Much of Ibn Hazm's substantial body of works, also show a fearless irreverence towards his academic critics and authorities. Ibn Hazm wrote works on law and theology and over ten medical books. He called for science to be integrated into a standard curriculum. In
Organization of the Sciences, he diachronically defines educational fields as stages of progressive acquisition set over a five-year curriculum, from language and
exegesis of the Qur'an to the life and physical sciences to a rationalistic theology. Apart from his rational works, Ibn Hazm's
The Ring of the Dove (
Tawq al-hamamah) is considered a major work of Arabic literature from Al-Andalus. The manuscript of
Ṭawq al-ḥamāma (MS Or. 927) is kept at
Leiden University Libraries and is also available digitally.
Detailed Critical Examination In
Fisal (
Detailed Critical Examination), a treatise on
Islamic science and
theology, Ibn Hazm promoted sense
perception above subjectively flawed human
reason. Recognizing the importance of reason, as the
Qur'an itself invites
reflection, he argued that reflection to refer mainly to
revelation and
sense data since the principles of reason are themselves derived entirely from
sense experience. He concludes that reason is not a faculty for independent
research or
discovery, but that
sense perception should be used in its place, an idea that forms the basis of
empiricism.
Jurisprudence Perhaps Ibn Hazm's most influential work in the Arabic, selections of which have been translated into English, is now
The Muhalla, or
The Adorned Treatise. It is reported to be a summary of a much longer work, known as
Al-Mujalla. Its essential focus is on matters of jurisprudence, but it also touches of matters of creed in its first chapter,
Kitab al-Tawheed, whose focus is on credal matters related to monotheism and the fundamental principles of approach to divine texts. One of the main points that emerges from the masterpiece of jurisprudencial thought is that Ibn Hazm rejects analogical reasoning (qiyas) in favor of direct reliance on the
Quran,
sunnah, and
ijma of the companions.
Logic Ibn Hazm wrote the
Scope of Logic, which stressed on the importance of sense perception as a source of knowledge. He wrote that the "first sources of all human knowledge are the soundly used senses and the intuitions of
reason, combined with a correct understanding of a language". Ibn Hazm also criticized some of the more traditionalist theologians who were opposed to the use of
logic and argued that the first generations of
Muslims did not rely on logic. His response was that the early Muslims had witnessed the
revelation directly, but later Muslims have been exposed to contrasting beliefs and so the use of logic is necessary to preserve the true teachings of
Islam. The work was first republished in Arabic by
Ihsan Abbas in 1959 and most recently by
Abu Abd al-Rahman Ibn Aqil al-Zahiri in 2007.
Ethics In his book,
In Pursuit of Virtue, Ibn Hazm had urged his readers: Do not use your energy except for a cause more noble than yourself. Such a cause cannot be found except in Almighty God Himself: to preach the truth, to defend womanhood, to repel humiliation which your creator has not imposed upon you, to help the oppressed. Anyone who uses his energy for the sake of the vanities of the world is like someone who exchanges gemstones for gravel.
Poetry A poem or fragment of a poem by him is preserved in
Ibn Said al-Maghribi's
Pennants of the Champions: :::You came to me just before :::the Christians rang their bells. :::The half-moon was rising :::looking like an old man's eyebrow :::or a delicate instep. :::And although it was still night :::when you came a rainbow :::gleamed on the horizon, :::showing as many colours :::as a peacock's tail.
Medicine Ibn Hazm's teachers in medicine included
al-Zahrawi and
Ibn al-Kattani, and he wrote ten medical works, including ''Kitab fi'l-Adwiya al-mufrada'' mentioned by
al-Dhahabi. ==Views==