The medieval Islamic commentary on Plato’s republic: Ibn Rushd’s perspective on the position and potential of women, 2021
By: Tineke Melkebeek
Title The medieval Islamic commentary on Plato’s republic: Ibn Rushd’s perspective on the position and potential of women
Type Article
Language English
Date 2021
Journal Islamology
Volume 11
Issue 1
Pages 9-23
Categories Commentary, Plato, Politics, Tradition and Reception
Author(s) Tineke Melkebeek
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)
This paper investigates the twelfth-century commentary on Plato’s Republic by the Andalusian Muslim philosopher Ibn Rushd (Averroes). Ibn Rushd is considered to be the only Muslim philosopher who commented on the Republic. Written around 375 BC, Plato’s Republic discusses the order and character of a just city-state and contains revolutionary ideas on the position and qualities of women, which remained contested also in Ibn Rushd’s time. This Muslim philosopher is primarily known as the most esteemed commentator of Aristotle. However, for the lack of an Arabic translation of Aristotle’s Politics, Ibn Rushd commented on the political theory of Aristotle’s teacher, i.e. Plato’s Republic, instead. In his commentary, Ibn Rushd juxtaposes examples from Plato’s context and those from contemporary Muslim societies. Notably, when he diverges from the text, he does not drift off toward more patriarchal, Aristotelian interpretations. On the contrary, he argues that women are capable of being rulers and philosophers, that their true competencies remain unknown as long as they are deprived of education, and that this situation is detrimental to the flourishing of the city. This article aims to critically analyse Ibn Rushd’s statements on the position of women, as well as their reception in scholarly literature.

{"_index":"bib","_type":"_doc","_id":"5808","_score":null,"_source":{"id":5808,"authors_free":[{"id":6729,"entry_id":5808,"agent_type":"person","is_normalised":null,"person_id":903,"institution_id":null,"role":{"id":1,"role_name":"author"},"free_name":"Tineke Melkebeek","free_first_name":"Tineke ","free_last_name":"Melkebeek","norm_person":{"id":903,"first_name":"","last_name":"","full_name":"","short_ident":"","is_classical_name":0,"dnb_url":"","viaf_url":"","db_url":"","from_claudius":1,"link":"bib?authors[]="}}],"entry_title":"The medieval Islamic commentary on Plato\u2019s republic: Ibn Rushd\u2019s perspective on the position and potential of women","title_transcript":"","title_translation":"","main_title":{"title":"The medieval Islamic commentary on Plato\u2019s republic: Ibn Rushd\u2019s perspective on the position and potential of women"},"abstract":"This paper investigates the twelfth-century commentary on Plato\u2019s Republic by the Andalusian Muslim philosopher Ibn Rushd (Averroes). Ibn Rushd is considered to be the only Muslim philosopher who commented on the Republic. Written around 375 BC, Plato\u2019s Republic discusses the order and character of a just city-state and contains revolutionary ideas on the position and qualities of women, which remained contested also in Ibn Rushd\u2019s time. This Muslim philosopher is primarily known as the most esteemed commentator of Aristotle. However, for the lack of an Arabic translation of Aristotle\u2019s Politics, Ibn Rushd commented on the political theory of Aristotle\u2019s teacher, i.e. Plato\u2019s Republic, instead. In his commentary, Ibn Rushd juxtaposes examples from Plato\u2019s context and those from contemporary Muslim societies. Notably, when he diverges from the text, he does not drift off toward more patriarchal, Aristotelian interpretations. On the contrary, he argues that women are capable of being rulers and philosophers, that their true competencies remain unknown as long as they are deprived of education, and that this situation is detrimental to the flourishing of the city. This article aims to critically analyse Ibn Rushd\u2019s statements on the position of women, as well as their reception in scholarly literature. ","btype":3,"date":"2021","language":"English","online_url":"","doi_url":"10.24848\/islmlg.11.1.02","ti_url":"","categories":[{"id":23,"category_name":"Commentary","link":"bib?categories[]=Commentary"},{"id":20,"category_name":"Plato","link":"bib?categories[]=Plato"},{"id":4,"category_name":"Politics","link":"bib?categories[]=Politics"},{"id":43,"category_name":"Tradition and Reception","link":"bib?categories[]=Tradition and Reception"}],"authors":[{"id":903,"full_name":"","role":1}],"works":[],"republication_of":null,"translation_of":null,"new_edition_of":null,"book":null,"booksection":null,"article":{"id":5808,"journal_id":null,"journal_name":" Islamology","volume":"11","issue":"1","pages":"9-23"}},"sort":[2021]}

