Ikhwan As-Shafa
sebuah organisasi rahasia yang aneh dan misterius
Ikhwan As-Shafa (Arab اخوان الصفا; terjemahan: Persaudaraan Kemurnian) adalah sebuag organisasi rahasia yang aneh dan misterius[1][2] yang terdiri dari para filsuf Arab[3] Muslim, yang berpusat di Basra, Irak -yang saat itu merupakan ibukota Kekhalifahan Abassiyah- di sekitar abad ke-10 Masehi.
Ajaran dan filosofi mereka dijelaskan secara terperinci dalam Ensiklopedia Ikhwan As-Shafa (Bahasa Arab: Rasa'il Ikhwan al-safa'), sebuah ikhtisar dari 52 epistel, yang nantinya akan mempengaruhi ensiklopedia-ensiklopedia lain. Banyak cendekiawan Barat dan Islam yang berusaha menyelidiki identitas dari anggota persaudaraan ini, dan kapan mereka aktif.
Catatan kaki
- ^ "Having been hidden within the cloak of secrecy from its very inception, the Rasa'il have provided many points of contention and have been a constant source of dispute among both Muslim and Western scholars. The identification of the authors, or possibly one author, the place and time of writing and propagation of their works, the nature of the secret brotherhood, the outer manifestation of which comprises the Rasa'il - these and many secondary questions have remained without answer." pg 25, Nasr (1964)
- ^ They are generally considered a secret society because of their closed & private meetings every 12 days, as mentioned in the Rasa'il.
- ^ Ikhwan al-Safa', by Ian Richard Netton, from Routledge (1998). Retrieved from http://www.muslimphilosophy.com/ip/rep/H051