Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī on the Existence and Nature of the Jinn

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Please see the attached file for my review. 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

I am very grateful for your thoughtful and constructive feedback. Your comments were invaluable in helping me clarify the framing of this article and its relevance to the special issue.

In light of your suggestions, I have:

• Strengthened the introduction and abstract to highlight the liminality of the jinn and the seriousness with which they were treated as subjects of rational enquiry.

• Made more explicit the theological stakes of assigning the jinn a place between God and creation.

• Clarified my use of terminology (e.g., metaphysical vs. ontological) and incorporated Arabic transliterations for technical terms.

• Rooted the cosmological discussion more directly in the Qurʾān and specified the textual basis (e.g., Q. 72:1).

These changes have helped me sharpen the article’s argument and align it more closely with the aims of the special issue. Thank you again for your detailed guidance.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The present article is an interesting attempt to discuss al-Rāzī’s conception of the nature of jinn in his Qur’ānic commentary. This is an interesting topic, which, indeed, has received little attention in scholarship. Unfortunately, however, the paper lacks scholarly research and rigor. As it stands, the paper is a mere paraphrase of what al-Rāzī writes in this particular section of his commentary and does not engage at all with the text: there is no problematization or discussion of the different views proposed nor any engagement with other texts of al-Rāzī which would have shed light on what he writes here regarding the named “immaterialist”, “essentialist-corporeal” and “non-essentialist corporeal” views. Moreover, besides from the introduction, no secondary literature is mentioned throughout the whole paper. In fact, the bibliographical references given in the introduction seem to be just a way of flagging some classical studies, but there is no intention of taking them into account in the development of the paper. There are important references that must be mentioned regarding concepts and views that al-Rāzī refers to, as mentioned in my comments (see attachment). Finally, the paper proposes no argument. The conclusion seems to indicate that he sided with one particular view, while at the same time pointing to the difficulty of determining al-Rāzī’s own position (which is, in my view, judicious), but this idea is never really discussed during the article and needs to be further developed.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Thank you very much for your generous and detailed feedback on the original submission. I found your comments very stimulating, and they have guided me in reshaping the article in significant ways.

In revising, I took to heart your observation that the earlier version was too paraphrastic and lacked sufficient analytical depth. To address this, I have restructured the article and added much more systematic analysis. I now lay out the Denialist position with its objections and responses in a clearer argumentative sequence, so that al-Rāzī’s reasoning can be more directly assessed. In addition, I have expanded the framing and conclusion to make the underlying theological and metaphysical stakes more explicit.

I also worked to ensure that the article is not confined to a single text. I have now drawn directly on both the Tafsīr and the Maṭālib, which allows me to demonstrate how al-Rāzī’s reflections on the jinn are consistent and mutually illuminating across his late corpus.

At the same time, I want to be clear about the direction I have taken. My aim here is not to provide a broad historical contextualisation or a complete survey of al-Rāzī’s intellectual milieu, but rather to excavate and present his mature reflections on this issue in a coherent and integrated way. I recognise that a more expansive contextual study would be valuable, but it is beyond the scope of this article and closer to a different kind of project.

I hope that the restructuring, the integration of material from the Maṭālib, and the more straightforward argumentative presentation demonstrate my efforts to incorporate your feedback while remaining faithful to the aims of the article. My goal has been to present al-Rāzī’s thought on this subject as clearly and concisely as possible, and I am grateful for your comments, which have helped me to move in that direction.

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The Author has sufficiently revised their paper and taken into account the feedback of this reviewer. I believe that the changes have significantly improved the paper and I recommend its publication in the present form.