Aristotelismus und Averroismus in der politischen Theorie bei Marsilius von Padua und Wilhelm von Ockham, 2019
By: Jürgen Miethke
Title Aristotelismus und Averroismus in der politischen Theorie bei Marsilius von Padua und Wilhelm von Ockham
Type Article
Language German
Date 2019
Journal Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia
Volume 75
Issue 3
Pages 1739–1762
Categories Politics, Latin Averroism, Tradition and Reception, Ockham
Author(s) Jürgen Miethke
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)
The paper is aiming to look at the importance of the Arabian political philosopher Averroes (Ibn Rušd) for the reception of the political philosophy of the Greek philosopher Aristotle in the Latin West by analyzing the exemple of two maior medieval authors (Marsiglio of Padua and William Ockham) for “averroistic” doctrines, in order to check the often discussed so called “Political Averroism” in the medieval Latin political philosophy. As result there seems to emerge the insight, that “Political Averroism” is only a “historiographical myth”, for Marsiglio is showing only some minor points of reference to averroistic topics, whereas Ockham seems free of clear relationship to “Averroism”.

{"_index":"bib","_type":"_doc","_id":"5406","_score":null,"_source":{"id":5406,"authors_free":[{"id":6267,"entry_id":5406,"agent_type":"person","is_normalised":null,"person_id":null,"institution_id":null,"role":{"id":1,"role_name":"author"},"free_name":"J\u00fcrgen Miethke","free_first_name":"J\u00fcrgen","free_last_name":"Miethke","norm_person":null}],"entry_title":"Aristotelismus und Averroismus in der politischen Theorie bei Marsilius von Padua und Wilhelm von Ockham","title_transcript":"","title_translation":"","main_title":{"title":"Aristotelismus und Averroismus in der politischen Theorie bei Marsilius von Padua und Wilhelm von Ockham"},"abstract":"The paper is aiming to look at the importance of the Arabian political philosopher Averroes (Ibn Ru\u0161d) for the reception of the political philosophy of the Greek philosopher Aristotle in the Latin West by analyzing the exemple of two maior medieval authors (Marsiglio of Padua and William Ockham) for \u201caverroistic\u201d doctrines, in order to check the often discussed so called \u201cPolitical Averroism\u201d in the medieval Latin political philosophy. As result there seems to emerge the insight, that \u201cPolitical Averroism\u201d is only a \u201chistoriographical myth\u201d, for Marsiglio is showing only some minor points of reference to averroistic topics, whereas Ockham seems free of clear relationship to \u201cAverroism\u201d.","btype":3,"date":"2019","language":"German","online_url":"https:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/26796771","doi_url":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.17990\/RPF\/2019_75_3_1739","ti_url":"","categories":[{"id":4,"category_name":"Politics","link":"bib?categories[]=Politics"},{"id":7,"category_name":"Latin Averroism","link":"bib?categories[]=Latin Averroism"},{"id":43,"category_name":"Tradition and Reception","link":"bib?categories[]=Tradition and Reception"},{"id":3,"category_name":"Ockham","link":"bib?categories[]=Ockham"}],"authors":[],"works":[],"republication_of":null,"translation_of":null,"new_edition_of":null,"book":null,"booksection":null,"article":{"id":5406,"journal_id":null,"journal_name":"Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia","volume":"75","issue":"3","pages":"1739\u20131762"}},"sort":[2019]}

