Arabic reason(s) in latin history of philosophy. Avicennan proofs for the immateriality of intellect in Albert the Great’s psychological works

Albert the Great makes wide use of Arabic scientific and philosophical sources, in both his autonomous theological works and his commentaries on Aristotle’s corpus. This contribution aims to explore a set of ten Arabic arguments for the incorporeal nature of the human rational soul that Albert quotes in extenso in at least four important works of his: i) De homine (written around 1242), ii) De anima (1254–7), iii) De natura et origine animae (post 1254–7), and iv) the second, possibly inauthentic part of Summa theologiae sive de mirabili scientia Dei (post 1274). While alternatively attributed by Albert to both Avicenna and Algazel or to the sole Avicenna, the ten proofs constitute in fact a largely verbatim quotation of a lengthy excerpt of the psychological section of al-Ġazālī’s Maqāṣid al-falāsifa [The Intentions of the Philosophers] (Latin Summa theoricae philosophiae). In tracing the variations and additions provided by Albert with respect to al-Ġazālī’s text, and the specific role played by the proofs in their new Albertinian contexts, this contribution will add some fresh material to the well-known historical transmission of Arabic psychology to Latin Scholasticism.