فكر
fikr
Thought and intellection in their general sense.
What it means
Fikr is the general word for thought: the act of the mind in considering a matter, together with its product. It is the noun related to the verb fakkara, to ponder. Where fakkara in the Quran leads to the signs of God in creation, fikr is used in later Arabic writing for thought of every kind, including philosophy and the thinking of a school or a movement.
Muslim authors have produced a long literature on fikr. The phrase al-fikr al-islāmī, Islamic thought, refers to the body of thinking developed by scholars in theology, law, ethics and the sciences. In the Quran the related verbal forms are always positive, and the book urges people to reflect (6:50, 16:44). The noun itself is not found in the Quran, which uses verb forms.
Often misunderstood as
Treated as a neutral word for any thinking; in Muslim usage it is tied to the call to reflect on God’s signs.
Term and Arabic as listed in Ismail al Faruqi, Toward Islamic English (International Institute of Islamic Thought, 1995), p. 43, listed as FIKR. The definition is restated here.