Talk:Averroes

He is an Arab

There is no dispute about that. Here is another source. [1]. Being an Andalusian doesn't mean he isn't an Arab.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 00:32, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

‪Wikaviani‬--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 00:33, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

You gotta be kidding me, do you really think that the book you linked in your above comment is a reliable source for this topic ?---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 00:37, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Wikaviani, what's the reliable source for this topic. I obviously have no time to be kidding. The source is published by the University of Chicago and the author is a notable historian Rémi Brague.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 00:45, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

The author is a historian of philosophy, not specialized in the history of Islam. I already added a high quality source (EOI 3] that says he was Andalusian. Also, you can take alook at Talk:List of pre-modern Arab scientists and scholars#WP:OR as there is an active thread about this. Good night.---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 00:51, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Wikaviani, what does the history of Islam have to do with this?--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 00:54, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

He is a historian of philosophy and a philosopher, not a historian of medieval islam. He got a phd in philosophy (not a phd in history). You could use this source to discuss his ideas not his origins. -TheseusHeLl (talk) 00:55, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

MOS:ETHNICITY says that "Ethnicity, religion, or sexuality should generally not be in the lead unless it is relevant to the subject's notability." In this case I feel that ethnicity (unlike religion) has no relevance to Averroes' notability so let's not argue over something that shouldn't be added in the first place. I get that some people feel passionately about this, I suggest take the energy to research the lineage and ethnic background and add it in a prose form to the article body. HaEr48 (talk) 01:30, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Also, see previous discussions Talk:Averroes/Archive_1#Ethnicity and Talk:Averroes/Archive_1#Ethnicity_2, this tends to be an intractable debate. HaEr48 (talk) 01:33, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Those are IPs making stuff up with no sources. There is no dispute over his ethnicity but of course, when it's Arab it's controversial. Here is a source from Brill Encyclopedia of Islam [2]. Also, ethnicity here is a notable thing about Ibn Rushd.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 01:57, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

WP:RS AGE: Why should we use the 1927 work (Encyclopaedia of Islam, First Edition) and not use the 1986 work (Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition)?

"Also, ethnicity here is a notable thing about Ibn Rushd." Do you have any evidence for this claim? -TheseusHeLl (talk) 02:19, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Both are not contradicting each other. This is a reliable source and that's a reliable source. The source itself says he is known as "The greatest Arab philosopher in Spain".-SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 02:22, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Please, it;s not "when it's Arab it's controversial" at all, it's just applying policy and avoiding edit wars. You're welcome to add material from RSes about his ethnicity in the article body where such info belongs. It took a lot of work bringing this article to Good article status, it serves no one's interest to carelessly go against the MOS and start edit wars now. HaEr48 (talk) 02:22, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

This is not true. Ethnicity can be included in the lead if it's notable. This person is known as the "greatest Arab philosopher of Spain". Also, when it's Arab it's controversial, this has been the trend in most articles of Wikipedia. I have always seen editors removing Arab from articles without any reason. It doesn't bother me because I am an Arab, it does bother me because I they are removing sourced content.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 02:37, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

The MOS doesn't say "it can be included in the lead if it's notable", it's only if it is relevant to the subject's notability". In this case, I don't believe this is the case. Averroes is notable on the weight of his works in philosophy, Islamic law, medicine, astronomy, commentary on Aristotle, etc. as well as his legacy in Medieval Europe; being Arab is nowhere near the main factor of this notability. Again, no one is suggesting removing of sourced information about his ethnicity, I am just saying it belongs in the article body, not the lead paragraph. HaEr48 (talk) 02:48, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Well I don't mind that. I just saw that editor in Doug Weller's talk page saying that he is going to remove Averroes from the list of Arab philosophers without even having to do a little bit of search to see that there are tons of reliable sources saying he is an Arab.[3].--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 02:57, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

@HaEr48:, @SharabSalam: Arab philosopher/writer/poet, etc are just generic designations. It can mean anything from an arabic-speaking Iranian to an Andalusian with unknown tribal affiliations. Are there any sources that talks about the Arab origin of his family? His tribal claims (Tanukh, Kinda, Zuhr, Taghlib, Qays, etc)? You know that the majority of people in Al-Andalus were claiming arab tribal affiliations, but they were muladi/Berber/Saqaliba in origin? It's like claiming that the Hammudids were Berbers (by using tangential mentions of Berber in reliable sources), but finding that they were Idrisids when using more detailed accounts of their origins.-TheseusHeLl (talk) 03:17, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

