WESTERN PHILOSOPHY
Muslim rule in North Africa west of the Nile valley was commenced
under conditions very different from those prevailing in Egypt and
Syria. The Arabs found this land occupied by the Berbers or Libyans,
the same race which from the time of the earliest Pharaohs had been a
perpetual menace to Egypt, and which, on the Mediterranean seaboard,
had offered a serious problem to Phœnician, Greek, Roman and Gothic
colonists. For some thousands of years these Berbers had remained
very much the same as when they had emerged from the neolithic stage,
and were hardy desert men like the Arabs in pre-Islamic times. Their
language was not Semitic, but shows very marked Semitic affinities,
and, although language transmission is often quite distinct from racial
descent, it seems probable that in this case there was a parallel, and
this is best explained by supposing that both were derived from the
neolithic race which at one time spread along the whole of the south
coast of the Mediterranean and across into Arabia, but that some cause,
perhaps the early development of civilization in the Nile valley, had
cut off the eastern wing from the rest, and this segregated portion
developed the peculiar characteristics which we describe as Semitic.
The series of Greek, Punic, Roman, and Gothic settlements had left no
permanent mark on the Berber population, on their language, or on their
culture. At the time of the Arab invasion the country was theoretically
under the Byzantine Empire, and the invading Arabs had to meet the
resistance of a Greek army; but this was not a very serious obstacle,
and the invaders were soon left face to face with the Berber tribes.
The Muslim invasion of North Africa followed immediately after the
invasion of Egypt, but the internal disputes of the Muslim community
prevented a regular conquest. It was not until a second invasion
took place in A.H. 45 (= A.D. 665) that we can regard the Arabs as
commencing the regular conquest and settlement of the country. For
centuries afterwards the Arab control was precarious in the extreme,
revolts were constantly taking place, and many Berber states were
founded, some of which had an existence of considerable duration.
As a rule there was a pronounced racial feeling between Berbers and
Arabs, but there were also tribal feuds, and Arab policy generally
aimed at playing off one powerful tribe against another. Gradually
the Arabs spread all along North Africa and down to the desert edge,
their tribes as a rule occupying the lower ground, whilst the older
population had its chief centres in the mountainous districts. During
the invasion of 45 the city of Kairawan was founded some distance
south of Tunis. The site was badly chosen, and is now marked only by
ruins and a scanty village, but for some centuries it served as the
capital city of _Ifrikiya_, which was the name given to the province
lying next to Egypt, embracing the modern states of Tripoli, Tunis,
and the eastern part of Algeria up to the meridian of Bougie. West
of this lay _Maghrab_, or the “western land,” which was divided into
two districts, Central Maghrab extending from the borders of Ifrikiya
across the greater part of Algeria and the eastern third of Morocco,
and Further Maghrab, which spread beyond to the Atlantic coast. In
these provinces Arabs and Berbers lived side by side, but in distinct
tribes, the intercourse between the two varying in different localities
and at different times. For the most part each race preserved its own
language, the several Arabic dialects being distinguished by archaic
forms and a phonology somewhat modified by Berber influences; but there
are instances of Berber tribes which have adopted Arabic, and some of
the Arab and mixed groups have preferred the Berber language.
The religion of Islam spread rapidly amongst the Berbers, but it took
a particular development, which shows a survival of many pre-Islamic
religious ideas. The worship of saints and the devotion paid at their
tombs is a corruption which appears elsewhere, on lines quite distinct
from the Asiatic beliefs as to incarnation or transmigration, and in
the west this saint worship takes an extreme form, although here and
there are tribes which reject it altogether, as is the case with the B.
Messara, the Ida of South Morocco, etc. Pilgrimages (_ziara_) are made
to saints’ tombs, commemorative banquets are held there (_wa´da_ or
_ta´an_), and acts of worship, often taking a revolting form, are paid
to living saints, who are known as _murabits_ or _marabouts_, a word
which literally means “those who serve in frontier forts (_ribat_),”
where the soldiers were accustomed to devote themselves to practices
of piety. These saints are also known as _sidi_ (lords), or _mulaye_
(teachers), and in the Berber language of the Twaregs as _aneslem_,
or “Islamic.” Very often they are insane persons, and are allowed to
indulge every passion and to disregard the ordinary laws of morality.
Even those living at the present day are credited with miraculous
powers, not only with gifts of healing, but with exemption from the
limitations of space and from the laws of gravity (cf. Trumelet: _Les
saints de l’islam_, Paris, 1881); in many cases the same saint has two
or more tombs, and is believed to be buried in each, for it is argued
that, as he was able to be in two or more places at once during life,
so his body can be in several tombs after death. All this, of course,
is no normal development of Islam, to which it is plainly repugnant.
How thin a veneer of Muslim usages covers over a mass of primitive
animism may be seen from Dr. Westermarck’s essay on “Belief in spirits
in Morocco,” the firstfruits of the newly established Academy at Abo in
Finland (_Humaniora._ I. i. Abo, Finland, 1920), and from Dr. Montet’s
_Le culte des saints musulmans dans l’Afrique du nord_ (Geneva, 1905).
Amongst the Berber tribes in perpetual conflict with the Arab garrisons
there was always a refuge and a welcome for the lost causes of Islam,
and so almost every heretical sect and every defeated dynasty made
its last stand there, so that even now those parts show the strangest
survivals of otherwise forgotten movements. No doubt this was mainly
due to a perennial tone of disaffection towards the Arab rulers, and
anyone in revolt against the Khalif was welcomed for that very fact.
The conquest of Spain towards the end of the 1st cent. A.H. (early 8th
cent. A.D.) was jointly an Arab and Berber undertaking, the Berbers
being in the great majority in the invading army, and most of the
leaders being Berber. Thus in Andalusia the old rivalries between Arab
and Berber figure largely in the next few centuries. At first Andalusia
was regarded merely as a district attached to the province of North
Africa, and was ruled from Ifrikiya.
