Christmas at Niagara Falls

            I worked on my essay for almost an hour on Tuesday morning before heading out to Philosophy class and then I worked on it in the lecture theatre for about fifteen minutes.

            Professor Black gave us our final lecture on Averroes.

            Traditional theories of allegorical interpretation and consensus.

            What counts as orthodox is a consensus of scholars, but there are disputes in some texts and so there is no clear determination.

            Averroes claims that in practical matters a consensus must be sought. This is truer for his time than now. It’s hard to get a consensus of all scholars across history. Averroes says that philosophers should be considered part of the consensus group. He goes through Ghazali’s charges and finds the disagreement among scholars to be too minimal. No one deviates that far from the religious texts.

            Of providence, Avicenna says that god knows particulars in a universal way. The philosophers claim god is sui generis. God knows itself, its effects and particulars differentiated by matter. If we read god’s self knowledge in an Aristotelian way, god only knows itself and not every dust mote.

            Philosophers on the divination of the future. Aristotle’s Parva Naturalia has a chapter on Divination in Sleep. Averroes also says we can divine through dreams. But then he says that dreams are a type of practical reasoning done while sleeping, so there is nothing about god’s revelation here and it’s not that close to providence.

            On the pre-eternity of the world, if we break the problem down we have god, then individual creatures (angels) which are directly connected to the world. But is the world corruptible or is it co-eternal with god? Some say that the world is eternal in the past but most agree that the world could be eternal in the future if god decided it wanted the world that way. Averroes says that the Qur’an does not say that god created the first moment; just that god is the first cause of the world. Avicenna and Al-Farabi say god caused the world but Aristotle says god was just the prime mover of creation. Averroes says god is an efficient cause by way of being a final cause. Without its activity everything would fall apart.

            The third thesis is difficult for Averroes.

            Ghazali says that the body is not important for identity. There is a replica theory about a body in the afterlife built by god.

            Averroes ignores bodily resurrection and doesn’t support the idea of personal immortality. The individual just dies and there are no replicas. The ancient philosophers don’t talk about bodily resurrection, although Plato does. What they agree on is that it’s an important belief for ordinary people to have for socio-political reasons to give them incentive. So there is agreement between theologians and philosophers. There are big disagreements but not in a broad religious context. Ghazali had said that philosophers are heretics but Averroes turns the tables on him and says that it is heretical to get in the way of philosophers. He admits though that Ghazali’s heart is in the right place. He likens Ghazali to someone that subverts a physician’s knowledgeable instructions to a patient. A quack comes along with an alternative medicine that harms the patient. Ghazali is like the quack in that he causes people to doubt the logic of philosophers and making them lose faith. There is elitism and conservatism here in protecting knowledge from the ignorant.

            Averroes’s theory of the different classes of believers. Different levels of discourse in the Qur’an.

            The laws of rule and conduct are practical texts, agreed on by scholars in consensus, which are literal for everyone.

            The philosophers are the demonstrative class that must read the allegorical texts with logic that ordinary believers would not understand.

            There are other texts that have an uncertain status.

            If philosophers make a mistake they should not be condemned.

            A woman pointed at the sky and declared that god was there. Mohammed’s followers wanted to condemn her but he said not to mess with simple believers even if they are wrong. Simple folk beliefs are permissible but he draws the line at polytheism.

            Any virtuous religion with texts revealed by god has parts aimed at philosophers. Religious texts must put forward goads for philosophers. Abelard thinks so too. The rhetorical class (the theologians) must be persuaded. Logic must be the ultimate judge of religious discourse.

            Not much is known about Al-Farabi’s life but there are legends that he had very simple beginnings. He is presented as a gardener or a night watchman to show that philosophy is not class based.

            Professor Black began her lecture on Maimonides. He was a close contemporary and about ten years younger than Averroes. They both lived in Islamic Spain. He was the son of a rabbi and came from a long line of Talmudic scholars. He was born into a period of harmony between Jews and Muslims but persecution came later, with forced conversions. He moved to Palestine and then Egypt. He was one of the last Jewish philosophers to write in Arabic. He spent most of his career as a physician and a judge. He and Averroes both got translated in the 13^th Century but Averroes didn’t get as much respect as Rabbi Moses, as Maimonides was called. Although he wrote codifications of Jewish law in Hebrew, he wrote his philosophy for Jews in Arabic or in Judaeo-Arabic.

            Maimonides main work was called, “Guide for the Perplexed”. It was written in Arabic, translated twice into Hebrew and later from Hebrew into Latin. The perplexed person he addresses in the book is Rabbi Joseph, who is learning about god being incorporeal even though there are places in the Bible where god is physically described. Maimonides addresses this question by going through the terms that refer to god in the Torah. He gives his interpretation of religious discourse. The nature of theology is that it cannot say anything positive about god because human beings are limited.