The Genesis of Secular Politics in Medieval Philosophy: The King of Averroes and the Emperor of Dante, 2016
By: Sabeen Ahmed
Title The Genesis of Secular Politics in Medieval Philosophy: The King of Averroes and the Emperor of Dante
Type Article
Language undefined
Date 2016
Journal Labyrinth
Volume 18
Issue 2
Pages 209–231
Categories Politics, Aristotle, Tradition and Reception
Author(s) Sabeen Ahmed
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)
In contemporary political discourse, the "clash of civilizations" rhetoric often undergirds philosophical analyses of "democracy" both at home and abroad. This is nowhere better articulated than in Jacques Derrida's Rogues, in which he describes Islam as the only religious or theocratic culture that would "inspire and declare any resistance to democracy" (Derrida 2005, 29). Curiously, Derrida attributes the failings of democracy in Islam to the lack of reference to Aristotle's Politics in the writings of the medieval Muslim philosophers. This paper aims to analyze this gross misconception of Islamic philosophy and illuminate the thoroughgoing influence the Muslim philosophers had on their Christian successors, those who are so often credited as foundations of Western political philosophy. In so doing, I compare the ideal states presented by Averroes and Dante – in which Aristotelian influence is intimately interlaced – and offer an analysis thereof as heralds of what we might call the secularization of the political, inspiring those democratic values that Derrida believes to be absent in the rich philosophy of the Middle Ages.

{"_index":"bib","_type":"_doc","_id":"4995","_score":null,"_source":{"id":4995,"authors_free":[{"id":5729,"entry_id":4995,"agent_type":"person","is_normalised":1,"person_id":903,"institution_id":null,"role":{"id":1,"role_name":"author"},"free_name":"Sabeen Ahmed","free_first_name":"Sabeen","free_last_name":"Ahmed","norm_person":{"id":903,"first_name":"","last_name":"","full_name":"","short_ident":"","is_classical_name":0,"dnb_url":"","viaf_url":"","db_url":"","from_claudius":1,"link":"bib?authors[]="}}],"entry_title":"The Genesis of Secular Politics in Medieval Philosophy: The King of Averroes and the Emperor of Dante","title_transcript":"","title_translation":"","main_title":{"title":"The Genesis of Secular Politics in Medieval Philosophy: The King of Averroes and the Emperor of Dante"},"abstract":"In contemporary political discourse, the \"clash of civilizations\" rhetoric often undergirds philosophical analyses of \"democracy\" both at home and abroad. This is nowhere better articulated than in Jacques Derrida's Rogues, in which he describes Islam as the only religious or theocratic culture that would \"inspire and declare any resistance to democracy\" (Derrida 2005, 29). Curiously, Derrida attributes the failings of democracy in Islam to the lack of reference to Aristotle's Politics in the writings of the medieval Muslim philosophers. This paper aims to analyze this gross misconception of Islamic philosophy and illuminate the thoroughgoing influence the Muslim philosophers had on their Christian successors, those who are so often credited as foundations of Western political philosophy. In so doing, I compare the ideal states presented by Averroes and Dante \u2013 in which Aristotelian influence is intimately interlaced \u2013 and offer an analysis thereof as heralds of what we might call the secularization of the political, inspiring those democratic values that Derrida believes to be absent in the rich philosophy of the Middle Ages.","btype":3,"date":"2016","language":null,"online_url":"","doi_url":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.25180\/lj.v18i2.54","ti_url":"","categories":[{"id":4,"category_name":"Politics","link":"bib?categories[]=Politics"},{"id":21,"category_name":"Aristotle","link":"bib?categories[]=Aristotle"},{"id":43,"category_name":"Tradition and Reception","link":"bib?categories[]=Tradition and Reception"}],"authors":[{"id":903,"full_name":"","role":1}],"works":[],"republication_of":null,"translation_of":null,"new_edition_of":null,"book":null,"booksection":null,"article":{"id":4995,"journal_id":null,"journal_name":"Labyrinth","volume":"18","issue":"2","pages":"209\u2013231"}},"sort":[2016]}

Prophecy Between Poetics and Politics from Al-Farabi to Leo Strauss
By: Peter Makhlouf
Title Prophecy Between Poetics and Politics from Al-Farabi to Leo Strauss
Type Article
Language English
Journal International Journal of the Classical Tradition
Pages 1-29
Categories al-Fārābī, Avicenna, Maimonides, Aristotle, Poetics, Rhetoric, Politics, Tradition and Reception
Author(s) Peter Makhlouf
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)
Judaeo-Arabic prophetology, as developed in the wake of Platonic and Aristotelian philosophy, was highly attentive to the kind of representational modes produced by divine revelation and their political use—but also their political precarity. By drawing on another corpus, less often discussed in this context, the Arabic commentaries on Aristotle's Poetics and Rhetoric, this study proposes to undertake a close analysis of how the medieval thinkers in question (Al-Farabi, Avicenna, Averroes, and Maimonides) understood the poetics of prophecy to function. What emerges is an account of how the political theo-logic of poetics and rhetoric—as developed with respect to terms such as imitation, imagination and visualization—came to play a central role in the theory of prophecy, and how that theory of prophecy in turn gave rise to an understanding of what Leo Strauss once termed the ‘literary character’ of these philosophers' ‘art of writing’.

