The film ”Destiny” presents a depiction of Ibn Rushd’s life, which is exactly 12th century in Andalusia where Aristotelianism in Islam firstly flourished in Andalusia. Before this period, there were several Muslim and Christian scholars and mystics who were familiar with Platonism rather than Aristotelianism. In Plato’s understanding of the world, the sense of dualism is important. It is thought that material world as we perceive it, is incomplete. Moreover, there is an abstract world beyond the material one. The soul is supposed to be immortal; it survives and may be reincarnated in our bodies. The emphasis on “the One” and the idea of resurrection made it possible and easy especially for Christians to adapt.
On the other hand, Aristotle’s views differ from Plato’s, firstly because, he claims that what exists in natural world, and there is nothing beyond it which is unchanging. Plus, the idea of God is interpreted as a clock maker; he constructs the world and lets it function on its own. World is eternal and the soul of individual isn’t important while there is no resurrection, which is against Muslim and Christian theology. Furthermore unlike Plato, Aristotelianism is interested in observing nature.
We see in the film that Ibn Rushd is very much interested in science; he once even makes a kind of binoculars by just using wood and water. He was a polymath; interested in science, religion and philosophy. In lecture, it was stated that Ibn Rushd’s ideas, especially the ones he wrote in “Commentary on Aristotle” touched a nerve in orthodox and fundamentalist Muslim scholars. Even the caliph Mansur in the movie turns his back to him at first. Caliph’s political rivals especially Sheikh Emir is very much against Ibn Rushd; and also Spaniards aren’t in awe to his work. In lecture it was also said that Ibn Rushd was called “heretic” by the church. Actually, the beginning scene of the movie exemplifies this situation: A Christian man in Spain, who was working on Ibn Rushd’s Commentary on Aristotle, was burned alive. Later his son Joseph came to live and study with Ibn Rushd.
There are two more scenes that I find significant here. First of all, we already know that Ibn Rushd was an influential philosopher in the way which his ideas, later called as Averroism were held in high regards until 16th century among European intellectuals. He is considered as the first Western philosopher to be founder of “secular thought”, which influenced some thoughts of Renaissance and Reformation movements later. In the film, Ibn Rushd is working under the Caliph as the judge; and instead of sentencing to death the ones who attempted to kill Marwan, he penalizes them with five years imprisonment. At that time, this decision of his was very marginal and everyone including the Caliph opposed to it. However, Ibn Rushd claimed that, humans’ right to live is important and also the Caliph cannot be above the established laws of state. Secondly, Ibn Rushd talks to Caliph’s son, Abdallah and says him that claiming God’s words is not about memorizing poems or phrases in Quran and simply telling them. For him, it is more importantly about knowing medicine, astronomy, chemistry, mathematics and philosophy.
I really enjoyed this movie, and find it very significant in terms of realizing the importance of Ibn Rushd as an influential philosopher in 12thcentury.