His life:
• Ibn Rushd, known to Europeans as Averroes, was an Arabian philosopher, astronomer and writer on jurisprudence who was born in Cordoba in what is now Spain in 1126. He died in Morocco in 1198.
• He was educated in Cordoba where his father and grandfather were judges in the court of civil affairs and both had played an important part in the political history of Andalusia.
• Ibn Rushd was influential in the fields of jurisprudence, medicine and mathematics.
• He is mostly remembered for his insights into philosophy and theology.
• Under the Caliphs Abu Jacob Yusuf and his son, Jacob Al Mansur, he was entrusted with several important civil offices in Morocco, Seville and Cordoba. However, he fell into disfavor and was banished with other representatives of learning.
• Shortly before his death, the decree was cancelled, but by this time many of his works in logic and metaphysics had been burned.
• By the end of the Moorish domination of Spain, which occurred shortly after his death, he had left no school, forcing his work to be studied in Hebrew and Latin. Thus, his work was better known in Europe than it was in the Arab world, and his thought has influenced Europe until today.
• Ibn Rushd was the greatest thinker in the history of Andalusian philosophy. His writings demonstrate Islam as a religion of tolerance that was willing to borrow from non-Islamic elements.
• At the time he was writing, Europe was living through the Dark Ages where cultural works were suppressed. In the midst of ignorance and intolerance, Ibn Rushd who translated several of the Greek philosophers into Arabic, which were then introduced into Europe, kept the flame of free inquiry and thought alive in these dark times.
• His theory of government was also enlightened, and based on his religious belief that the goal of religion and politics was the same: to make people happy.
His Method
• Ibn Rushd used the mental process of syllogism, or deduction. This is a