I can't find any sources that discussed his origins. All the sources you showed are peripherally mentioning the word "Arab" without expanding on it. -TheseusHeLl (talk) 03:27, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Even reading about his grandfather Ibn Rushd al-Jadd shows that little is known about them, "Ibn Rushd al-Jadd was born in Cordova in Shawwāl 450/December 1058. Little is known about the origins and activities of his family. To judge by the short genealogy provided by early biographers, it seems that he was the first member of his family to gain renown. It is not until IbnʿAbd al-Malik al-Marrākushī (d. 703/1303) that we find a short entry on Ibn Rushd’s father included in a biographical dictionary: “Aḥmad b. Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b. Aḥmad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Rushd, a man of science, excellence and integrity (ʿadāla), was still alive in 482/1089.” Subsequently, the Maghribī historian al-Maqqarī provided what appears to be the complete genealogy of Ibn Rushd al-Jadd: Abū l-Walīd Muḥammad b. Aḥmad b. Aḥmad b. Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b. Aḥmad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Rushd. This suggests that it was the grandfather of Ibn Rushd’s great-grandfather...who converted to Islam. Assuming that the average lifespan in al-Andalus was forty lunar years, and that twenty-five was the average age of conversion, Ibn Rushd’s ancestors would have converted to Islam about the middle of the 3rd/9th century, approximately two centuries after the Muslims arrived in the Iberian Peninsula." -TheseusHeLl (talk) 03:37, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

TheseusHeLl, the term Arab is not generic. There is no source that says he is Berber or Persian. All reliable sources say that he is an Arab. The source that you have brought doesn't dispute that. It also not a reliable source in this subject.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 09:45, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

the term Arab is not generic.

I didn't say that the term Arab is generic. I said: "Arab philosopher/writer/poet, etc are just generic designations. It can mean anything from an arabic-speaking Iranian to an Andalusian with unknown tribal affiliations. Are there any sources that talks about the Arab origin of his family? His tribal claims (Tanukh, Kinda, Zuhr, Taghlib, Qays, etc)? You know that the majority of people in Al-Andalus were claiming arab tribal affiliations, but they were muladi/Berber/Saqaliba in origin?"

There is no source that says he is Berber or Persian.

Who said anything about him being a Persian or Berber? Did you read what I wrote?

All reliable sources say that he is an Arab.

Nope. All reliable sources say that nothing is known about his origins. If you have any sources that goes in detail about his origins, feel free to share them.

The source that you have brought doesn't dispute that.

It actually disputes that. It says about his grandfather (Ibn Rushd al-jadd), "Little is known about the origins and activities of his family." and "This suggests that it was the grandfather of Ibn Rushd’s great-grandfather...who converted to Islam. Assuming that the average lifespan in al-Andalus was forty lunar years, and that twenty-five was the average age of conversion, Ibn Rushd’s ancestors would have converted to Islam about the middle of the 3rd/9th century, approximately two centuries after the Muslims arrived in the Iberian Peninsula."

It also not a reliable source in this subject.

Oh yes a work that is edited by (Oussama Arabi, David S. Powers and Susan A. Spectorsky) and goes in detail about his grandfather's biography is not reliable, okay.-TheseusHeLl (talk) 10:07, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

First of all, I have brought multiple sources that say he is an Arab. The only source that you have brought is not reliable and not in their expertise to talk about origins. I have brought sources from multiple historians.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 11:10, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

We have multiple sources saying he is an Arab.

• source 1: University of Chicago by a leading historian Rémi Brague
• source 2 encyclopedia of Islam published by Brill
• source 3 Jon Stewart (philosopher) published by Bloomsbury
• source 4 published by the University of Yale

The only reason I can think of to completely remove Arab from the article is that you just don't like it.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 11:24, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Pure example of IDIDNTHEARTHAT. You dodged all the points that I made and that Wikaviani made. You know that the source that I gave you is more reliable than the multiple sources you gave? Is the concept of WP:CONTEXTMATTERS too hard? A quick mention of Arab is more reliable than a whole section about the life/origin/genealogy of his grandfather? And more reliable than EI2? Are you implying that there is no relationship between Ibn Rushd al-Hafid and Ibn Rushd al-Jadd?

Using a reliable philosophical work that talks (tangentially) about his ethnicity while avoiding all the other reliable sources that talks about his life in more detail is disingenuous. In example the EI2 gives more detail about his life... without talking about his ethnicity because nothing is know about it, "Ibn Rushd belonged to an important Spanish family. His grandfather (d. 520/1126), a Maliki jurisconsult, had been qaddi and imam of the Great Mosque of Cordova.". The Cambridge Companion to Arabic Philosophy, "...was born at Cordoba into a family prominent for its expert devotion to the study...", etc.-TheseusHeLl (talk) 11:39, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

We are not discussing the tribal affliction of Ibn Rushd as we aren't going to add that. We are discussing whether sources are saying he is an Arab or not. All reliable sources say he is an Arab. There is no reliable source that says he is Berber, Persian or whatever. Also, we don't do original research here. We need sources that explicitly say he is not Arab.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 11:54, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

We need sources that explicitly say he is not Arab.

