Search

The idea that the Leviathan frontispiece offers a visual summary of the contents of the work is widespread. However, the analysis of the frontispiece often under-explores Leviathan's text or leaves certain iconographic elements aside. In discussions of the Scholastics 'Dilemma' emblem, for instance, the image is commonly reduced to a representation of 'logic' or 'scholasticism', leaving aside the intricate interrelationship between the objects present in the image and their connection with the content of the book. This paper argues that this image helps understanding Hobbes' critique of Scholastic doctrines and their political effects in Leviathan. For Hobbes, these supposedly pure philosophical concepts either in logic (trident of the 'Syllogism') or metaphysics ('Real/Intentional' bident) hide a central part of Scholastic thought: a 'seditious' political conception claiming that the Pope has an indirect right to temporal power in affairs concerning spiritual matters theory ('Spiritual/Temporal' and 'Direct/Indirect' bidents). The Scholastic model made the common people believe that the Pope would have at least as much authority as the Sovereign. When faced with the choice between obeying either the Pope or their Civil Sovereign the subjects would find themselves in a dangerous 'Dilemma'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Rasāʾil Ikhwān al-ṣafāʾ wa-khullān al-wafāʾ (Epistles of the Brethren of Purity and Loyal Friends), copied in Baghdad in 686/1287 and kept in the Süleymaniye Library in Istanbul, is known for its double page frontispiece, headed by the names of the authors and the book title, and painted with an image of debating scholars surrounded by luxurious architecture [Fig. 1]. The copy features diagrams and tables and is of interest for the study of medieval manuscript traditions of the Rasāʾil. This article re-examines the codex, expanding observations and insights into its history. It discusses the function of the frontispiece, which has been perceived as an authors' portrait in the succession of pre-Mongol Arab book painting, but is unique among known Rasāʾil copies. Reviewing the text on the double page and considering that the Rasāʾil was an anonymous book, we argue that the frontispiece advertised a particular opinion and reference regarding the authorship, visualized and emphasised through the medium of the figural image. Situating the copy in the scholarly book production of early Ilkhanid Baghdad under the Persian Juwaynī governors from early Ilkhanid Iran, the article examines how that time and place are referenced in the painting. Extending the question to the unknown patron and his milieu, it discusses figures with portrait-like faces presenting a book as possible references to the Juwaynīs. We suggest to see the novelty of the painting not only in its style and close text-image relation, but in its function as editorial statement and in the layered references. These evidence a concept of visual commentary on both history and present, that has been argued for Ilkhanid painting of northwest Iran, but was used here several decades earlier in Baghdad. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]