Syed Muhammad al Naquib bin Ali al-Attas ( ; born 5 September 1931) is a Malaysian Muslim philosopher. He is one of the few contemporary scholars who is thoroughly rooted in the traditional Islamic sciences and studies theology, philosophy, metaphysics, history, and literature. He pioneered the concept of Islamisation of knowledge. Al-Attas' philosophy and methodology of education have one goal: Islamisation of the mind, body and soul and its effects on the personal and collective life on Muslims as well as others, including the spiritual and physical non-human environment. He is the author of 27 works on various aspects of Islamic thought and civilisation, particularly on Sufism, cosmology, metaphysics, philosophy and Malay language and literature. Early life and education Syed Muhammad Naquib al-Attas was born in Bogor, Java, Dutch East Indies into a family with a history of illustrious ancestors, saints. His genealogical tree can be authentically traced over a thousand years through the Ba'Alawi sayyids of Hadramaut and all the way back to the Imam Hussein, the grandson of the Islamic prophet, Muhammad. He was the second of three sons; his older brother, Syed Hussein Alatas later became an academian and politician. He is the cousin of the academic Ungku Abdul Aziz. After World War II, in 1946 he returned to Johor to complete his secondary education. He was exposed to Malay literature, history, religion, and western classics in English. After al-Attas finished secondary school in 1951, he entered the Malay Regiment as a cadet officer. There he was selected to study at Eaton Hall, Chester, England and later at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst, UK (1952–1955). During this time he became interested in metaphysics of the Sufis, especially the works of Jami. He travelled to Spain and North Africa where the Islamic heritage had a profound influence on him. Al-Attas felt the need to study, and voluntarily resigned from the King's Commission to serve in the Royal Malay Regiment, to pursue studies at the University of Malaya in Singapore (1957–1959). While an undergraduate at University of Malaya, he wrote Rangkaian Ruba'iyat, a literary work, and Some Aspects of Sufism as Understood and Practised among the Malays. He was awarded the Canada Council Fellowship for three years of study at the Institute of Islamic Studies at McGill University in Montreal. He received the M.A. degree with distinction in Islamic philosophy in 1962, with his thesis Raniri and the Wujudiyyah