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(2009) Late antique epistemology, Dordrecht, Springer.
In his introductory address to Hayy Ibn Yaqẓân ("Living, Son of Wakeful") Abû Bakr Ibn Ṭufayl (1116–85) indicates that the tale he is about to tell was occasioned by a request made upon the Andalusian philosopher-physician to relate what he can concerning the secrets of Ibn Sînâ's Philosophy of the Easterners (ḥikma al-mashriqiyyîn). Those expecting an actual exposition of this chimera-like entity will be frustrated in their desires as instead, Ibn Ṭufayl launches into what appears to be an account of the psychological effect the request had on the author. According to Ibn Ṭufayl, the question carried him on a stream of consciousness that led him to a state such as he had not experienced before, culminating: in the attainment of something so wonderful that "no tongue can describe it", something for which there is no explanation: this because it came from another stage (ṭawr) and another world ("âlam) from that which they [descriptions and explanations] occupy. But neither could anyone who has reached this state (ḥâl) or even come upon the verge of the delight, pleasure, and rapture <it offers> keep its secrets or conceal its mysteries.1 Though this rapturous experience is in principle ineffable, because infinite (Ḥayy, 11.4–5), Ibn Ṭufayl does provide a few pointers as to what it is and what it is not, both in his introduction and in the context of Ḥayy's story itself (the protagonist enters a state that is clearly meant to mirror the author's own).
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Full citation:
Kukkonen, T. (2009)., Ibn Ṭufayl and the wisdom of the East: on apprehending the divine, in P. Vassilopoulou & S. R. L. Clark (eds.), Late antique epistemology, Dordrecht, Springer, pp. 87-102.
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