{"_index":"bib","_type":"_doc","_id":"5615","_score":null,"_source":{"id":5615,"authors_free":[{"id":6518,"entry_id":5615,"agent_type":"person","is_normalised":null,"person_id":903,"institution_id":null,"role":{"id":1,"role_name":"author"},"free_name":"Peter Makhlouf","free_first_name":"Peter ","free_last_name":"Makhlouf","norm_person":{"id":903,"first_name":"","last_name":"","full_name":"","short_ident":"","is_classical_name":0,"dnb_url":"","viaf_url":"","db_url":"","from_claudius":1,"link":"bib?authors[]="}}],"entry_title":"Prophecy Between Poetics and Politics from Al-Farabi to Leo Strauss","title_transcript":"","title_translation":"","main_title":{"title":"Prophecy Between Poetics and Politics from Al-Farabi to Leo Strauss"},"abstract":"Judaeo-Arabic prophetology, as developed in the wake of Platonic and Aristotelian philosophy, was highly attentive to the kind of representational modes produced by divine revelation and their political use\u2014but also their political precarity. By drawing on another corpus, less often discussed in this context, the Arabic commentaries on Aristotle's Poetics and Rhetoric, this study proposes to undertake a close analysis of how the medieval thinkers in question (Al-Farabi, Avicenna, Averroes, and Maimonides) understood the poetics of prophecy to function. What emerges is an account of how the political theo-logic of poetics and rhetoric\u2014as developed with respect to terms such as imitation, imagination and visualization\u2014came to play a central role in the theory of prophecy, and how that theory of prophecy in turn gave rise to an understanding of what Leo Strauss once termed the \u2018literary character\u2019 of these philosophers' \u2018art of writing\u2019.","btype":3,"date":"","language":"English","online_url":"","doi_url":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1007\/s12138-022-00632-8","ti_url":"","categories":[{"id":28,"category_name":"al-F\u0101r\u0101b\u012b","link":"bib?categories[]=al-F\u0101r\u0101b\u012b"},{"id":10,"category_name":"Avicenna","link":"bib?categories[]=Avicenna"},{"id":9,"category_name":"Maimonides","link":"bib?categories[]=Maimonides"},{"id":21,"category_name":"Aristotle","link":"bib?categories[]=Aristotle"},{"id":44,"category_name":"Poetics","link":"bib?categories[]=Poetics"},{"id":48,"category_name":"Rhetoric","link":"bib?categories[]=Rhetoric"},{"id":4,"category_name":"Politics","link":"bib?categories[]=Politics"},{"id":43,"category_name":"Tradition and Reception","link":"bib?categories[]=Tradition and Reception"}],"authors":[{"id":903,"full_name":"","role":1}],"works":[],"republication_of":null,"translation_of":null,"new_edition_of":null,"book":null,"booksection":null,"article":{"id":5615,"journal_id":null,"journal_name":"International Journal of the Classical Tradition","volume":"","issue":"","pages":"1-29"}},"sort":[-9223372036854775808]}

Aristotelismus und Averroismus in der politischen Theorie bei Marsilius von Padua und Wilhelm von Ockham, 2019
By: Jürgen Miethke
Title Aristotelismus und Averroismus in der politischen Theorie bei Marsilius von Padua und Wilhelm von Ockham
Type Article
Language German
Date 2019
Journal Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia
Volume 75
Issue 3
Pages 1739–1762
Categories Politics, Latin Averroism, Tradition and Reception, Ockham
Author(s) Jürgen Miethke
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)
The paper is aiming to look at the importance of the Arabian political philosopher Averroes (Ibn Rušd) for the reception of the political philosophy of the Greek philosopher Aristotle in the Latin West by analyzing the exemple of two maior medieval authors (Marsiglio of Padua and William Ockham) for “averroistic” doctrines, in order to check the often discussed so called “Political Averroism” in the medieval Latin political philosophy. As result there seems to emerge the insight, that “Political Averroism” is only a “historiographical myth”, for Marsiglio is showing only some minor points of reference to averroistic topics, whereas Ockham seems free of clear relationship to “Averroism”.

