296 Reviews

beneath the rationalistic assumptions with which the Enlightenment taught us toapproach the late ancient and early medieval world. He loves to put a criticalquestion-mark against assumptions that this or that is 'superstitious' or mere'popular religion' suitable for monks or the vulgar, but hardly for a Protestant or ahumanistic aesthete. He is never more enjoyable to read than when he isdemonstrating what incomprehension must beset a historian whose method isdetermined for him by David Hume. The Stenton lecture on Gregory of Tours, forexample, is magnificently dismissive of the assumption that Gregory was just acredulous man who wrote very indifferent and demotic Latin, and tellingly brings outwhat a good story-teller the man was and how good for conversation it would be ifhisshade were ever to enliven the high table at All Souls.

HENRY CHADWICKMagdalene College, Oxford

I. R. Netton. Muslim Neoplatonists, An Introduction to the Thought ofthe Brethren of Purity, London, George Allen & Unwin, 1982, x + 150pp., £12.50.

In Islam, the Koran and the Traditions of the Prophet exalt knowledge andemphasize the importance of its pursuit ('0 my Lord, increase me in knowledge',Surah 20:114). This attitude towards knowledge led to a powerful translationmovement in Baghdad (c. 750-c.B50 A.D.) in which almost the whole corpus ofGreekscience and philosophy, together with important texts in Persian and Indian, weremade accessible in Arabic. These translations provided the basis of the differentaspects oflslamic culture in which Western and Eastern thought were forced togetherwithin the frameworks of Islam.

The Epistles of the Brethren of Purity, who flourished in Basra, Iraq, in the lathcentury, illustrate this point clearly. It is an impressively encyclopedic work in whichits anonymous authors attempted to produce a conpendium ofknowledge available intheir time. Its main object is to secure man's happiness in this world and the next byhealing his body from sickness and purifying his soul from ignorance. The fifty twoEpistles, however, are to be considered a mere introduction to knowledge whencompared to that of the spiritual leader, the Imam, who exists in every age, and isregarded by his followers as 'the inheritor and keeper of the Prophet's knowledge andthe possessor of truth and certainty'.

While previous studies of the Epistles are mainly concerned with the identificationof their authors and the dating of the work, the present one, by Dr Netton, Lecturer inArabic and Islamic Studies at Exeter University, deals primarily with the influenceson the Brethren's thought from Greek, Neoplatonic, Christian, Judaic and Islamicsources. He shows that Neoplatonism was the most predominant influence, hence thetitle of his book. Dr Netton devotes the last chapter to the problem of authorship, andargues that the Brethren were not an Ismaili secret organization, though they wereinfluenced by Ismaili thought. Not everyone could accept such a conclusion, as it wasmainly based on some ambiguous passages which could have different interpretationsif the Epistles are dealt with in their entirety. There is, as some previous studies haveshown, strong internal and external evidence which suggests that the Brethren ofPurity were an intellectual revolutionary Ismaili (Shi'a) secret movement whose

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ultimate goal was the overthrow of the Sunni Abbasid dynasty, ' the people of evil', asdescribed by them. Dr Netton's book is the first of its kind in English, and shouldprove of great value as an introduction to the thought of the Brethren of Purity whoseEpistles occupy a unique place in Arabic literature, for their rich content and theirfar-reaching influences on many later major writers.

YEHIA RAEF,University ofLancaster

Bruno Petzold, Goethe und der Mahayana buddhismus (ed. and introd.Joseph P. Strelka), Vienna, Oktopus Verlag 1982, 1I6pp. 20DM.

This finely written and suggestive essay may turn out to be one of the more importantworks written by German Tendai Buddhist Bruno Petzold who lived in Japan from19IO until his death in 1949; some of his writings are still to appear posthumously. Itfirst appeared in Japan in 1936 but as with many German works on Japan from thatperiod was neglected in the wider world because of the war and its aftermath. Thefascination of the comparison between Goethe's thought and major themes ofMahayana Buddhism lies in the fact that Goethe himself was unaware of the greatsystem of thought with which he had such interesting points of similarity. The mainpoint is that Goethe's version of pantheism or panentheism (not that MahayanaBuddhism is precisely pantheist) was one in which every part of nature is a dynamicinterplay of interacting forces, all sharing in the fundamental powcr of the divine.This is comparable to the cosmology of Kegon (Hua Yen) or Tendai (T'jen T'ai)Buddhism. Moreover every specific aspect of the world of experience points to deeperreality, a mode of understanding which was only deepened by Goethe's interest innatural science and his idealist philosophising about originals (Urpj/lznze and so on).In this insistence on the availability of deeper levels of significance in the naturalworld which could be plumbed if recognised , Goethe's approach was similar to that ofesoteric Buddhism, argues Petzold . Indeed as he concludes, one could hardly wish fora better statement ofTendai and Shingon esotericism than 'Alles Verganglichc ist nurein Glcichnis' (everything transient is hut a parable).

Of course there are difficulties too with the analogy between the two worlds ofthought. Petzold is aware of these however and acts as a most judicious guide throughthe various themes, which cannot all be considered here. The work is also anindication that deep familiarity with two systems is the best basis for a worthwilecomparative enterprise. The book docs assume some knowledge of both worlds on thepart of the reader too, but is in principle accessible to the non-specialist.

MICHAEL PYEPhilipps- Unioersitdt Marburg

Stuart D. B. Picken, Shinto, Japan's Spiritual Roots. Tokyo, Kodansha(1981), 80 pp. 10.50 Yen.

In this attractively printed work a Scottish minister of religion with several years'experience of life and work in Japan joins with a leading general puhlisher to