The Concept of Elegance as a Virtue and Way of Life in Classical Islamic Thought

Abstract

Although elegance is a concept that has been extensively explored by classical Islamic philosophers and thinkers, it has been largely neglected in modern academic studies. However, the conception of elegance in classical Islamic philosophy and thought offers significant opportunities for overcoming the tension between modernism’s rigid rationalism and postmodernism’s relative and rule-free structure, particularly in the re-establishment of the relationship between the individual and society. This study approaches elegance not merely as an aesthetic quality, but as a comprehensive ethical-aesthetic framework that integrates knowledge, ethics, reason, eloquence, art and beauty, and aims to highlight the potential this framework holds for contemporary thought. In this context, the study analyses the views on elegance of Washshā’, al-Rāghib al-Isfahānī, al-Muḥāsibī and Zakariyyā al-Rāzī. It is argued that the concept of elegance in classical Islamic thought—which integrates science, ethics, rhetoric, art and beauty—offers new possibilities for resolving the tension and opposition between the universalist rationality of modernism and postmodern thought’s critique of rationality. Viewed from this perspective, it is concluded that, thanks to the aesthetic appeal and transformative power of elegance, rational communication between high culture and low culture can take place without any coercion or domination.