In A.H. 138, after the fall of the Umayyads in Asia, a fugitive member
of the fallen dynasty, `Abdu r-Rahman, failing in an attempt to restore
his family in Africa, crossed over to Spain, and there established a
new and independent power, with its seat of government at Cordova,
and in A.H. 317 one of his descendants formally assumed the title
of “Commander of the Faithful.” The Umayyads of Spain very closely
reproduced the general characteristics of their rule in Syria. They
were tolerant, and made free use of Christian and Jewish officials;
they encouraged the older literary arts, and especially poetry, and
employed Greek artists and architects; but though doing much for the
more material elements of culture, there is no evidence under their
rule of any interest in Greek learning or philosophy. Yet, though in a
sense old-fashioned, the country was by no means isolated, and we find
frequent intercourse between Spain and the east. The religious duty of
the pilgrimage has always been an important factor in promoting the
common life of Islam, and there is abundant evidence that the Spanish
Muslims looked steadily eastwards for religious guidance, accepting
the _hadith_, the canon law, and the development of a scientific
jurisprudence as it took shape in the east. Both Muslims and Jews
travelled to Mesopotamia in order to complete their education, and thus
kept in contact with the more cultured life of Asia. But Spanish Islam
had no feeling of sympathy with the philosophical speculation popular
in the east, and certainly disapproved the latitudinarian developments
which were taking place under the `Abbasids of the third century:
its tendency was to a rigid orthodoxy and strict conservatism, its
interests were confined to the canon law, Qur´anic exegesis, and the
study of tradition.
The reactionary character of Spanish Islam is well illustrated by
_Ibn Hazm_ (d. 456 A.H.), the first important theologian which it
produced. Rejecting the four recognised and orthodox schools of canon
law, and discarding even the rigid system of Ibn Hanbal as not strict
enough, he became an adherent of the school founded by Da´ud az-Zahiri
(d. 270), which has never been admitted as on the same footing as the
other four, and now is totally extinct. In the teaching of that school
Qur´an and tradition were taken in their strictest and most literal
sense; any sort of deduction by analogy was forbidden; “it is evident
that here we have to do with an impossible man and school, and so the
Muslim world found. Most said roundly that it was illegal to appoint a
Zahirite to act as judge, on much the same grounds that objection to
circumstantial evidence will throw out a man now as juror. If they had
been using modern language, they would have said that it was because
he was a hopeless crank.” (Macdonald: _Muslim Theology_, p. 110). This
was the system which Ibn Hazm now introduced into Spain, and it was
one calculated to appeal to the stern puritan strain which undoubtedly
exists in the Iberian character. The novel point was that Ibn Hazm
applied the principles and methods of jurisprudence to theology proper.
Like Da´ud he entirely rejected the principles of analogy and _taqlid_,
that is, the following of authority in the sense of accepting the
dictum of a known teacher. As this undermined all existing systems, and
required every man to study Qur´an and tradition for himself, it did
not receive the approval of the canonists, who, in Spain as elsewhere,
were the followers of recognised schools, such as that of Abu Hanifa
and the other orthodox systems, and it was not until a full century
afterwards that he gained any number of adherents. In theology he
admitted the Ash`arite doctrine of _mukhalafa_, the difference of God
from all created beings, so that human attributes could not be applied
to him in the same sense as they were used of men; but he carried this
a stage further, and opposed the Ash`arites, who, though admitting
the difference, had then argued about the attributes of God as though
they described God’s nature, when the very fact of difference deprives
them of any meaning intelligible to us. As in the Qur´an ninety-nine
descriptive titles are applied to God we may lawfully employ them, but
we neither know what they imply nor can we argue anything from them.
The same method is applied to the treatment of the anthropomorphical
expressions which are applied to God in the Qur´an; we may use those
expressions, but we have not the slightest idea of what they may
indicate, save that we know they do not mean what they would mean as
used of men. In ethics the only distinction between good and evil is
based on God’s will, and our only knowledge of that distinction is
obtained from revelation. If God forbids theft it is wrong only because
God forbids it; there is no standard other than the arbitrary approval
or disapproval of God.
Although it took a century for these views to obtain any number of
adherents, Ibn Hazm was no obscure figure during his lifetime. He
became prominent as a violent and abusive controversialist, an opponent
of the Ash`arite party and of the Mu`tazilites, curiously enough
treating the latter more gently as having limited God’s qualities.
Ibn Hazm lived at a time when the Umayyads of Cordova were already
in their decay, and in 422 the dynasty fell. Very soon the whole of
Andalusia was split into a number of independent principalities, and
this was followed by a period of anarchy, during which the country
was exposed more and more to Christian attacks, until at length
Mu`tamid, King of Seville, fearing that the Muslim states would
disappear altogether under the tide of Christian conquest, advised his
co-religionists to appeal for help to the Murabit power in Morocco,
which, with much misgiving, they did.
The Murabits, the name is that commonly applied to saints in Morocco,
were the product of a religious revival led by Yahya b. Ibrahim of the
clan of the Jidala, a branch of the great Berber tribe of Latuna, one
of those light-complexioned Berber races such as can still be seen
in Algeria, and are apparently nearest akin to the Lebu as they are
represented in ancient Egyptian paintings. In 428 (= 1036 A.D.) Yahya
performed the pilgrimage to Mecca, and was astonished and delighted
at the evidences of culture and prosperity which he saw in the lands
through which he travelled, so far exceeding anything which had
previously entered his experience. On his return journey he stopped
at Kairawan and became a hearer at the lectures given there by Abu
Amran. The lecturer was greatly struck by the diligence and attention
of his pupil, and greatly surprised when he discovered that he was a
product of one of the wild and barbarous tribes of the far west. But
when Yahya asked that one of the alumni of Kairawan might be sent
home with him to teach his fellow-tribesmen no one was found willing
to venture amongst a people who were generally regarded as fierce and
savage, until at last the task was undertaken by Abdullah ibn Jahsim.