{"_index":"bib","_type":"_doc","_id":"5406","_score":null,"_source":{"id":5406,"authors_free":[{"id":6267,"entry_id":5406,"agent_type":"person","is_normalised":null,"person_id":null,"institution_id":null,"role":{"id":1,"role_name":"author"},"free_name":"J\u00fcrgen Miethke","free_first_name":"J\u00fcrgen","free_last_name":"Miethke","norm_person":null}],"entry_title":"Aristotelismus und Averroismus in der politischen Theorie bei Marsilius von Padua und Wilhelm von Ockham","title_transcript":"","title_translation":"","main_title":{"title":"Aristotelismus und Averroismus in der politischen Theorie bei Marsilius von Padua und Wilhelm von Ockham"},"abstract":"The paper is aiming to look at the importance of the Arabian political philosopher Averroes (Ibn Ru\u0161d) for the reception of the political philosophy of the Greek philosopher Aristotle in the Latin West by analyzing the exemple of two maior medieval authors (Marsiglio of Padua and William Ockham) for \u201caverroistic\u201d doctrines, in order to check the often discussed so called \u201cPolitical Averroism\u201d in the medieval Latin political philosophy. As result there seems to emerge the insight, that \u201cPolitical Averroism\u201d is only a \u201chistoriographical myth\u201d, for Marsiglio is showing only some minor points of reference to averroistic topics, whereas Ockham seems free of clear relationship to \u201cAverroism\u201d.","btype":3,"date":"2019","language":"German","online_url":"https:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/26796771","doi_url":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.17990\/RPF\/2019_75_3_1739","ti_url":"","categories":[{"id":4,"category_name":"Politics","link":"bib?categories[]=Politics"},{"id":7,"category_name":"Latin Averroism","link":"bib?categories[]=Latin Averroism"},{"id":43,"category_name":"Tradition and Reception","link":"bib?categories[]=Tradition and Reception"},{"id":3,"category_name":"Ockham","link":"bib?categories[]=Ockham"}],"authors":[],"works":[],"republication_of":null,"translation_of":null,"new_edition_of":null,"book":null,"booksection":null,"article":{"id":5406,"journal_id":null,"journal_name":"Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia","volume":"75","issue":"3","pages":"1739\u20131762"}},"sort":["Aristotelismus und Averroismus in der politischen Theorie bei Marsilius von Padua und Wilhelm von Ockham"]}

Prophecy Between Poetics and Politics from Al-Farabi to Leo Strauss
By: Peter Makhlouf
Title Prophecy Between Poetics and Politics from Al-Farabi to Leo Strauss
Type Article
Language English
Journal International Journal of the Classical Tradition
Pages 1-29
Categories al-Fārābī, Avicenna, Maimonides, Aristotle, Poetics, Rhetoric, Politics, Tradition and Reception
Author(s) Peter Makhlouf
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)
Judaeo-Arabic prophetology, as developed in the wake of Platonic and Aristotelian philosophy, was highly attentive to the kind of representational modes produced by divine revelation and their political use—but also their political precarity. By drawing on another corpus, less often discussed in this context, the Arabic commentaries on Aristotle's Poetics and Rhetoric, this study proposes to undertake a close analysis of how the medieval thinkers in question (Al-Farabi, Avicenna, Averroes, and Maimonides) understood the poetics of prophecy to function. What emerges is an account of how the political theo-logic of poetics and rhetoric—as developed with respect to terms such as imitation, imagination and visualization—came to play a central role in the theory of prophecy, and how that theory of prophecy in turn gave rise to an understanding of what Leo Strauss once termed the ‘literary character’ of these philosophers' ‘art of writing’.

