What is First? Islamic First Philosophy and Public Warrant

In this article, I make a methodological intervention into first philosophy within Islamic philosophical and theological discourses. I propose that two metatheoretical norms, non-circularity and publicness, must be met for a first philosophy to achieve its proposed explanatory priority. I use this criterion to construct a dilemma, showing that prevailing approaches within Islamic traditions either put “being” first, presupposing a given set of metaphysical commitments (e.g., kalām and Avicennan camps), or prioritise “intelligibility”, drawing an abductive inference to a henological explanatory framework that ultimately relies on non-public mystical warrants (e.g., Ismāʿīlī, Suhrawardī and Akbarī strands of thought). As an extended test case, I examine the metaphysical status and discovery of essences by select representative authors, showing how their approaches to explanatory priority are challenged by my argument. My aim is not to deny the possibility of first philosophy within Islam but to clarify its preconditions in terms of public warrant.