Helped by his companion Yahya commenced a religious revival amongst
the Berbers of the West, and seems to have modelled his work on the
example of the Prophet, by force of arms urging his reforms upon the
neighbouring tribes and laying the foundation of a united kingdom, a
work which was continued by his successor, Yusuf b. Tashfin, and so
at length a powerful kingdom was established, which extended from the
Mediterranean to the Senegal. Many such Berber states were established
at various times, but, as a rule, they fell into decay after a couple
of generations.
Yusuf b. Tashfin was the champion now invited by the Muslims of Spain,
not without misgivings in many quarters, but the choice seemed to lie
only between Christian or Berber, and the Berbers were at least of
their own religion and of the same race as the majority of the Spanish
Muslims. Yusuf came as a helper, but a second time invited he stayed on
and established his authority over the country, and thus Spain became
a province under the rule of the Murabit princes of Morocco. Yusuf was
succeeded by `Ali, who was successful in restraining the Christians,
and at one time even formed plans to drive them out of Spain altogether.
Murabit rule, which lasted 35 years, brought many changes and itself
experienced many changes. The rulers were rough men of uncouth manners
and fanatical outlook. Not many years before, it will be remembered,
the Arabs of Kairawan were reluctant to venture into their land, such
was their ill repute. They were partially humanised by a religious
movement, and thus naturally show a religious character which bordered
on fanaticism. `Ali himself was entirely in the hands of the _faqirs_
or mendicant devotees and qadis, and the government was liable to
interference from these irresponsible fanatics at every turn. It was a
state of affairs which awakened the impatience of the cultured Muslims
of Spain, who expressed their feelings in many caustic epigrams and
satirical poems. But very soon a change began to work. The Murabits
and their followers did not become less attached to the devotees, who
swarmed unchecked on every side and received idolatrous attentions
from the multitude, but they learned the luxuries and refinements of
the cultured life then prevailing in Spain and showed themselves apt
pupils. Indeed, their downfall may be explained either as due to effete
luxury or to faqir-ridden superstition, as we shall see later on.
The intellectual life of Muslim Spain up to the Murabit period was
conservative rather than backward. Its literary men were nearer the old
traditional Arab type than was the case in the eastern Khalifate, where
Persian influences had pushed the Arab so much into the background;
its scholars were still occupied exclusively with the traditional
sciences, exegesis, canon law, and traditions. The Murabit invasion
offered a stimulus to satirical verse, but otherwise did nothing to
promote either literature or science. Yet it is under Murabit rule
that we find the first beginnings of western philosophy, and the line
of transmission is from the Mu`tazilites of Baghdad through the Jews
and thence to the Muslims of Spain. The Jews act as intermediaries who
bring the Muslim philosophy of Asia into contact with the Muslims of
Spain.
For a long time the Jews had taken no part in the development of
Hellenistic philosophy, although in the latter Syriac period they
had participated in medical studies and in natural science, of which
we have seen evidence in the important work of Jewish physicians and
scientists at Baghdad under al-Ma´mun and the early `Abbasids. Outside
medicine and natural science Jewish interest seems to have been mainly
confined to Biblical exegesis, tradition, and canon law.
One of the few exceptions to this restriction of interests was
_Sa`id al-Fayyumi_ or Saadya ben Joseph (d. 331 A.H. = 942 A.D.), a
native of Upper Egypt, who became one of the Geonim of the academy
at Sora on the Euphrates, and is best known as the translator of the
Old Testament into Arabic, which had now replaced Aramaic as the
speech of the Jews both in Asia and in Spain. As an author his most
important work was the _Kitab al-Amanat wa-l-´Itiqadat_, or “Book of
the articles of faith and dogmatics,” which was finished in 321-2 (=
A.D. 933), and was afterwards translated into Hebrew as _Sefer Emunot
we-De´ot_ by Judah b. Tibbon. He was the author also of a commentary
on the Pentateuch, of which only a portion (on Exod. 30, 11-16)
survives, as well as other works; but it is in the first-named and
in the commentary that his views appear most clearly. For the first
time a Jewish writer shows familiarity with the problems raised by
the Mu`tazilites, and gives these a serious attention from the Jewish
stand-point. It does not seem, however, that we should class Sa`id as
a Mu`tazilite; he more properly represents the movement which produced
his Muslim contemporaries, al-Ash`ari and al-Mataridi, that is to say,
he is one of those who use orthodox _kalam_ and adapt philosophy to
apologetic purposes. His position is shown most clearly in the “Book of
the articles of faith and dogmatics” in dealing with the three problems
of (_a_) creation, (_b_) the Divine Unity, and (_c_) free will. In the
first of these he defends the doctrine of a creation _ex nihilo_, but
in giving proofs of the necessity of a creator he shows in three out of
the four arguments employed distinct traces of Aristotelian influences.
In treating the doctrine of the Divine Unity he is chiefly concerned
with opposing the Christian teaching of the Trinity, but incidentally
is compelled to deal with the idea of God and the Divine attributes,
and in doing so maintains that none of the Aristotelian categories can
be applied to God. As to the human will he defends its freedom, and his
task is mainly an effort to reconcile this with the omnipotence and
omniscience of God. In the fragment on Exodus he refers to the commands
of revelation and the commands of reason, these latter, he asserts,
being based on philosophical speculation.
