80 SCIENCE AND THE HUMAN MIND 



of the nation with the teachings of Greek philosophy, 

 and an analogous contest between those who relied 

 on reason and rational authority and those who put 

 their faith in revelation, denying the validity of human 

 reason in matters of faith. 



The chief fame of this Spanish-Arabian school of 

 thought is due to the work of Averrhoes, who was 

 born at Cordova in 1126. While showing a profound 

 reverence for the teachings of Aristotle, Averrhoes 

 nevertheless introduced a new conception into the 

 relations between religion and philosophy. According 

 to him, religion was not a branch of knowledge that 

 could be reduced to propositions and systems of dogma, 

 but a personal and inward power, distinct from the 

 generalities of " demonstrative " or experimental 

 science. Theology, the mixture of the two, he re- 

 garded as an unmixed source of evil to both, fostering, 

 on the one hand, a false impression of the hostility 

 between religion and philosophy, and, on the other, 

 corrupting religion by a pseudo-science. 



It is not surprising that the teaching of Averrhoes 

 came into fierce conflict with that of the orthodox 

 theologians, but, in spite of unrelenting opposition, 

 especially from the great Dominican school of thought, 

 his words fell upon willing ears. By the thirteenth 

 century, Averrhoes had become a recognized authority 

 in the universities of North Italy, Paris and Oxford, 

 worthy to be placed, according to Roger Bacon and 

 Duns Scotus, by the side of Aristotle as a master of 

 the science of proof. That such a position should 

 have been accorded to a teacher who was not only 

 of non-European origin, but also of alien and anta- 

 gonistic religion, indicates the approach of a time 



