Multicultural society in Farabi's political philosophy

This article examines the thoughts of Abu Nasr Farabi in terms of attention to multicultural society and raises the question whether minorities and different ethnic and religious groups are recognized in Farabi's thought. If the answer is yes, how does this happen? In this study, in the two parts of ontological foundations and political-social foundations, topics such as the precedence of philosophy over religion, communal city, the great society, the use of allegory and imagination, the evolutionary formation of language and society, and the increasing complexity of language along with the evolution of society and the impact of Farabi's ontological debates on the acceptance of pluralism in society, have been discussed. In discussing the formation of society, Farabi talked about how different cultures were created and then how they faced each other. A communal city gives the same status to minorities and different groups as advanced democracies do today. The great society in his thought is made up of all nations and is more complete than a single country. Philosophy, which is based on universal rational reasoning and methodology, determines the practical and theoretical opinions of religion and provides a common language for all the residents of a city, and thus, hadithism and religious appearances do not replace rational truths. All of these make Farabi's thought rich and efficient source for analyzing and investigating a multicultural society and show the acceptance and desirability of a multicultural society in his thought.