Evidently the _Mutakallamin_ movement, professedly an orthodox
reaction from the Mu`tazilites, represents a great widening of
philosophical influences. Philosophy was no longer a subject confined
to one group of scholars who were interested in Greek writings, but
had spread out until it reached the mosques, and could no longer be
thrust aside as an heretical aberration, and in its outspread it had
penetrated the Jewish schools as well. But Sa`id produced no immediate
disciples, and those who followed him in the Jewish academies of
Mesopotamia showed no interest in his methods. Yet his work, apparently
barren, was destined to have results of the widest importance after a
century’s interval. In spite of distance and the difficulties of travel
there was a very close and frequent intercourse maintained between all
the Jews of the Sefardi group, those, namely, who had adopted Arabic
as their ordinary speech and who were living under Muslim rule. The
Ashkenazi Jews in the north and centre of Europe who lived in Christian
lands and did not use Arabic were definitely separated from these
others by the barrier of language, and thus in different surroundings
the two groups developed marked differences in their use of Hebrew,
in their liturgical formularies, and in their popular beliefs and
folk-lore. Thus we must bear in mind that a synagogue in Spain would
naturally be in close touch with synagogues in Mesopotamia, but it was
not likely to have any contact with one in the Rhine valley.
Although the earlier Jewish settlers in Spain and Provence had enjoyed
considerable freedom, restrictions had been imposed by the council
of Elvira (A.D. 303-4), and they had to suffer considerable severity
under the later West Goths. The coming of the Muslims had greatly
eased their position, chiefly because the Jews had taken a leading
part in assisting and probably in inviting the invaders; they often
furnished garrisons to occupy towns which the Muslims had conquered,
and were the means of supplying them with information as to the enemy’s
movements. It seems probable that they had been in correspondence with
the Muslims beforehand, so that they shared with Witiza’s partisans
the responsibility of inviting the invasion. Under Umayyad rule their
prosperity continued and increased. Very often we find Jews occupying
high positions at court and in the civil service, and these favorable
conditions seem to have prevailed until the time of the Muwahhids, for
it does not appear that the Murabits, for all their fanaticism, took
any measures against Christians or Jews.
Important amongst the Jews of the Umayyad period was _Hasdai ben
Shabrut_ (d. 360 or 380 A.H.), a physician under `Abdu r-Rahman, who
sent presents to Sora and Pumbaditha, and carried on a correspondence
with Dosa, son of the Gaon Sa`id al-Fayyumi. Hitherto it had been the
custom for the western Jews to refer all difficult problems of the
canon law to the learned of the academies in Mesopotamia, just as their
Muslim neighbours referred to the East for guidance in jurisprudence
and theology. But Hasdai took advantage of the accidental presence
of Moses Ben Enoch in Cordova to found a native Spanish academy for
rabbinical studies there, and appointed Moses its president, a step
which received the warm approval of the Umayyad prince. This turned
out to be more important than its founder had anticipated; it was
not merely a provincial school reproducing the work of the eastern
academies, but resulted in the transference of Jewish scholarship to
Spain. At that time Asiatic Islam was beginning to feel the restricting
power of the orthodox reaction, whilst Spain, on the other hand, saw
the opening of a golden age. Shortly before this date the Umayyad Hakim
II. had been working to encourage Muslim scholarship in the west, and
had sent his agents to purchase books in Cairo, Damascus, Baghdad,
and Alexandria. In the reactionary age of Mahmud of Ghazna (388-421)
Muslim b. Muhammad al-Andalusi had been instrumental in introducing
the teachings of the “Brethren of Purity” to the Muslims of Spain. We
cannot say that the Jews anticipated the Muslims of Spain in their
study of philosophy, but it is clear that the Jews were associated with
the first dawn of the new learning in Spain, and thus as the sun was
setting in the East a new day was beginning to break in the West.
The first leader of Spanish philosophy was the Jew _Abu Ayyub Sulayman
b. Yahya b. Jabirul_ (d. 450 A.H. = 1058 A.D.), commonly known as Ibn
Gabirol (Jabirul), and hence “Avencebrol” in the Latin scholastic
writers. He is chiefly known as the author of _Maqor Chayim_, “The
Fountain of Life,” a title based on the words of Psalm 36, 10, which
was one of the works translated into Latin at the college of Toledo
and so well known to the scholastic writers as the _Fons Vitae_ (ed.
Baumer: _Avencebrolis Fons Vitae_, Münster, 1895). It was this work
which really introduced neo-Platonism to the West. Ibn Jabirul teaches
that God alone is pure reality, and He is the only actual substance;
He has no attributes, but in Him are will and wisdom, not as possessed
attributes but as aspects of His nature. The world is produced by
the impress of form upon pre-existing universal matter. “Separate
substances” in the sense of ideas abstracted from the things in which
they exist (cf. Aristot. _de anima_. iii. 7, 8, “and so the mind when
it thinks of mathematical forms thinks of them as separated, though
they are not separated”) do not exist apart in reality; the abstracting
is only a mental process, so the general idea exists only as a concept,
not as a reality. But between the purely spiritual being of God and
the crudely material observed in the bodies existing in this world are
intermediate forms of existence, such as angels, souls, etc., wherein
the form is not impressed upon matter.
Besides this “Fountain of Life” Ibn Gabirol was the author of two
ethical treatises, the _Tikkun Midwoth han-Nefesh_, “the correction of
the manners of the soul,” in which man is treated as a microcosm after
the kabbalistic fashion; and _Mibchar hap-Peninim_, a collection of
ethical maxims collected from the Greek and Arabic philosophers. The
former has been published at Luneville in 1804, the latter at Hamburg
in 1844.