{"_index":"bib","_type":"_doc","_id":"5615","_score":null,"_source":{"id":5615,"authors_free":[{"id":6518,"entry_id":5615,"agent_type":"person","is_normalised":null,"person_id":903,"institution_id":null,"role":{"id":1,"role_name":"author"},"free_name":"Peter Makhlouf","free_first_name":"Peter ","free_last_name":"Makhlouf","norm_person":{"id":903,"first_name":"","last_name":"","full_name":"","short_ident":"","is_classical_name":0,"dnb_url":"","viaf_url":"","db_url":"","from_claudius":1,"link":"bib?authors[]="}}],"entry_title":"Prophecy Between Poetics and Politics from Al-Farabi to Leo Strauss","title_transcript":"","title_translation":"","main_title":{"title":"Prophecy Between Poetics and Politics from Al-Farabi to Leo Strauss"},"abstract":"Judaeo-Arabic prophetology, as developed in the wake of Platonic and Aristotelian philosophy, was highly attentive to the kind of representational modes produced by divine revelation and their political use\u2014but also their political precarity. By drawing on another corpus, less often discussed in this context, the Arabic commentaries on Aristotle's Poetics and Rhetoric, this study proposes to undertake a close analysis of how the medieval thinkers in question (Al-Farabi, Avicenna, Averroes, and Maimonides) understood the poetics of prophecy to function. What emerges is an account of how the political theo-logic of poetics and rhetoric\u2014as developed with respect to terms such as imitation, imagination and visualization\u2014came to play a central role in the theory of prophecy, and how that theory of prophecy in turn gave rise to an understanding of what Leo Strauss once termed the \u2018literary character\u2019 of these philosophers' \u2018art of writing\u2019.","btype":3,"date":"","language":"English","online_url":"","doi_url":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1007\/s12138-022-00632-8","ti_url":"","categories":[{"id":28,"category_name":"al-F\u0101r\u0101b\u012b","link":"bib?categories[]=al-F\u0101r\u0101b\u012b"},{"id":10,"category_name":"Avicenna","link":"bib?categories[]=Avicenna"},{"id":9,"category_name":"Maimonides","link":"bib?categories[]=Maimonides"},{"id":21,"category_name":"Aristotle","link":"bib?categories[]=Aristotle"},{"id":44,"category_name":"Poetics","link":"bib?categories[]=Poetics"},{"id":48,"category_name":"Rhetoric","link":"bib?categories[]=Rhetoric"},{"id":4,"category_name":"Politics","link":"bib?categories[]=Politics"},{"id":43,"category_name":"Tradition and Reception","link":"bib?categories[]=Tradition and Reception"}],"authors":[{"id":903,"full_name":"","role":1}],"works":[],"republication_of":null,"translation_of":null,"new_edition_of":null,"book":null,"booksection":null,"article":{"id":5615,"journal_id":null,"journal_name":"International Journal of the Classical Tradition","volume":"","issue":"","pages":"1-29"}},"sort":["Prophecy Between Poetics and Politics from Al-Farabi to Leo Strauss"]}

The Genesis of Secular Politics in Medieval Philosophy: The King of Averroes and the Emperor of Dante, 2016
By: Sabeen Ahmed
Title The Genesis of Secular Politics in Medieval Philosophy: The King of Averroes and the Emperor of Dante
Type Article
Language undefined
Date 2016
Journal Labyrinth
Volume 18
Issue 2
Pages 209–231
Categories Politics, Aristotle, Tradition and Reception
Author(s) Sabeen Ahmed
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)
In contemporary political discourse, the "clash of civilizations" rhetoric often undergirds philosophical analyses of "democracy" both at home and abroad. This is nowhere better articulated than in Jacques Derrida's Rogues, in which he describes Islam as the only religious or theocratic culture that would "inspire and declare any resistance to democracy" (Derrida 2005, 29). Curiously, Derrida attributes the failings of democracy in Islam to the lack of reference to Aristotle's Politics in the writings of the medieval Muslim philosophers. This paper aims to analyze this gross misconception of Islamic philosophy and illuminate the thoroughgoing influence the Muslim philosophers had on their Christian successors, those who are so often credited as foundations of Western political philosophy. In so doing, I compare the ideal states presented by Averroes and Dante – in which Aristotelian influence is intimately interlaced – and offer an analysis thereof as heralds of what we might call the secularization of the political, inspiring those democratic values that Derrida believes to be absent in the rich philosophy of the Middle Ages.

