Muslim Spain has produced some of the brightest intellectual luminaries
of the Middle Ages. One of them was Ibni Rushd, better known as Averroes
in the West who is universally acknowledged as the greatest philosopher
of Islam and one of the greatest of all times. Being a versatile genius,
he influenced the course of thought both in the East and the West in more
than one domain of knowledge. According to George Sarton: `He was great
because of the tremendous stir he made in the minds of men for centuries.
A history of Averroism would include all the essential elements of a history
of thought from the end of the twelfth century to the end of the sixteenth,
a period of four centuries which would perhaps deserve as much as any other
to be called the Middle Ages, for it was the real transition between ancient
and modern methods.'
Abul Waleed
Muhammad Ibni Ahmed Ibni Muhammad Ibni Rushd, known as Averroes in the
West was born in Cordova, the metropolis of Muslim Spain in 1126. He came
of an illustrious Muslim family of Cordova which held the high office of
the Grand Qazi for the last two generations, Ibni Rushd himself occupying
the same post in the third generation. His grandfather Abul Waleed Muhammad
Ibni Rushd (1058-1126) was an eminent Maliki theologian, who was the Imam
of the Grand Mosque of Cordova. His father also occupied the high office
of the Qazi. The young Ibni Rushd received his education in his native
city which was the highest seat of learning in the West. He was taught
Tradition by Abul Qasim, Abu Marwan Ibni Masarrat, Abu Jafar Ibni Aziz
and Abu Abdullah Marzi. He learnt `Fiqh' from Hafiz Abu Muhammad Ibni Rizq.
Abu Jafar, a reputed scholar, taught him medicine. Ibni Rushd, soon acquired
great scholarship in literature, law, philosophy and medicine. He was a
contemporary of some of the outstanding thinkers of Muslim Spain, including
Ibni Zuhr, Ibni Baja and Ibni Tufail. Ibni Rushd was a juris-consult of
the first rank and was appointed Qazi of Seville in 1169-70. In 1182-83,
he was invited by the Almohade Caliph Abu Yaqub (1163-84) to Morocco and
replaced Ibni Tufail as the Court Physician. In the beginning, he was patronized
and respected by the succeeding Almohode Caliph Yaqub Al-Mansur (1184-99),
but, when the pent-up Berber fanaticism burst forth, he fell victim to
religious fanatics who were jealous of his genius. The Caliph had to banish
him to Lucena, a Jewish colony near Cordova. His entire library consisting
of invaluable books except the scientific ones was reduced to ashes in
1194-95. In 1198, when the religious fanaticism subsided, Ibni Rushd was
recalled to Morocco by the Almohade Ruler Yaqub Al-Mansur, but he did not
live long to enjoy the favours of his patron and died on December 10th,
1198 at the age of 75.
Ibni Rushd
was known for his humility and hospitality. Being pensive by nature, he
abhorred position and wealth. He passed most of his time in study and,
according to Ibni Al-Abar, during his long life there had been only two
nights when he could not study: one was the night of his marriage and the
other was the night of his death. He did not make any distinction in his
treatment towards friends and foes. He was a great lover of his native
land. Like Plato who in his "Republic" has highly praised Greece, Ibni
Rushd has claimed his native land, Spain, to be the rival of Greece. According
to Ptolemy, Greece possessed the best climate in the world, but Ibni Rushd
claims the same distinction for Cordova, the capital of Muslim Spain.
Averroes,
who was considered Avicenna of the West, applied himself to philosophy,
mathematics, medicine, astronomy, logic and Islamic jurisprudence. His
works have been given to the world by Renan. `He was one of the profoundest
commentators', says Munk `of Aristotle's works'. According to Ibni Al-Abar,
his writings are spread over more than twenty thousand pages, the most
important works being on philosophy, medicine and Fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence).
