A Comparative Study BetweenMuhammad Abd Al-Rahman Bin Khaldun And Max Weber

Abstract

 The research sought to compare the Arab thinker Muhammad Abd al-Rahman ibn Khaldun, who lived in the fourteenth century AD, and wrote his introduction to human civilization, which is an intellectual precedent in many fields, especially sociology, and the German thinker Max Weber, who was born in the nineteenth century. And he died in the twentieth century, and made a distinguished contribution to sociology, in his formulation of the definition of sociology: it is the social science based on understanding.

The difficulty of the research was manifested in encompassing the ideas dealt with by each of them, and for the diversity of fields of writing and creativity, for their distinction with a comprehensive encyclopedic culture, and for their involvement in more than one field of science and knowledge. Therefore, the comparison was focused on specific issues, which dealt with: birth and upbringing- culture- literature- Earning a livelihood according to Ibn Khaldun - the social act based on understanding according to Max Weber.

The research touched on the impact of the geographical and social environment on the one hand, and the impact of the temporal discrepancy between each of the thinkers on the other hand, and the linguistic vocabulary used by each of them on the third hand, and its suitability for addressing and clarifying the ideas presented.

Some of the ideas of Ibn Khaldun and Max Weber were studied independently, and researches were presented about them and letters were prepared, but comparative studies between them were rare, if not non-existent, and therefore this research takes its importance from the importance of each of them on the one hand, and the importance of what they presented on the other. And because it is unique in comparison between them from a third point of view.

The research adopted the descriptive analytical method which made it possible to use the method of comparison between two thinkers who are far apart in time, and presented their visions in one field, which is sociology, but in two different styles and formulations, which enabled the formulation of the results, and the submission of proposals at the end of the research.