{"_index":"bib","_type":"_doc","_id":"4995","_score":null,"_source":{"id":4995,"authors_free":[{"id":5729,"entry_id":4995,"agent_type":"person","is_normalised":1,"person_id":903,"institution_id":null,"role":{"id":1,"role_name":"author"},"free_name":"Sabeen Ahmed","free_first_name":"Sabeen","free_last_name":"Ahmed","norm_person":{"id":903,"first_name":"","last_name":"","full_name":"","short_ident":"","is_classical_name":0,"dnb_url":"","viaf_url":"","db_url":"","from_claudius":1,"link":"bib?authors[]="}}],"entry_title":"The Genesis of Secular Politics in Medieval Philosophy: The King of Averroes and the Emperor of Dante","title_transcript":"","title_translation":"","main_title":{"title":"The Genesis of Secular Politics in Medieval Philosophy: The King of Averroes and the Emperor of Dante"},"abstract":"In contemporary political discourse, the \"clash of civilizations\" rhetoric often undergirds philosophical analyses of \"democracy\" both at home and abroad. This is nowhere better articulated than in Jacques Derrida's Rogues, in which he describes Islam as the only religious or theocratic culture that would \"inspire and declare any resistance to democracy\" (Derrida 2005, 29). Curiously, Derrida attributes the failings of democracy in Islam to the lack of reference to Aristotle's Politics in the writings of the medieval Muslim philosophers. This paper aims to analyze this gross misconception of Islamic philosophy and illuminate the thoroughgoing influence the Muslim philosophers had on their Christian successors, those who are so often credited as foundations of Western political philosophy. In so doing, I compare the ideal states presented by Averroes and Dante \u2013 in which Aristotelian influence is intimately interlaced \u2013 and offer an analysis thereof as heralds of what we might call the secularization of the political, inspiring those democratic values that Derrida believes to be absent in the rich philosophy of the Middle Ages.","btype":3,"date":"2016","language":null,"online_url":"","doi_url":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.25180\/lj.v18i2.54","ti_url":"","categories":[{"id":4,"category_name":"Politics","link":"bib?categories[]=Politics"},{"id":21,"category_name":"Aristotle","link":"bib?categories[]=Aristotle"},{"id":43,"category_name":"Tradition and Reception","link":"bib?categories[]=Tradition and Reception"}],"authors":[{"id":903,"full_name":"","role":1}],"works":[],"republication_of":null,"translation_of":null,"new_edition_of":null,"book":null,"booksection":null,"article":{"id":4995,"journal_id":null,"journal_name":"Labyrinth","volume":"18","issue":"2","pages":"209\u2013231"}},"sort":["The Genesis of Secular Politics in Medieval Philosophy: The King of Averroes and the Emperor of Dante"]}

The medieval Islamic commentary on Plato’s republic: Ibn Rushd’s perspective on the position and potential of women, 2021
By: Tineke Melkebeek
Title The medieval Islamic commentary on Plato’s republic: Ibn Rushd’s perspective on the position and potential of women
Type Article
Language English
Date 2021
Journal Islamology
Volume 11
Issue 1
Pages 9-23
Categories Commentary, Plato, Politics, Tradition and Reception
Author(s) Tineke Melkebeek
Publisher(s)
Translator(s)
This paper investigates the twelfth-century commentary on Plato’s Republic by the Andalusian Muslim philosopher Ibn Rushd (Averroes). Ibn Rushd is considered to be the only Muslim philosopher who commented on the Republic. Written around 375 BC, Plato’s Republic discusses the order and character of a just city-state and contains revolutionary ideas on the position and qualities of women, which remained contested also in Ibn Rushd’s time. This Muslim philosopher is primarily known as the most esteemed commentator of Aristotle. However, for the lack of an Arabic translation of Aristotle’s Politics, Ibn Rushd commented on the political theory of Aristotle’s teacher, i.e. Plato’s Republic, instead. In his commentary, Ibn Rushd juxtaposes examples from Plato’s context and those from contemporary Muslim societies. Notably, when he diverges from the text, he does not drift off toward more patriarchal, Aristotelian interpretations. On the contrary, he argues that women are capable of being rulers and philosophers, that their true competencies remain unknown as long as they are deprived of education, and that this situation is detrimental to the flourishing of the city. This article aims to critically analyse Ibn Rushd’s statements on the position of women, as well as their reception in scholarly literature.

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