At the beginning of the sixth century A.H., a younger contemporary
of al-Ghazali, we have _Abu Bakr ibn Bajja_ (d. 533 A.H. = 1138
A.D.), the first of the Muslim philosophers of Spain. By this time,
some three-quarters of a century after the death of Ibn Sina,
Arabic philosophy was almost extinct in Asia and was treated as a
dangerous heresy. In Egypt, it is true, there was a greater degree of
toleration, though less than in the golden age of the Fatimids, but
Egypt was regarded with suspicion as the home of heresy and of forms
of superstition which were uncongenial to the philosopher. Spain thus
becomes the place of refuge for Muslim philosophy as it had already
become the nursery of Jewish speculation. Ibn Bajja, known to the
Latin schoolmen as “Avempace,” found in Murabit Spain the freedom
and toleration which Asia no longer afforded. He continues the work
of al-Farabi, not, it will be noted, of Ibn Sina, and develops the
neo-Platonic interpretation of Aristotle on sober and conservative
lines. He wrote commentaries on Aristotle’s Physics, _de generatione
et corruptione_, and the _Meteora_; he produced original works on
mathematics, on “the soul,” and a treatise which he called “The
Hermit’s Guide,” which was used by Ibn Rushd (Averroes) and by the
Jewish writer Moses of Narbonne in the 14th cent. A.D. In this last
work he makes a distinction between “animal activity,” in which action
is due to the prompting of the emotions, passions, etc., and “human
activity,” which is suggested and directed by abstract reason, and from
this distinction draws a rule of life and conduct. He is chiefly cited
by the Latin schoolmen with reference to the doctrine of “separate
substances.” “Avempace held that, by the study of the speculative
sciences, we are able by means of the images which we know from these
ideas to attain to the knowledge of separate substances” (St. Thomas
Aq. _c. Gentiles_, 3, 41). This question as to the possibility of
knowing substances separated, i.e. abstracted, from the concrete bodies
in which they exist in combination--and the “separate substances” were
regarded as spiritual things--was prominent in mediæval scholasticism,
which inherited it from the Arabic philosophers, and from it came the
further question whether the contemplation of such abstract ideas gives
us a better knowledge of realities than observation of the concrete
bodies. Both Albertus Magnus and St. Thomas Aquinas associate Avempace
especially with this question and with the doctrine of the “acquired
intellect,” to which we have already referred in our notes on Ibn Sina,
and which completes the theory of “separate substances” by supposing
that intelligible forms stream into our souls from an outside Agent
Intellect by way of emanation as substantial forms descend on corporeal
matter. St. Thomas Aquinas shows direct knowledge of Avempace’s
treatment of these subjects, but this is not so evident in Albertus.
Avempace, like all other Arabic philosophers, describes _ittisal_ or
union of the human intellect with the Agent Intellect, of which it is
an emanation, as the supreme beatitude and final end of human life. By
the operation of the Agent Intellect on the latent intellect in man
this is awakened to life, but eternal life consists in the complete
union of the intellect with the Agent Intellect. In Avempace the Sufi
strain is much weaker than in al-Farabi; the means of attaining this
union is not by ecstasy, but by a steady disentangling of the soul
of those material things which hinder its pure intellectual life and
consequent union. This leads us to the teaching of asceticism as the
discipline of the soul for its spiritual progress, and the ascetic
and solitary life is the ideal proposed by Avempace. This ascetic and
contemplative hermit life is not, however, in any sense a religious
life, for in this respect Avempace has advanced far beyond al-Farabi;
he is fully conscious that pure philosophy cannot be reconciled with
the teachings of revelation, a conviction which now marks the definite
separation of the “philosophers” from the orthodox scholastics of
Islam, such as al-Ghazali and his school; he regards the teachings
of revelation as an imperfect presentation of the truths which are
more completely and correctly learned from Aristotle, and only admits
the Qur´an and its religion as a discipline for the multitude whose
intelligence neither desires nor is capable of philosophical reasoning.
Strangely enough he lived in security, protected from the attacks of
hostile theologians, under the protection of the Murabit princes.
Within a few years after the death of Avempace the Murabit dynasty came
to an end. The succeeding dynasty, the Muwahhids, were of Berber origin
like the Murabits, and, like them, had their origin in a religious
revival.
The foundation of the Muwahhids is associated with _Ibn Tumart_
(d. 524 A.H. = 1129 A.D.). He was a native of Morocco, and a strange
combination of fanatic and scholastic. He claimed to be a descendant
of `Ali, and posed as the “Mahdi” possessing the supernatural grace
of _isma_ or “security from error,” and thus introduced Shi`ite ideas
into Morocco; and at the same time it was he who introduced to the West
the orthodox scholasticism of al-Ghazali, although at the same time he
professed to be a follower of Ibn Hazm. He travelled in Asia, where,
no doubt, he learned of al-Ghazali and his doctrines. Roughly treated
at Mecca he removed to Egypt, where he rendered himself prominent and
objectionable by his puritanical criticisms on the manners of the
people. Setting out from Alexandria in a ship travelling westwards
he occupied himself with a reformation of the morals of the crew,
compelling them to observe the correct hours of prayer and the other
duties of religion. In 505 he appeared at Mahdiya, where he took up
his abode in a wayside mosque. There he used to sit at the window
watching the passers-by, and, whenever he saw any of them carrying a
jar of wine or a musical instrument, he used to sally out and seize the
offensive article and break it. The common people reverenced him as
a saint, but many of the wealthier citizens resented his activities,
and at length brought a complaint against him before the Emir Yahya.
