Sunarya, Bayu (2024) LANGUAGE AND MEANING IN DERRIDA AND AL-ATTAS’ THOUGHT: AN ANALYTICAL COMPARATIVE STUDY. S2 Masters thesis, Universitas Darussalam Gontor.

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Abstract

Language has been a complex issue in the history of Western thought. This problem is evident in how philosophers have continuously sought to formulate and convey the relationship between language and meaning. Since meaning is also foundational to knowledge, conclusions regarding this relationship ultimately influence how philosophers perceive knowledge itself. In the 20th century, Jacques Derrida closed this issue with a nihilistic conclusion, asserting that language fundamentally lacks a representational relationship to meaning and knowledge. For Derrida, meaning and knowledge arise from mechanisms of différance, which function intrinsically within language. Since language does not directly connect to extralinguistic reality, meaning and knowledge become perpetually undecidable. Even when they are identifiable, they are merely products of language games that must always be viewed through the lens of relativism. When examined through the thought of Syed Muhammad Naquib al-Attas, Derrida’s conclusion is far from accurate for several reasons. First, the existence of God serves as evidence that certain and permanent meaning, along with knowledge (such as knowledge of Allah ‘azza wa jalla), is not only possible but necessary. Second, the presence of ‘aql, which is the nature of man, enables individuals to recognize meaning related to something, process it into knowledge, and then preserve it. Third, the existence of interpretive methods, i.e. tafsīr and ta’wīl, ensures that the process of obtaining meaning and knowledge can be certain and stable. Therefore, for al-Attas, the relationship between language, meaning, and knowledge is direct and firm, in contrast to Derrida, who views it as indirect and unstable. Derrida’s characterization of language, meaning, and knowledge can only result from intellectual inquiry that excludes revelation in its original and final form, as al-Attas demonstrates.

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