Abstract
Throughout medieval thought, a major issue raised was that of the relationship between religion and philosophy. Alternative frameworks see the problem as a conflict between faith and reason, tradition and speculation, mysticism and rationalism. The medieval Muslim philosopher Ibn Rushd, or Averroes, (1126–98), who lived in medieval Spain, attempts in his philosophy to reconcile philosophy with religion. This article probes into an ‘Averroist dialogue’ through his rationalist philosophy. Meanwhile, al-Ghazali (1058–1111), from Persia, tends towards an Islamic philosophy based on cause and effect and determined by God. Ibn Rushd's retaliation to al-Ghazali was his defence of the primacy of philosophy and reason, and a call for diversity of knowledge. Ibn Rushd explicates the relation between religion and philosophy as two different ways of reaching the same truth, and clarifies the connection between Islamic law and Greek science, striving for a rapprochement between the Islamic ‘I’ and the European ‘Other’ through his epistemological principles of dialogue in a time of convivencia (coexistence) in medieval Andalusia.