He was an eminent legist of his time and worked as a Qazi for a considerable
period. His "Bidayat ul Mujtahid wa Nihayat ul Muqtasid" which deals with
the Maliki Fiqh, is, according to Abu Jafar Zahbi, the best book ever written
on this subject. Renan has given a detailed list of his writings in his
"Averroes" (3rd Ed, Pgs 58-79). The list totals 67 works of Ibni Rushd,
including 28 on philosophy, 5 on theology, 8 on law, 4 on grammar and 20
on medicine. He was an astronomer of repute who wrote, "Kitab fi Harkat
il Falak", a treatise dealing with the motion of the sphere. He also summarized
the "Almagest" of Ptolemy which was translated into Hebrew by Jacob Anatoli
in 1231. He is credited with the discovery of sunspots.
Muslim rulers
had the reputation of being the greatest patrons of learning in the world.
Writing in his well-known book "The Making of Humanity" Robert Briffault
admits: `The incorruptible treasures and delights of intellectual culture
were accounted by the princes of Baghdad, Shiraz and Cordova, the truest
and proudest pomps of their courts. But it was not a mere appendage of
their princely vanity that the wonderful growth of Islamic science and
learning was fostered by their patronage. They pursued culture with the
personal ardour of an over mastering craving. Never before and never since,
on such a scale, has the spectacle been witnessed of the ruling classes
throughout the length and breadth of a vast empire given over entirely
to a frenzied passion for the acquirement of knowledge. Learning became
with them the chief business of life. The Khalifa and the Amirs hurried
from their Diwans to closet themselves in their libraries and observatories
... Caravans laden with manuscripts and Botanic specimens plied from Bukhara
to Tigris, from Egypt to Andulusia; embassies were sent to Constantinople
and to India for the purpose of obtaining books and teachers; a collection
of Greek authors or a distinguished mathematician was as eagerly demanded
as the ransom of an Empire.' The Umayyad Caliph of Spain, Al-Hakam had
founded a magnificent library containing about half a million books. He
had accumulated a rare collection of books on Eastern philosophy and was
instrumental in creating a taste for philosophy in Spain which in later
years produced some of the greatest Muslim philosophers in the West, including
Ibni Rushd. About two centuries later, another Muslim ruler of the West,
Abdul Momin, who was himself a great scholar had drawn to his court a galaxy
of talented thinkers, including Ibni Tufail and Ibni Rushd. The learned
Averroes owed his knowledge in philosophy to Abu Jafar Haroon, a well-known
rationalist of Andulusia. But the philosophy of Ibni Baja reached its climax
in Averroes who surpassed his teacher and rose to be the greatest commentator
and exponent of Aristotelian philosophy in the world. Together with Ibni
Massara and Ibni Arabi, Ibni Rushd forms the trio of the greatest Arabian
thinkers of Spain. The first two were essentially mystic, while the third
(Averroes) was a rationalist.
His chief
philosophical work is "Tahafut ul Tahafut" (The Refutation of the Refutation),
which was written in refutation of Al Ghazali's work, "Tahafut ul Falasifa"
(The Refutation of Philosophy). This work of Averroes evoked severe criticism
and stirred bitter reaction throughout the Muslim world. A strong refutation
of Ibni Rushd's arguments in "Tahafut al-Tahafut" was made by a Turk, Mustafa
Ibni Yousuf Al Bursawi, commonly known as Khwaja Zada (d:1487-88) who wrote
a third refutation. This indicated once more the weakness of human understanding
and the strength of faith. But, contrary to Muslim reactions, the philosophical
writings of Averroes produced a great impact on Christian Europe and he
still continues to be the most popular Muslim philosopher in the West.
Alfred Gillaume in his article on philosophy and theology in his "Legacy
of Islam", writes that Ibni Rushd `belongs to Europe and European thought
rather than to the East ... Averroism continued to be a living factor in
European thought until the birth of modern experimental science. Latin
is said to have preserved more than one of Ibni Rushd's works which Arabic
had lost.' His "Tahafut ul Tahafut" is essentially a reply to Al Ghazali's
attack on rationalism. His fame as a philosopher, specially in the West,
both in Christian and Jewish circles is based on his three commentaries
of Aristotle's works known as the "Jami" (Summary), the "Talkhis" (Resume)
and a long "Tafsir or Sharah" (Commentary). These commentaries were translated
into Hebrew by Samuel Ibni Tibbon in the first half of the thirteenth century,
by Jacob Anatoli in 1232 and by Michael Scott and Hermann, the German,
into Latin. These translations were later revised in the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries. Among his other philosophical treatises are "Kitab
Fasl ul Maqal" and the "Kitab Kashf ul Manahij", which were edited by M.J.
