Assured of the conformity of the teaching of Aristotle with the teaching of revelation al-Farabi denies that Aristotle teaches the eternity of matter, and so is inconsistent with the dogma of creation. The whole question depends on what is meant by “creation.” God, he supposes, created all things in an instant in unmeasured eternity, not directly, but by the intermediary operation of the _`aql_ or Agent Intelligence. In this sense Aristotle held that the universe existed in eternity, but it so existed as a created thing. Creation was therefore complete before God, acting through the _`aql_, introduced movement, at which time commenced; as movement and time came into existence simultaneously, forthwith creation already existing in the timeless came out of its concealment and entered into reality. The term “creation” is sometimes used as applying to this emergence from timeless quiesence, but more properly may be taken as denoting the causation, which, as it preceded time, came into unmeasured eternity, which is what Aristotle means when he speaks of the world as eternal. Thus both Qur´an and Aristotle are right, but each uses “creation” to denote a different thing.
It is difficult to over-estimate the importance of al-Farabi. Practically all we afterwards meet in Ibn Sina and Ibn Rushd is already to be found in substance in his teaching, only that these later philosophers have realized that the Aristotelian system cannot be reconciled with the traditional theology, and so, having given up all attempt at formal reconciliation, are able to express themselves more clearly and to press home their tenets to their logical conclusions. When considering the reconciliation between philosophy and Qur´an attempted by al-Farabi it is important to compare and contrast the reconciliation attempted on quite other lines by al-Ash`ari and other founders of orthodox scholasticism. It must be noted that the beginning of scholasticism was contemporary with al-Farabi.
As has been noted, al-Farabi was mixed up with the Shi`ite group; the supporters of `Alid claims who held aloof from the official Khalifate at Baghdad. About the time of al-Kindi’s death (circ. 260), the twelfth Imam of the _Ithna `ashariya_ or orthodox Shi`ite sect, Muhammad al-Muntazar, “disappeared.” In the year 320, within the period of al-Farabi’s activity, the Buwayhid princes became the leading power in `Iraq, and in 334, five years before his death, they obtained possession of Baghdad, so that for the next 133 years the Khalifs were in very much the same position as the Frankish kings when they, surrounded with great ceremony and treated with the utmost reverence, were no more than puppets in the hands of the Mayors of the Palace. In exactly the same way the Khalifs, half popes and half emperors, whose sign manual was sought as giving a show of legitimacy to sovereigns even in far-off India, possessed in Baghdad only ceremonial functions, and were treated as honoured prisoners by the Buwayhid Emirs, who themselves were Shi`ites of the _Ithna `ashariya_ sect, and who, consequently, regarded the Khalifs as mere usurpers. At this period the Shi`ites were the patrons of philosophy, and the orthodox Sunnis generally took a reactionary attitude.