The Emir heard their complaints and observed Ibn Tumart and took note
of the impression he had made upon the populace. With characteristic
craft the Emir treated the reformer with all possible respect, but
advised, nay rather urged, him to bestow the favour of his presence
upon some other town as soon as convenient to him, and so he removed to
Bijaiya (Bougie in Algeria). Here his ways were extremely unpopular,
and he was driven away. He next settled at Mellala, where he met a boy
named `Abdu l-Mumin al-Kumi (d. 558), a potter’s son, whom he made his
disciple and declared to be his successor. At this time the Murabit
dynasty had fallen from its original puritanism and was distinguished
for the wealth and luxury which had been made possible by the conquest
of Spain, and the splendour and ostentation of the royal family at
Morocco laid it open to criticism. One Friday a faqir entered the
public square where a throne was made ready for the Emir, and, pushing
his way through the guards who stood round, boldly took his seat upon
the throne and refused to leave. It was the Mahdi Ibn Tumart, and,
so great was the superstitious reverence accorded to all faqirs, and
to him above all, that none of the guards standing round ventured to
remove him by force. At length the Emir himself appeared and, finding
who had occupied his official seat, declined to interfere with the
redoubtable faqir’s will, but it was privately made plain to Ibn Tumart
that it would be wise for him to leave the city for a while. The Mahdi
therefore retired to Fez, but soon afterwards returned to Morocco.
One day he met in the streets the Emir’s sister, who had adopted the
shameless foreign custom of riding in public without a veil. The Mahdi
stopped her and poured out a stream of abuse at her for this neglect
of established custom, then, overcome by his indignation, he pulled
her off the beast she was riding. He seems, however, to have felt some
alarm at his own temerity and fled forthwith to Tinamel, where he
openly raised the standard of revolt against a corrupt and unfaithful
dynasty. At first this rebellion did not meet with much success, but,
after the Mahdi’s death, the leadership fell to his pupil, `Abdu
l-Mumin, who took Oran, Tlemsen, Fez, Sale, Ceuta, and in 542 became
master of Morocco, and in due course seized all the empire of the
Murabits. The new dynasty established by `Abdu l-Mumin is known by
the name of the Muwahhids or “Unitarians,” a title which the Spanish
historians render by “Almohades,” and their rule endured until 667 A.H.
(= 1268 A.D.).
Ibn Tumart professed to be a follower of al-Ghazali, and introduced
his system of orthodox scholasticism to the West. In canon law he
followed the reactionary school of Da´ud az-Zahiri and Ibn Hazm, like
the Murabits who preceded him. To the multitude he was the champion of
Berber nationality; he translated the Qur´an into the Berber language,
and caused the call to prayer to be made in Berber instead of Arabic.
Muwahhid rule introduced a period of bigotry and of religious
persecution. It was under the rule of this dynasty that we find the
Jews leaving the country in large numbers and migrating to Africa or to
Provence, and many Christians also fled to join the Castilian forces in
the north. Modern historians tend to condemn the later severities of
Christian rulers towards their Muslim subjects, and often seem to speak
of those subjects as the peaceable and cultured population which had
lived under the Umayyads and the Murabits. But Spain’s last experience
of the Muslims was of the fierce, bigoted, and persecuting Muwahhids,
whose tone was very different. Strangely, however, it was under these
intolerant rulers that Spanish Islam passed through its golden age
of philosophical speculation, and not only so, but the philosophers
were protected and favoured by the Muwahhid court. Quite early in
this period the position seems to have been tacitly arranged that the
philosophers were absolutely free in their work and teaching, provided
that teaching was not spread abroad amongst the populace: it was to be
regarded as a species of esoteric truth reserved for the enlightened.
It seems almost certain that this attitude was deliberately arranged
by the philosophers themselves; it had already been sketched out by
some of the Asiatic writers, and definitely laid down by al-Ash`ari
and al-Ghazali, and the Muwahhids, it must be remembered, professed to
be Ghazalians. But whilst the philosophers enjoyed this exceptional
freedom of speculation, so different from the repressive orthodoxy
of the Turkish dynasties in Asia, and defended the system in their
writings, the rulers officially were enforcing amongst the multitude of
their subjects the severest orthodoxy and the most reactionary system
of jurisprudence, so reactionary that it was never admitted by the
Asiatic sultans.
The first great leader of philosophical thought in Muwahhid Spain
was _Ibn Tufayl_ (d. 581 = 1185), who was wazir and court physician
under the Muwahhid Abu Yaqub (A.H. 558-580). His teaching was in
general conformity with that of Ibn Bajja (Avempace), but the mystic
element is much more strongly marked. He admits ecstasy as a means of
attaining the highest knowledge and of approaching God. But in Ibn
Tufayl’s teaching this knowledge differs very much from that aimed at
by the Sufis: it is mystic philosophy rather than mystic theology. The
beatific vision reveals the Agent Intellect and the chain of causation
reaching down to man and then back again to itself.
In his views as to the need of removing the doctrines of philosophy
from the multitude he shows the same principles as Ibn Bajja, which
are those which came to be recognised as the proper official attitude
under the Muwahhids, and defends them in a romance called _Hayy b.
Yaqzan_, “the Living One son of the Wakeful,” the work by which his
name is best remembered. In this story we have the picture of two
islands, one inhabited by a solitary recluse who spends his time in
contemplation and thereby raises his intellect until he finds that he
is able to apprehend the eternal verities which are in the One Active
intellect. The other island is inhabited by ordinary people who are
occupied in the commonplace incidents of life and follow the practices
of religion in the form known to them. In this way they are content
and happy, but fall far short of the complete and perfect happiness of
the recluse on the other island. In course of time the recluse, who is
perfectly well aware of the neighbouring island and its inhabitants,
begins to feel great pity for them in that they are excluded from the
more perfect felicity which he enjoys, and in an honest desire for
their welfare, goes over to them and preaches the truth as he has found
it. For the most part he is quite unintelligible to them, and the only
result is that he produces confusion, doubt, and controversial strife
amongst those whom he desired to benefit, but who are incapable of the
intellectual life which he has led. In the end he returns to his island
convinced that it is a mistake to interfere with the conventional
religion of the multitude.