Actually we need sources that explicitly say he is of Arab descent/origin. And we need sources that clearly says that his family were arabs. Tangential mentions of Arab are not good sources for a Good article. The existence of the three sources that I gave you negates the assertion "All reliable sources say he is an Arab". The burden of proof is not on me it's on you.

There is no reliable source that says he is Berber, Persian or whatever.

No one is claiming that he is Berber, Persian or whatever. -TheseusHeLl (talk) 12:11, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Since reliable sources call him explicitly an Arab we should say it as reliable sources say it. Wikipedia should not censor reliably sourced content. This discussion is becoming boring as you are changing the goalpost all the time so I am just going to leave. This is not an article that I am interested in. I will wait until there is another discussion and see if I can help.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 12:55, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

@SharabSalam: Your above sources are indeed from prestigious universities, but the problem is that their authors have no expertise in islamic history (but philosophy), however, if we can find reliable souces supporting Arab ethnicity, i would be in favor to include this in the article, even in the lead, since the ethnicity of this scholar, along with many others is relevant for their notability and shows how much medieval islamic era was rich and many other scholars have their ethnicity mentioned in the lead (i'm aware of WP:OTHER ...). Thus, the only point for me, would be to find reliable sources about his ethnicity. Best.---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 19:27, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

@Wikaviani: Actually we can't find them. His origins are unknown. I don't think sources that only mentions Arab without expanding on the claim are to be used. The only known thing is that he was Andalusian. As you can see above, the book Islamic Legal Thought A Compendium of Muslim Jurists ([4]) is the only book I found that goes in detail about their family's genealogy/biography/origins. From the book you can see that the biographers of his grandfather never wrote anything about his family's origins. They gave the genealogy, but they never give the ethnicity. -TheseusHeLl (talk) 19:57, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

@TheseusHeLl: Agreed, this is why i said that the only point for me is that we don't have reliable sources about his ethnic background. Also, a passing mention of "Arab" in a source is indeed not enough to support Arab ethnicity.---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 20:03, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Is this discussion reflected in any of the published literature? A section about the confusing regarding his origin—again, if discussed in the literature—would probably help neutralize this issue, even if it doesn't explicitly say he is/n't an Arab.--Gen. Quon (Talk) 19:35, 15 August 2020 (UTC)

Most of the sources quoted above to support the Arab origin are passing mentions of "Arab" as an introduction (e.g. "this Arab philosopher ..."). I haven't read any scholarly work that discusses the ethnicity in detail. There might be some out there, if someone finds any, I would be interested as well. HaEr48 (talk) 20:04, 15 August 2020 (UTC)

The only source that I found that discusses his origins (precisely his grandfather's) is Islamic Legal Thought: A Compendium of Muslim Jurists (p:297). -TheseusHeLl (talk) 20:16, 15 August 2020 (UTC)

Ethnicity

@SharabSalam: I suggest you use reliable source for the ethnicity of this scholar, especially since this article is a good article. The source you tried to cite is all but reliable, take a look at the authors' competences.---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 00:33, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Wikaviani, I have already responded in the above section.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 00:36, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Me too.---Wikaviani ^{(talk) (contribs)} 00:41, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Wikaviani, I have responded to your vague response.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 00:46, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Nickname and titles

@Relaxwikis: Given that the subject is a pretty famous person, I'm sure he has a lot of nicknames given by various other authors. "The Commentator" is a bit special because that often substitute his own name in Latin writings, and in those writing the large part of his reputation comes from him being the guy who wrote those commentaries. See Averroes#In_Latin_tradition for explanation and sources. For that I believe it deserve mention in the lead without any attribution. But as for other titles and nicknames, in my opinion, if they are relevant they should at most be mentioned in the body, and with attribution who said it (e.g. Historian XXX calls Averroes YYY). In addition, we should only add them to the lead if we have some evidence that it is widespread. Otherwise we'll end up adding dozens of nicknames in the lead, which I don't think will be great for its conciseness. HaEr48 (talk) 17:33, 29 April 2020 (UTC)

Understood thanks.--Relaxwikis (talk) 18:07, 29 April 2020 (UTC)

Latinization of Name

This is just a quick question: Is there any clear linguistic/historical research on how "Ibn Rushd" -> "Averroes"? I understand that "Ibn" often became "Aben" or "Aven" in Spain at the time, but I'm confused how "Rushd" was transmogrified into "-rroes." If anyone has any info, that'd be great!--Gen. Quon (Talk) 19:37, 15 August 2020 (UTC)

Gen. Quon, I don't have sources but just to speculate, Cluster reduction is pretty common (especially if the same cluster does not exist in the target language) so the losing of the d is not unexpected, and if the 'sh' [ʃ] sound does not appear in standard Spanish or Latin so it's not surprising either for it to be simplified to 's'. HaEr48 (talk) 21:43, 15 August 2020 (UTC)