Muller and published in Munich in 1859.
Regarding
predestination, Ibni Rushd maintained that man was `neither the absolute
master of his destiny nor bound by fixed immutable decrees, but, that the
truth lay in the middle, ie al amr bain al amrain.' `Human actions depend
partly on free-will and partly on outside causes. These causes spring from
general laws of nature, God alone knows their sequence.' According to him,
man should make utmost efforts to attain perfection which implies complete
identification with the active universal intellect. This human perfection
can only be attained through study, speculation and negation of desires
specially those relating to the senses.
Ibni Rushd
considered the Khilafat-i-Rashidah (The Pious Caliphate) as the model Republic
in which the dreams of Plato were realized. He claimed women to be equal
to men in all respects and possessing equal capacities to shine in war
and peace. He has cited women warriors among Greeks, Arabs and Africans.
Ibni Rushd
was the most learned commentator of Aristotelian works and was more Aristotelian
than Ibni Sina. He corrected some of the misconceptions of Ibni Sina about
the rational philosophy of Aristotle. A number of his invaluable works
perished when the Christian conquerors set fire to the intellectual treasures
of the Moors (Spanish Muslims) amassed after centuries of intellectual
activity. More than eighty thousand rare manuscripts were reduced to ashes
in Grenada alone. Muslim thinkers like Ibni Sina and Ibni Rushd formulated
their ideas with logical precision and in the latter Arabic philosophy
reached its apogee. It is all the more creditable for the learned Averroes
that he compiled his varied and invaluable works in such a distracted state
of mind and disturbed conditions.
In the beginning, philosophy was considered to be an
irreligious subject in Muslim Spain where the society was formulated on
true Islamic lines. Ishaq Ibni Umran, a physician of Baghdad was first
to introduce philosophy in Spain, which flourished thereafter, specially
during the reigns of Al Hakam and Yousuf Ibni Momin. The ideas of Ibni
Rushd, were incompatible with the religious sentiments of the orthodox
Muslims and he was accused of being an atheist. But, according to Phillip
K. Hitti: `He was a rationalist and claimed the right to submit everything
save the revealed dogmas of faith to the judgement of reason, but he was
not a free thinker or unbeliever.' George Sarton also holds similar views:
`Ibni Rushd was not by any means less honest and sincere, nor was he necessarily
less pious, than the other schoolmen, but he was more intelligent, and
his deeper vision enabled him to reconcile statements which seemed irreconcilable
to others.' Ibni Rushd, being a rationalist wanted to explain religion
in the light of reason. His contemporary Abdul Kabir, a highly religious
person, describes him as a person anxious to establish harmony between
religion and philosophy. In his well-known book "Averroes and Averroism",
Renan writes: `There is nothing to prevent our supposing that Ibni Rushd
was a sincere believer in Islamism, especially when we consider how little
irrational the supernatural element in the essential dogmas of this religion
is, and how closely this religion approaches the purest Deism.'
Ibni Rushd,
a versatile genius, is the author of about twenty medical treatises including
his encyclopaedic work "Kitab ul Kulliyat fit Tibb" (General Rules of Medicine),
better known as "Colliget" in Latin. This book written before 1162 comprises
seven volumes, and gives elaborate treatment to physiology, general pathology,
diagnosis, materia medica, hygiene and general theraeutics. He considered
that none suffers twice from smallpox. He also fully understood the function
of the retina. But his "Colliget" stands no comparison to "Continents"
of Rhazes and "Canon" of Avicenna. Actually his fame as a physician was
eclipsed by his fame as a philosopher. His "Kulliyat" was first translated
into Latin by the Jew Bonacosa in the latter half of the thirteenth century.
