth”

• 16:15-17:00 (8) Nicoletta Nativo, Charles University, Prague, “Albertism and Averroism in the Paduan Renaissance: Zimara vs Nifo”

17:00 Closing remarks and open discussion.

17:30 Time for some wine or other beverages!

Day Two – 29th of May, at Campion Hall

9-9:30 Welcome

Chair: (i) Prof. Frank Griffel, Professor for the Study of Abrahamic Religions, Fellow at Lady Margaret Hall
University of Oxford

9:30-10:25 (1) Dr. Therese-Anne Druart, Prof. Emerita, The Catholic University of America, “Al-F?r?b?”s and Ibn S?n?”s Problematic Conception of Justice “

10:25-11:20 (2) Prof. Yehuda Halper, Bar Ilan University, Israel, “Will the Wise Man Boast of Al-F?r?b?? How Samuel Ibn Tibbon Slipped Parts of De Intellectu into his Explanation of Unusual Terms in Maimonides’ “Guide of the Perplexed” “

11:20-11:50 Break

Chair: (ii) Dr Steven Harvey, Professor Emeritus, Bar-Ilan University, Israel

11:50-12:45 (3) Prof. Irfan Omar, Marquette University, “Ab?’l ‘Al?’ al-Ma‘arr?’s Philosophical Critique of Religion”

12:45-13:35 (4) Prof. Richard C. Taylor, Marquette University and KU Leuven, “A Critical Consideration of Ibn Rushd on Matters of Philosophy and Religion “

13:35-15:00 Lunch Break 

Chair:  (iii) Prof. Yehuda Halper, Bar Ilan University, Israel

15:00-15:55 (5) Dr. des. Ibrahim Safri (UM6P), University of Heidelberg, “Motion in Categories in Pre-modern Islamic Philosophy”

15:55-16:50 (6) Dr Steven Harvey, Professor Emeritus, Bar-Ilan University, Israel, “H. A. Wolfson and the Aquinas and ‘the Arabs’ Project”

16:50-17:20 Break

17:20-18:45 (7) Special Session on Method.

Chair: (iv) Prof. John Marenbon, Cambidge University

Prof. Katja Krause, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science & Technical University, Berlin, “Method in the History of Medieval Philosophy: What Good does it Serve?” Commentator: Prof. Frank Griffel, Oxford

19:00 Conference Dinner at Campion Hall (Vegetarian option available.)

Day Three – 30th of May, at Blackfriars

Chair: (v) Prof. Luis López-Farjeat, Universidad Panamericana, Mexico City

9-9:55 (8) Dr. R. E. Houser, Prof. Emeritus, University of St Thomas (Houston), “First Steps onto the Five Ways: Thomas and Avicenna”

9:55-10:50 (9) Prof. David B. Twetten, Marquette University, “Aquinas’ Novel Definition of ‘Universal’ and Its Background in Avicenna: How to Answer ‘Universal Realism’ “

11:50-11:20 Break

11:20-12:25 (10) Prof. John Peck, S.J., Saint Louis University, “Thomas Aquinas’s Prime Matter Pluralism “

12:25-13:20 (11) Dr. Daniel DeHaan, Oxford, “God, Creation, and Providence: Avicenna’s Influence on the Structure of the Contra Gentiles“

13:30-15:00 Lunch

Chair: (iv) Dr. Adriano Oliva, president, Commissio Leonina, Paris

15:00-15:55 (12) Prof. Randall B. Smith, University of St Thomas (Houston), “The Natural Law and Thomas Aquinas’s Debt to Maimonides”

15:55-16:50 (13) Prof. Patrick Zoll, S. J., Munich School of Philosophy, “Can We Know the Essence of a Simple God? Thomas Aquinas’s Critique of Maimonides in De potentia“

16:50-17:20 Break

17:20-18:15 (14) Dr. Marta Borgo, Commissio Leonina, Paris, & Dr. Mostafa Najafi, Lucerne University,”Ibn Rušd’s Commentary on Aristotle’s Metaphysics V.7 and Its Impact on Medieval Conceptions of Being as True”

18:15-19:10 (15) Prof. Nader El Bizri, Dean of the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at the University of Sharjah, heading the Falsafa Project of the Knapp Foundation, “Alhazen’s Optics and its impact on science and the architectural visual arts in Europe”

19:10 in the Aula: Knapp Foundation Wine Reception with remarks by Prof. Laurence Hemming, honorary professor jointly in Lancaster University’s Philosophy, Politics and Religion Department, and the Lancaster University Management School and Knapp Foundation Director

Day Four – 31st of may, at Campion

Chair: (v) Dr Charles Burnett, Prof. Emeritus, Warburg Institute, London

9-9:55 (16) Prof. Adam Takahashi, Kwansei Gakuin University (Nishinomiya, Japan), “Albert the Great on Angels and Miracles: Providence and Natural Causality in his Commentary on the Sentences (Book II) “

9:55-10:50 (17) Dr. Andre Martin, Post Doctoral Fellow, Charles University, Prague (PhD, McGill 2022), “Averroes’ Agent Sense in the Early 13th Century: Albert and his Sources”

11:00-11:30 Break

11:30-12:25 (18) Dr. Tracy Wietecha, Technical University, Berlin, “The City as A Mirror of Virtue: The Influence of Averroes on Albert the Great’s Conception of Virtue”

12:25-13:20 (19) Dr. Edmund Lazzari, Duquesne University, “Reading the Book of Nature: Quranic and Bonaventurian ay??/similitudines of God in Nature”

13:30-15:00 Lunch

Chair: (vi) Dr. Therese-Anne Druart, Prof. Emerita, CUA

15:00-15:55 (20) Prof. Luis López-Farjeat, Universidad Panamericana, Mexico City, “The literal (???? or ?????? / ??hir) and the hidden (??????? / b??in) in Philo of Alexandria and the Islamic philosophical tradition”

15:55-16:50 (21) Dr. Francisco J. Romero Carrasquillo, St. Gregory the Great Seminary , Seward, Nebraska, “The Multiple Meanings of Sacra Doctrine in Aquinas Seen Through Averroes’ Doctrine on the Levels of Discourse”

16:50-17:45 (22) Prof. Brett Yardley, DeSales University, “Can ‘Pseudo’ Authors be Trusted?”

17:45 Final discussion and closing remarks. Chairs: Richard Taylor & Luis López-Farjeat

Venue: Blackfriars Hall - St Giles Oxford, OX1 3LY United Kingdom Array ( [lat] => 51.756248 [lng] => -1.259881 )