Ibn Rushd, Decisive Treatise

Posted: Mon, Sep 22, 2025

Warm-up activity: Is there any tension between philosophy and religion?

Between Reason and Faith

A specific framing: Philosophy represents reason/wisdom/truth, and religion faith.

The Euthyphro problem: Is an action morally right/wrong because God commands so, or does God command that we do/not do something because it is morally right/wrong?

  • Horn 1: God commands that we do/not do X because X is the morally right/wrong thing to do—not explanatory, implying independent moral standards.
  • Horn 2: X is the morally right/wrong thing to do because God so commands (divine command theory)—arbitrary, undermining the authority of morality.

Ibn Rushd [Averroes]: Not only does philosophy not conflict with sharīʿah [Law], but Law requires the study of philosophy.

Reconciling Law and Philosophy

Three classes of people, three paths to taṣdīq [assent]:

  • Those capable of demonstrative reasoning (logic): The philosophers.
  • Those capable of dialectical reasoning.
  • Those restricted to rhetorical versions of truth: The masses.

What if a conclusion of demonstrative reasoning contradicts the apparent meaning of the Qur’an?

  • Ibn Rushd, quoting Aristotle: “truth does not contradict truth.”
    • Truth in philosophy does not conflict with truth in Law.
    • In cases of apparent conflict, philosophy is uncovering an “inner” meaning of the Qur’an, which admits of allegorical interpretation.
  • Leo Strauss: Exoteric vs. esoteric interpretations of a classical text.
    • Exoteric: Surface meaning, accessible,
    • Esoteric: Hidden meaning, safeguarded.
  • Three kinds of passages in the Qur’an:
    • Some passages’ meanings are plain and “must be taken in their apparent meaning by everyone.”
    • Some passages clearly have dual meanings and “must be taken in their apparent meaning by the lower classes and interpreted allegorically by the demonstrative class. It is inexcusable for the lower classes to interpret them allegorically or for the demonstrative class to take them in their apparent meaning.”
    • Some passages don’t clearly fall into either box. “Error in this matter by the demonstrative class is excused.”
  • Those not capable of demonstrative reasoning must be protected from esoteric readings.

How does this work? The creation/eternity controversy: Did God create the universe at a particular moment in time, or has the universe always existed (§§ 32ff)?

  • The philosophers, following Aristotle: Eternity.
  • The theologians: Creation.
  • Qur’an: “He it is Who created the heavens and the earth in six days, and His throne was on the water.”
    • There was water and a throne before the universe was created? No, that’s just a metaphorical/rhetorical description.
    • Ibn Rushd: A created universe could have always existed? Or, an eternal universe could have been brought into existence?
      • Time does not precede creation; the universe and the creator are co-eternal (§ 33).