The Epistemology of Islamic Thought as an Islamic Epistemic Trident in Confronting the Post-Truth Crisis in the Digital Era

Abstract

This research begins with the post-truth phenomenon in the digital era in shaping public opinion. This phenomenon has triggered a systemic epistemic crisis that threatens the foundations of Islamic knowledge, particularly through the spread of hoaxes, disinformation, filter bubbles, and echo chambers that are rampant on social media platforms. Amid this crisis, the Islamic scientific tradition has a highly relevant epistemological legacy, namely three main paradigms categorized by Muhammad Abed Al-Jabiri: Bayānī (epistemology based on text and revelation), Burhānī (epistemology based on reason and demonstrative logic), and ʿIrfānī (epistemology based on intuition and inner enlightenment). This study aims to identify the characteristics of each epistemology as an integrative knowledge verification system, analyze the manifestation of the post-truth crisis in the digital era from the perspective of Islamic epistemology and the epistemic vulnerabilities it exploits, and build an integrated model of the Bayānī-Burhānī-ʿIrfānī epistemic trident as a synergistic alternative framework to overcome the post-truth crisis. This study uses a qualitative approach with library research accompanied by descriptive, critical, and integrative-constructive philosophical-epistemological analysis. The findings show that the three epistemologies synergistically form a layered verification system: Bayānī as a normative-textual guardian through the principle of tabayyun, Burhānī as an instrument of critical rationality through logical-empirical testing, and ʿIrfānī as an ethical-spiritual filter through inner clarity. Their integration produces an epistemic trident model capable of responding to the post-truth crisis in a holistic, proactive, and values-based manner, going beyond a purely technical approach.