The Attitude of Ibn Rushd (Averroes) towards the Eternity of the World | ||
| مجلة كلية الآداب - جامعة القاهرة | ||
| Volume 2021, Issue 4, April 2021 | ||
| DOI: 10.21608/jarts.2021.63794.1082 | ||
| Abstract | ||
| This paper examines the attitude of Ibn Rushd (Averroes) towards the eternity of the world. Ibn Rushd was charged of having sided with this issue; however, this paper refutes this accusation and reduces it to a baseless one. Averroes believed that this world is a creation of Allah (God), the term of eternity and pre-eternity is heretical. His belief is based on the Qur'anic verses that deal with providence. In addition, Averroes opposed the divine emanationism doctrine, which supported the notion of the eternity of the world. The misjudgment of Averroes is ascribed to the lack of acquaintance with his approach and his objectivity, seen by some people as bias to falsehood, as well as the limitation to certain irrelevant philosophical works by Averroes, which do not reflect his opinion on this issue without fully inspecting the original publications in which he established the true representation for this point, such as the book entitled "Tahafut Altahafut". This book is seen by some readers as an attempt to criticize AL Ghazali only, although he criticized both Alfarabi and Ibn Sina alike, he also agreed with AL Ghazali on certain points, and proved that Alfarabi and Ibn Sina disagreed with the ancient philosophers because they did not properly impart their teachings, and all the knowledges they imparted had been based on mere assumptions. Averroes's integrity and objectivity is seen in the fact that he referred the inadequacy of AL Ghazali, in Tahafut Altahafut, to the fact that he restricted himself to the proposed opinions in Ibn Sina's publications, and that Alfarabi and Ibn Sina distorted the doctrines adopted by the ancient philosophers. They failed to fathom the depths of such doctrines especially those of Aristotle and his predecessors due to their improper approach to impart their knowledge after having been influenced by the Neoplatonism and the other philosophies, which in fact failed to reflect the true mindset of the ancient philosophers. | ||
| Keywords | ||
| Keywords: Averroes - AL Ghazali - eternity of the world - divine emanationism; Aristotle; Thales | ||
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