Book of Causes

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Part One.

The Arabic text of the book de causis.

The manuscript transmission of the Arabic text. pp. 3--10.

A manuscript copy is found in the Leiden University Library (cod. Gol. 209) 4; it dates from the year 593 of the Hijra, 1197 A.D. 5, but is highly defective 7. However, a second copy could not be located 9. The Latin translation provided essential help in the critical determination of the text 10. The principles followed in the preparation of the German paraphrase 10.

Appreciation of the book itself according to form and content. Its relationship to the στοιχείωσις θεολογική Elements of Theology passing under the name of the Neoplatonist Proclus. pp. 11—37.

Characterization of the doctrinal view of our book in general 11. It is, as St. Thomas Aquinas already recognized, an excerpt from the Elements of Theology 12. Criticism of the book from this point of view. The lack of plan and disposition. The vague and indeterminate mode of expression 13. Insufficient understanding of the source material. The theistic and monotheistic framing of the Neoplatonic thought. Other contradictions 14. Detailed proof of the dependency of our book on the Elements of Theology, or the reduction of the former, in its individual chapters and theorems, to the latter. The title of the book 15.
§ 1 15. § 2 16. § 3 18. § 4 18. § 5 20. § 6 21. § 7 22. § 8 23. § 9 24. § 10 24. § 11 25. § 12 26. § 13 26. § 14 26. § 15 27. § 16 29. § 17 29. § 18 29. § 19 30. § 20 31. § 21 31. § 22 31. § 23 32. § 24 33. § 25 33. § 26 33. § 27 34. § 28 34. § 29 34. § 30 35. § 31 36.

The origin of the book. Its traces in Arabic literature. pp. 37—57.

The Arabic text is in all probability an original, not a translation. A Greek source text is in any case not to be assumed 38. But no trace whatsoever of the present or earlier existence of a Syriac text can be demonstrated 40.