             

            Maimonides writes a letter of dedication to Joseph and also corresponds with Ibn Tibbon. He addresses the philosophical tradition and declares that Aristotle is better than Plato. He says that Aristotle is hard to understand and so one needs commentators. He mentions Averroes and says some good things. He declares Al-Farabi’s works on logic to be flawless and says forget about everybody else but watch out for Avicenna on the divine nature. He puts forward a negative theology that Maimonides picks up on and he warns that Avicenna must be read carefully to avoid mistakes, but Maimonides’s metaphysical foundation comes from Avicenna. One person can know god better than another.

            As I was getting ready to leave, James told Professor Black that he’d gotten a stomach ache from taking Advil for his headache. We told him that you can get a stomach ache from taking aspirin and we both kind of thought they were similar drugs but it turns out they aren’t. I think a stomach ache is fairly common with aspirin if one doesn’t eat first but I read somewhere online that if you get a stomach ache from Advil you should stop taking it. James said that his parents back in China had always told him to never take anything for a headache.

            I went to the West Hall at University College and went online on my laptop until it was time for tutorial. A little group of four people that appeared to be tourists from China wandering through, marvelling at the architecture. On any given day when I’m there I usually see one or two groups like that.

            Celia had us get together in larger groups than usual this time to discuss the weekly question. James took charge of our group because he seems to understand this stuff better than most of us. The question was “What do you think of Averroes' argument that philosophical study of the world is mandated by religious law?” Averroes’s argument is that since the Qur’an says that believers are supposed to reflect then the best way to do that is to philosophize. Someone said philosophy is the search for truth but James declared it is the search for being in different aspects.

            Philosophical reflection is only mandatory for people that have the ability to do it. Islam needs rational people with the ability to understand allegorical texts. Celia wanted to make sure that we understood what allegory meant. She said when Robbie Burns writes, “My love is like a red, red rose” it does not mean that he’s in love a flower. When the Bible says, “The lord is my shepherd” it doesn’t mean god thinks people are sheep. One has to sift through the true and the false and tweak one’s understanding of the Qur’an. How does one handle texts that have different values?

            On the idea that simple people should not try to interpret the allegorical parts of the Qur’an, I mentioned the non-Muslims that I encounter online and that try to use misinterpretations of the Qur’an for the purpose of attacking Muslims. They are clear evidence that stupid people should not try to interpret the Qur’an. Celia nodded politely.

            How does one appreciate Aristotle after finding out that he considered women to be birth defects too stupid to study philosophy?

            How do we understand the claim that philosophy and religion cannot contradict? There are rules for a just community and for living well together but people are worried that philosophy will challenge society’s values. Averroes insists there is no need to worry.

           

She asked people to share what they had expected out of philosophy when they first started. Noah, the pastor’s son said that hearing other people’s arguments helped to make his own arguments stronger. Celia didn’t seem to think that was a very good reason. Interestingly, I couldn’t think of my expectations. I guess that for me it’s a way of understanding my own thoughts and seeing if they are right.

We did our TA assessments in the last ten minutes, so Celia left the room. I commented on mine that I think Celia prefers to communicate with the more advanced students.

On the way home I stopped at Freshco and picked up a few of the usual items, but also a pork shoulder blade roast that I would have to cook that night if I didn’t want it to go bad. .

When I was unlocking my door the skinny little woman with the uncombed curly brown hair, who panhandles around the donut shop asked me for the time and told me she had to get to the bank. She said, “It’s Tuesday, right?” It was 14:45 exactly but I told it to her in twelve-hour language. As soon as I was inside the door I heard her asking someone else the time but then she remembered that I’d just told her and told the other person it was quarter to three.

At 15:30 I took the Christmas at Niagara Falls Royal Copenhagen plates that I’d been trying to sell on Kijiji for the last five months down to meet Brian, who’d called me about them the day before. He wasn’t inside the Coffee Time, so I stood outside. Moe came passing by and I called to him but he didn’t recognize me at first. He told me that his vision has gone down to 50% and the doctor says he has cataracts and needs an operation. A guy who was standing just west of the door had been standing and finishing a cigarette and listening to our conversation. He said he has cataracts too. He mentioned that he’s from Trinidad and since Moe is from Guyana he declared that Caribbean people all have bad eyesight because of the sun.

Brian arrived and we shook hands. Then Moe shook hands with me and headed home. Brian and I went inside and he bought me a coffee. We chatted about OCADU because he graduated from OCA in 1980, two years before I started working there. A lot of the instructors that he remembered having were people that I’d worked for in the early part of my modeling career. Brian bought the two plates for $20 each and then said he had to try to beat the traffic back to Niagara, so we shook hands and he left.

When I went back upstairs, Benji came out in the hall to tell me that David had lost another key, this time for his mailbox. As we were speaking about him we heard footsteps on the stairs and David came through the hallway door. I told him that I’d sold two of his plates and tried to give him half the money, as per out\r deal, but as usual, he wouldn’t take it. He said he’d just gotten paid and bought his Metropass so he didn’t need it. He thanked me though as if I’d given him something and told he had some more stuff for me to sell.

That night I followed a recipe for cooking the pork shoulder blade roast that involved covering the roast with mesquite liquid smoke. The smell of that stuff is so obtrusive and I find that for some reason it bothers my teeth when I eat things that have mesquite on them.