_Ibn Rushd_ (A.H. 520-595), known to the West as Averroes, was the
greatest of the Arabic philosophers, and was practically their last.
He was a native of Cordova and the friend and protégé of Ibn Tufayl,
by whom he was introduced to Abu Ya´qub in 548. He was, however, more
outspoken than Ibn Tufayl, and wrote several controversial works
against al-Ghazali and his followers. The family to which he belonged
was one whose members usually became jurists, and Ibn Rushd acted as
Qadi in various Spanish towns; like most of the Arabic philosophers
he studied medicine, and in 578 was appointed court physician to Abu
Ya´qub. By this time he had finished his career as an author. Under
the Muwahhid Abu Yusuf al-Mansur he was censured as a heretic and
banished from Cordova. It must be remembered that the Muwahhids, like
the Murabits, were really Moroccan rulers, to whom Spain was a foreign
province. It was whilst the Emir was in Spain and at Cordova, making
ready for an attack upon the Christians, that Ibn Rushd was disgraced,
and it seems probable that this was mainly a matter of policy, as the
Emir, on the eve of a religious war, was desirous of proving his own
strict orthodoxy by the public disapproval of one who had been rather
too outspoken in his speculative theories. As soon as the Emir returned
to Morocco the order of exile was revoked, and later on Ibn Rushd
appears at the court of Morocco, where he died in 595.
Amongst the Muslims Ibn Rushd has not exercised great influence; it was
the Jews who supplied the bulk of his admirers, and they, scattered in
Provence and Sicily by Muwahhid persecution, seem to have been chiefly
instrumental in introducing him to Latin Christendom.
His chief medical work was known as the _Kulliyat_, “the universal,”
which, under the Latinized name of “colliget,” became popular as a
manual in the mediæval universities where the Arabic system of medicine
was in use. He wrote also on jurisprudence a text-book of the law of
inheritance, which is still extant in MS., and also produced works on
astronomy and grammar. He maintained that the task of philosophy was
one approved and commended by religion, for the Qur´an shows that God
commands men to search for the truth. It is only the prejudice of the
unenlightened which fears freedom of thought, because for those whose
knowledge is imperfect the truths of philosophy seem to be contrary
to religion. On this topic he composed two theological treatises--“On
the Agreement of Religion with Philosophy” and “On the Demonstration
of Religious Dogmas,” both of which have been edited by M. J. Mueller.
The popular beliefs he does not accept, but he regards them as wisely
designed to teach morality and to develop piety amongst the people
at large; the true philosopher allows no word to be uttered against
established religion, which is a thing necessary for the welfare of the
people. Aristotle he regards as the supreme revelation of God to man:
with it religion is in total agreement, but as religion is known to the
multitude it only partially discloses Divine truth and adapts it to the
practical needs of the many; in religion there is a literal meaning,
which is all the uneducated are able to attain, and there is an
“interpretation,” which is the disclosing of deeper truths beneath the
surface which it is not expedient to communicate to the multitude. He
opposes the position of Ibn Bajja, who inclined to solitary meditation
and avoided the discussion of philosophical problems; he admits and
desires such discussion provided it is confined to the educated who are
able to understand its bearing, and not brought before the multitude
who are thereby in danger of having their simple faith undermined. He
agrees with Ibn Bajja, however, as against Ibn Tufayl in disapproval
of ecstasy; such a thing may be, but it is too rare to need serious
consideration.
There are different classes of men who fall roughly into three groups.
The highest of these are those whose religious belief is based on
demonstration (_burhan_), the result of reasoning from syllogisms which
are _à priori_ certain; these are the men to whom the philosopher makes
his appeal. The lowest stratum contains those whose faith is based on
the authority of a teacher or on presumptions which cannot be argued
out and are not due to the exercise of pure reason; it is mischievous
to put “demonstration” or reason or controversy before people of this
type, for it can only cause them doubt and difficulty. Intermediate
between these two strata are those who have not attained the use of
pure reason--which, with Ibn Rushd, seems to be simply intuition--but
are capable of argument and controversy by means of which their faith
can be defended and proved; “demonstration” proper is not to be laid
before these, but it is right to enter into argument with them and to
assist them to rise above the level of those whose belief is based only
upon authority.
Most of all, Ibn Rushd opposed the teaching of the _mutakallimin_
or orthodox scholastic theologians, whom he regarded as subverting
the pure principles of the Aristotelian philosophy, and of these he
considered the worst to be al-Ghazali, “that renegade of philosophy.”
His leading controversial work is the _Destruction of the Destruction_
(Tahafat at-Tahafat), which he designed as a refutation of al-Ghazali’s
_Destruction of the Philosophers_.
But it was as a commentator on the text of Aristotle that he became
best known to subsequent generations amongst the Jews and the later
Latin scholastics; he was the great and final commentator. Strangely,
however, Ibn Rushd never perceived the importance of reading Aristotle
in the original; he had no knowledge of Greek, and gives no sign of
supposing that a study of the Greek text would at all assist a student
of the philosopher. The method of his commentaries is the time-honoured
form derived from the Syriac commentators: a sentence of the text is
given and the explanatory comments follow.
