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CVSP 202 In this reflective essay, I will discuss and argue with three authors. The

authors are Ibn Rushd, Dante and Aquinas. I want to discuss some points that I found to be remarkable and arguable. Some of them did agree with my thinking and some did not. During my discussion in this paper, I did not include any religious laws or arguments. I will try to restrict myself to my own world by using my own logic and reason rather than referring to my beliefs. After reading and understanding the ideas and views discussed by these three authors, my view on reason developed extraordinarily. In this essay, I will be focusing on faith, reason, and experience. I completely agree with Aquinass idea that says, reason and faith should be cooperated with each other in order to reach God. In my opinion, one cannot know that God exist through reason by itself because we dont know anything about God and our reason is limited. The only thing I could conclude by using my reason is that there is something or someone responsible for this enormous creation. But who is this thing or that one? Here comes the role of faith. God sent us prophets to give us the faith we need, and it is up to us to choose, either reject it or follow it. My definition to faith is to have trust and relief towards people such as my parents, but I think that faith is divided into two kinds, faith in humans and faith in God. Faith in humans is very weak because when I have faith in any human being I would put in mind that something could go wrong, it is always doubtful. Hence, I define faith in humans in terms of trust only, even though sometimes things dont make sense, I still can put trust in them without letting my mind accept the idea, for example I trust my mother in everything she says. Faith in God is the maximum faith a man can reach because then he believes and trusts in something he has not seen (God). According to my reason and

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experience, I think if anyone wants to achieve faith in God, people must accept God and his effects before trusting him. Trust by itself is not enough. I think if anybody has faith in God, then this faith must not be doubtable because God cannot fault because he is incorruptible. I disagree with Aquinas when he refers Trinity to faith because that contradicts with my own reason. My reason says that God is one in all cases and Jesus Crist is a human being. God cannot be represented physically and spiritually in any human being because he is God and the creator of everything. My mind does not accept the idea that God is spiritually represented in his own creature because he is unique. Aquinas argues that God has the highest essence, and this essence is unknown to us because our essence is much lower Man is an animal, for animal is contained in the essence of man. Here, I definitely agree with Aquinas, but my reason reached a conclusion that if God has the highest essence, then why is he represented in a human figure that has a lower essence? Hence, I reject the idea of trinity. I completely agree with Aquinass five arguments because they are reasonable to proof that there is a creator. I also agree with him that God is not self-evident to us because I think if God was completely self-evident to humans, then the value of faith would decrease or disappear. Now because we do not know the essence of God, the proposition is not self-evident to us, but needs to be demonstrated by things that are more known to us, though less known in their nature namely, by His effects here I agree with Aquinas because I think we cannot directly know God and hence we need to know him through things we already know and understand through reason such as his effects. I also think that experience is very important to reach the demonstrative

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understanding and reason because an experienced man has gone through many difficulties that allow him to think more of God. Now I want to discuss some of Dantes ideas. I completely agree with Dante when he argues in his book Purgatory that Evil in the world is due to free will and that God gave a man a soul which he loves and gave this soul purity. I think that God cannot create evil because he is God and evil must not come from him. Free will the center of Dantes book is an indispensable for our human nature because free will either leads us to Hell or Heaven. Here, I must disagree with Dante on Purgatory. I dont believe in purgatory and I dont think that there is a place between heaven and hell where people rest to purify themselves from sins because I think once an individual dies his soul will either go to hell or heaven. However I believe that there are levels of heavens and hells, for example a Saint will be in a higher position in heaven than a normal believer. In my point of view, todays earth represents a kind of purgatory. It is here we should purify ourselves from sins and not after death. Dante discusses the idea of love and divided it into two kinds, natural love and irrational love, Nature it is which is through pleasure bound anew in you. Here, my reason completely agrees with the Idea of natural love. I think certainly there is natural love. This natural love is inborn in us humans and not only humans but all living things. We see for example, natural love in animals such as cats defending her child or cells interact with each other to protect us. In conclusion I clearly see natural love in all living things. On the other hand, I dont really agree with the idea of irrational love. I believe wrath and pride is definitely inborn in us and hence, we cannot choose to avoid it. In fact Dantes The Divine Comedy itself is creating Pride to

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the Italians, and they should be proud of it. It also might have created wrath against Dante for his critique towards certain politicians and religious leaders. I dont completely reject this idea, but when it turns toward evil or pursues some good with not enough or too much zeal, the creature turns on his creator then. I think that if the love is directed towards evil then I agree with Dante, but it depends on the definition of the term evil, for example killing for no reason is evil, but wrath, envy, and pride are born in us and cannot be avoided. Dante also focuses on reason, and he refers to reason symbolically in his book in the character of Virgil. Dante argues that reason must be used in our lives in order to be correctly guided, but it also has a limit. My respond to this idea is that reason itself is not enough, and I think that experience is highly required along with reason in order to select the correct path. In my opinion, reason and experience must cooperate because the more reason a person has, the more experienced he is. One cannot from the first time select the correct path. One must try all paths and then choose, and that doesnt mean that he shall continue all the way, for example we dont know that fire burns unless we try it. Ibn Rushd argues in his book that philosophy is nothing more than the study of being and reflecting on them. He also stated that Islamic laws encourages and urges reflection and thus obliges Muslims to reflect on beings. He gave us examples from holy Quran. I think that philosophy is very important and required in any religion be it Islam or Hinduism. I think its uncivilized and stupid to just accept a certain religion without understanding everything in it because in my point of view, I think understanding religion eventually lead us to faith.

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CVSP 202 Ibn Rushd also argues that Allegorical interpretations are very important

to try to solve a certain idea. For every Muslim the law has provided a way to truth suitable to his nature, through demonstrative, dialectical or rhetorical methods, here Ibn Rushd is classifying the Umma or the society. Allegorical interpretations are only held by the demonstrative class, and even if those people fail they are excused. I dont see any reason in that because everyone has the right to analyze a certain idea. Ibn Rushd also argues that if a normal person fails to interpret a certain idea, then this person is a sinner. I dont really agree with Ibn Rushd here because one must try to analyze the idea in his mind first and then refer to a specialized man and choose the one he thinks is correct. I think using the term sinner is strict, and hence it will stop people from thinking.