Solomon ibn Gabirol
Everything except God, even angels and souls, is made of matter and form – and God’s will is the bridge between him and the world.
Placement
Jewish poet-philosopher of al-Andalus: in the “Fountain of Life” even spiritual beings are composed of matter and form; in Latin, as “Avicebron”, he was long taken for a Muslim.
Key ideas
- Universal hylomorphism
- Divine will as mediator
- Neoplatonic emanation
Influence
Influenced by 1
Plotinus
influenced by
Ibn Gabirol’s Fountain of Life follows a Neoplatonic scheme of procession from the One, adding universal matter and the divine will between God and creation. Solomon ibn Gabirol, Fons vitae (Meqor hayyim); SEP “Solomon Ibn Gabirol [Avicebron]”
Evidence: AI draft
Plotinus › 204–270
Criticism
Criticized by 1
Thomas Aquinas
criticised by
Aquinas rejected Avicebron’s (Ibn Gabirol’s) universal hylomorphism: angels and souls have no matter, being composed only of potency and act (Summa theologiae I q. 50 a. 2). Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I q. 50 a. 2; De spiritualibus creaturis a. 1; SEP “Solomon Ibn Gabirol [Avicebron]”
Evidence: AI draft
Thomas Aquinas › c. 1225–1274
Works
A Neoplatonic dialogue preserved in Latin: all created beings, even souls and intelligences, are composed of matter and form.
Position
Ibn Gabirol was one of the great Hebrew poets – his “Royal Crown” is still recited on the Day of Atonement – and a philosopher. His Fountain of Life, a Neoplatonic dialogue, almost never cites the Bible. Everything except God, he argues, is composed of matter and form: even souls and intelligences have a “spiritual matter” (universal hylomorphism). Between God and creation stands the divine will, through which forms are imparted to matter. The Arabic original is lost; the Latin version circulated under the name “Avicebron”, taken for a Muslim or Christian until Salomon Munk identified him in 1846. Franciscans such as Bonaventure adopted spiritual matter; Thomas Aquinas rejected it.
Life & context
Solomon ibn Gabirol was born around 1021 in Málaga and grew up in Saragossa, then a centre of Jewish culture in al-Andalus. Orphaned and sickly, he found a patron in the courtier Jekuthiel ibn Hassan, who was killed in 1039; later he wrote poems for Samuel ha-Nagid of Granada. He died young, around 1058 – some sources say around 1070.
Further main works
- The Improvement of the Moral Qualities (Tikkun middot ha-nefesh, 1045)
- The Fountain of Life (Arabic original lost; Latin Fons Vitae, c. mid-11th century, translated 12th century)
- The Royal Crown (Keter Malkhut, poem, 11th century)
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