Q0215

Al-Ghazali

A verified English rendering from the curated archive.

English

Knowledge without action is vanity, and action without knowledge is madness.
Thinker Al-Ghazali
School Sufism
Source Iḥyāʾ ʿUlūm al-Dīn et al.
Theme Knowledge
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source context

This English passage is associated with Iḥyāʾ ʿUlūm al-Dīn et al., within the tradition of Sufism. The wording below is a verified rendering prepared for careful reading rather than a claim of unique translation authority.

A short reading

Read in the register of knowledge, the sentence asks the reader to test an assumption rather than to collect a slogan. In Al-Ghazali's wider work, similar claims are usually offered as prompts for judgment: what would have to be true for the sentence to hold, and what would follow if it did?

How to cite this quotation

APA: Al-Ghazali. (n.d.). Knowledge without action is vanity, and action without knowledge is madness. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0215

MLA: Al-Ghazali. “Knowledge without action is vanity, and action without….” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0215.

Chicago: Al-Ghazali. “Knowledge without action is vanity, and action without….” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0215.

Same thinker

More from Al-Ghazali

  1. Certainty is not attained by imitation, but by tasting (direct experience).

All quotations by Al-Ghazali

Same theme

More on knowledge

  1. What I do not know, I do not claim to know.
  2. No one errs willingly.
  3. What then is time? If no one asks me, I know; if I wish to explain it to one who asks, I do not know.
  4. What do I know?
  5. Once in a lifetime, everything must be doubted.

Browse the knowledge theme