  With al-Farabi and Avicenna, Maimonides adopts a cosmology of 10 separate intellects, with active intellect governing the sublunar realm in which we live. With his Islamic predecessors, Maimonides additionally identifies these separate intellects with the angels spoken of in religious tradition. One Islamic philosophical example of this view can be seen in al-Farabi who, in the introductory summary to his treatise on the perfect state, describes the ten separate cosmic intellects as “the existents which should be believed to be the angels ” (PS 39), and as those “of which it should be said that they are the angels ” (PS 41).