Abd al-Rahman Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406), born in Tunis, is considered the father of sociology and the philosophy of history. His major work, the Muqaddimah (Introduction), written in 1377, analyzes the mechanisms of the birth, growth, maturity and fall of civilizations.
The cyclical theory of civilizations
Ibn Khaldun observed that dynasties and civilizations follow a natural cycle of about three to four generations (100-120 years). Each cycle includes: a founding phase, driven by strong social cohesion (asabiyya); a phase of expansion and prosperity; a phase of maturity where luxury and comfort set in; then a phase of decline where cohesion weakens, corruption sets in and the civilization collapses, leaving room for a new force carrying a new asabiyya.
This cyclical vision of history, revolutionary for its time, was rediscovered by modern historians such as Arnold Toynbee, who recognized in Ibn Khaldun a precursor of the philosophy of history.
The convergence with the Quranic divine law
This scientific analysis remarkably meets the divine law stated in the Quran, which describes the same phenomenon as a law of God applying to peoples:
"Have they not seen how many generations before them We destroyed? We had established them on earth more firmly than We have established you, and We sent upon them rain from the sky in abundance and made rivers flow beneath them. Then We destroyed them for their sins and brought forth after them another generation." (6:6)
The Quran precisely describes the cycle that Ibn Khaldun theorized: a prosperous civilization (established on earth, rains, rivers), which becomes corrupt (sins), then is destroyed and replaced by a new generation. Ibn Khaldun, as a Muslim scholar, himself recognized in the Quran the source of his understanding of historical cycles.
Verse 11 of Surah Ar-Ra'd also states: "Indeed, Allah will not change the condition of a people until they change what is in themselves." This law of social causality, formulated in the 7th century, is at the heart of the Khaldunian theory of the decline of civilizations through internal corruption.
Ibn Khaldun's scientific contribution
Ibn Khaldun introduced a method of historical analysis based on the observation of social, economic and geographical causes, well before the modern sociology of Auguste Comte and รmile Durkheim. He analyzed the influence of climate on the characters of peoples, economic cycles, and the mechanisms of the state. His work influenced thinkers as diverse as Machiavelli, Montesquieu and Toynbee.