In main substance Ibn Rushd reproduces the psychology of Aristotle
as interpreted by al-Farabi and Ibn Sina, but with some important
modifications. In man is a passive and an active intellect: the active
intellect is roused to action by the operation of the Agent Intellect,
and thus becomes an acquired intellect; the individual intellects
are many, but the Agent Intellect is but one, though present in
each, just as the sun is one, but there are in action as many suns
as there are bodies which it illuminates. This is the form of the
Aristotelian doctrine as it had been transmitted through Ibn Sina; the
Agent Intellect is one, but it is as by emanation present in each, so
that the quickening power in each one is part of the universal Agent
Intellect. But Ibn Rushd differs from his predecessors in his treatment
of the passive intellect, the _`aql hayyulani_, which is the seat of
latent and potential faculties upon which the Agent operates. In all
the earlier systems this passive intellect was regarded as purely
individual and as operated on by the emanation of the universal Agent,
but Ibn Rushd regarded the passive intellect also as but a portion
of a universal soul and as individual only in so far as temporarily
occupying an individual body. Even the passive powers are part of a
universal force animating the whole of nature. This is the doctrine of
_pampsychism_, which exercised so strong an attraction for many of the
mediæval scholastics, and has its adherents at the present day; thus
James (_Principles of Psychology_, p. 346) says: “I confess that the
moment I become metaphysical and try to define the _more_, I find the
notion of some sort of an _anima mundi_ thinking in all of us to be a
more promising hypothesis, in spite of all its difficulties, than that
of a lot of absolutely individual souls.” Ibn Rushd regards Alexander
of Aphrodisias as mistaken in supposing that the passive intellect is
a mere disposition; it is in us, but belongs to something outside; it
is not engendered, it is incorruptible, and so in a sense resembles
the Agent Intellect. This doctrine is the very opposite to what is
commonly described as materialism, which represents the mind as merely
a form of energy produced by the activity of the neural functions. The
activity of brain and nerves, according to Ibn Rushd, are due to the
presence of an external force; not only, as Aristotle teaches, at least
according to Alexander Aph.’s interpretation, is the highest faculty of
the reason due to the operation of the external one Agent Intellect,
but the passive intellect on which this agent acts is itself part of
a great universal soul, which is the one source of all life and the
reservoir to which the soul returns when the transitory experience of
what we call life is finished.
Ibn Rushd’s views do not receive much attention or criticism
from Muslim scholars, but the Christian scholastics brought two
main arguments against this theory, one psychological, the other
theological. The psychological objection is that it is entirely
subversive of individuality: if the conscious life of each is only
part of the conscious life of a universal soul there can be no real
_ego_ in any one of us; but there is no fact to which consciousness
bears clearer witness than the reality and individuality of the _ego_.
This did not touch the possibility that the individual soul might be
drawn from a universal soul as its source, nor did it disprove that
the individual soul might be reabsorbed again in the universal soul,
but in so far as Ibn Rushd’s view represented the soul as throughout
a part of the universal soul it was argued that this is contrary to
experience, which makes it clear that in this present life the _ego_
is very distinctly individual. The theological argument was that Ibn
Rushd’s view denied the immortality of the soul, and so was contrary to
the Christian faith. This objection deals more specifically with the
reabsorption of the soul of the individual in the universal soul; such
cessation of separate and individual existence, it was argued, meant
that the soul as such no longer existed.
As we have already noted, Aristotle gives a rather narrow range to the
highest faculty of reason, confining its activity to the perception
of abstract ideas; “as to the things spoken of as abstract (the mind)
thinks of them as it would of the being snub-nosed, if by an effort of
thought it thinks of it _qua_ snub-nosed, not separately, but _qua_
hollow, without the flesh in which the hollowness is adherent: so
when it thinks of mathematical forms, it thinks of them as separated,
though they are not separated” (Aristot. _de anima._ iii. 7, 7-8).
Those who followed Alexander Aph. and the neo-Platonists took this
“abstract” in a very narrow sense, and in the Arabic commentators
these abstractions even become non-substantial beings, as it were
disembodied, or rather bodiless, spirits: “in quibusdam libris de
Arabico translatis substantiae separatae, quae nos angelos dicimus,
intelligentiae vocantur” (S. Thos. Aquin. _Quaest. Disp. de anima._
16). Can man know these _substantiae separatae_ by his natural
faculties? Ibn Rushd says he can: if otherwise nature has acted in
vain, for there would be an _intelligibile_ without an _intelligens_ to
understand it; but Aristotle has shewn (_Polit._ 1, 8, 12) that nature
does nothing in vain, so that if there be an _intelligibile_ there
must be an _intelligens_ capable of perceiving it. “The commentator
(i.e. Ibn Rushd) says in 2 Met. comm. i. (in fine) that if abstract
substances cannot be understood by us then nature has acted in vain,
because it made that which is by nature understandable in itself to
be not understood by anyone. But nothing is superfluous or in vain in
nature. Therefore immaterial substances can be understood by us.” (S.
Thos. Aquin. _Summa._ 1, 88.)
As the Agent Intellect enters into communication with relative being
it has to suffer the conditions of relativity, and so is not equally
efficient in all; it acts on sensible images as form acts on matter,
yet the Agent Intellect never becomes corruptible as that on which it
acts.
These are in outline the points in the teaching of Ibn Rushd, which
show the most marked differences from that of his predecessors,
and which afterwards provoked most controversy amongst the Latin
scholastics.
Ibn Rushd really ends the illustrious line of Arabic Aristotelians.
A few Aristotelian scholars followed in Spain, but with the decay of
the Muwahhid power these came to an end. Of those later scholars we
may mention Muhyi ad-Din b. `Arabi (d. 638) and `Abdu l-Haqq b. Sab`in
(d. 667). The former of these was primarily a Sufi, and shows a strong
inclination towards pantheism. `Abdu l-Haqq, the last of the Muwahhid
circle, was also a Sufi, but at the same time an accurate student of
Aristotle. In modern Islam there is no Aristotelian scholarship, save
only in logic, where Aristotle has always held his own.