It was again translated into Latin by Syphorien Champier in about 1537.
It was twice translated into Hebrew. `In Spain, the philosophical bias
predominated among medical men', remarks Max Meyerhof. `The prototypes
of this combination are the two Muslims, Ibni Zuhr (Avenzoar) and Ibni
Rushd (Averroes).'
Muslim Spain
has produced some talented musicians both theorists and practical musicians.
Ibni Bajja (d:1138) known as Avempace, who as a musical theorist, occupies
the same place in the West which Farabi occupies in the East. Ibni Rushd
has also made invaluable contribution to musical theory by writing a commentary
on Aristotle's "De Anima" dealing perspicuously with the theory of sound.
This was translated into Latin by Michael Scot (d: 1232).
A number of
his biographies have appeared in different languages but the most elaborate
account of his life and works is found in "Averroes et j' averrosime" written
by Ernest Renan published in Paris in 1852. `This admirable work', says
George Sarton, `has justly become a classic; it is a penetrating study
which every student of mediaeval philosophy ought to read, but it must
be used with caution.' About the autocratic rule, Ibni Rushd has said:
`The tyrant is he who governs for himself and not for his people.'
It has been
customary with the Western writers to minimize the intellectual attainments
of Muslim thinkers, but now the less partial researches have lifted this
veil and their achievements stand in all their glory. Alfred Guillaume
says: `We may be sure that those who accuse the Muslim scholars of lack
of originality and of intellectual decadence have never read Averroes or
looked into Algazel but have adopted second hand judgements. The presence
of doctrines of Islamic origin in the very citadel of Western Christianity,
the `Summa' of Aquinas, is a sufficient refutation of the charge of lack
of originality and sterility.'
The works
of Ibni Rushd which were very popular in the West were translated into
several European languages including Latin, Hebrew, German and English.
It was through his commentaries that the West learned about Aristotle and
other Greek thinkers. The Latin "Editio Princeps" of Aristotle with Averroes'
commentaries was published for about fifty times in Venice alone. Andrea
Alpago of Belluno in Italy (d:1520) translated into Latin, Avicenna's "Canon"
and the minor works of Averroes. The Italian emperor Frederik, the Great,
who, on account of being a great patron of Muslim culture, was accused
by the Bishops to have embraced Islam, was instrumental in getting translated
a number of Arabic books, including those of Averroes.
Thus, the
works of Averroes which were not so popular in Islamic countries wielded
considerable influence in the Western thought, both Christian and Jewish.`He
deeply influenced Jewish philosophy through many translations and disciples',
writes George Sarton, in his monumental work "An Introduction to the Study
of Science". `Jewish Averroism reached its zenith under Levi ben Gershon
in the first half of the fourteenth century, and it continued to prosper
until the end of the fifteenth century. The Christian schoolmen were influenced
by the Jewish, and in various ways.' According to Phillip K. Hitti: `The
last of the great Arabic writing philosophers, Ibni Rushd belonged more
to Christian Europe than to Muslim Asia or Africa. To the West, he became
the commentator as Aristotle was `The Teacher'. From the end of the twelfth
to the end of the sixteenth century, Averroism remained the dominant school
of thought, and that, in spite of the orthodox reaction, it created first
among the Muslims in Spain, then among the Talmudists and finally among
the Christian clergy ... After being purged of objectionable matter by
ecclesiastical authorities, his writings became prescribed studies in the
University of Paris and other institutions of higher learning. With all
its excellence and other misconceptions collected under its name, the intellectual
movement initiated by Ibni Rushd continued to be a living factor in European
thought until the birth of modern experimental science'. Writing in the
Chapter `Crusades' of the book "The Legacy of Islam" Ernest Barker admits:
`The philosophy of Cordova and its great teacher Ibni Rushd (Averroes)
penetrated to the University of Paris.'
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