those most knowledgeable about the doctrines of Aristotle and his followers, and most devoted to studying, espousing, and explaining them—and clarifying the points on which Ibn Sīnā and others like him differed with Aristotle—is the philosopher and judge Abū al-Walīd ibn Rushd, the grandson. He even refuted those who opposed them, composing his book Tahāfut al-Tahāfut (The Incoherence of the Incoherence), in which he rebutted Abū Hāmid al-Ghazālī’s criticisms of the philosophers. Yet he was not correct wherever he contradicted what the Quran and Sunnah entail; rather, he was gravely mistaken—indeed, the matter was graver still—even though he claimed that demonstrative proof necessitated his position and that it belonged to the knowledge of the elite, not the general public.

The point, however, is that despite going to such lengths in following the views of the Peripatetic philosophers, he nevertheless reported that the philosophers affirmed direction. He also established this through their rational methods, which they call demonstrations. Yet he does not approve of the methods of the speculative theologians; rather, he and others like him call these dialectical methods and call their proponents dialecticians, just as they are also called by