Because the ideal city is specially characterized by the absence of the arts of the doctor and the qadi [magistrate], love being the strongest bond between them, there is no contention at all. When a part of it is lacking in love and contention occurs, justice must be established, and inevitably someone to dispense it, viz. the qadi, is required. Further, all actions in the ideal city are right, this being its special characteristic which it never lacks. Hence its people will not indulge in harmful foods. Therefore they will not need knowledge of remedies for choking at the breaking of the fast nor anything else of the kind, nor remedies for excessive drinking, since nothing not properly in order is there. Similarly when people give up exercise, numerous diseases arise in consequence. Clearly this does not apply to our city. It may also be that there will be no need in it for most of the remedies for dislocation and the like. In general, cannot the healthy body rouse itself to resist diseases whose obscure causes come from outside? For its desire is not great. The severe wounds of many people of sound health are cured of themselves--with numerous instances of the same kind. And so a special characteristic of the ideal city is that there is neither doctor nor qadi, while among the traits of the four simple [ignorant?] cities is their need of both. The further removed from the ideal, the more a city needs them, and the more honourable is the rank of both these classes. Plainly in the perfect city a man is given the best of which he is capable, and all its views are true. How could a view in it be false? Its actions alone are ideal in the absolute sense, and every other action, even if excellent, is in relation to the corruption of its existence. If a limb is cut from the body, it is essentially harmful, though incidentally it may be advantageous to one whom an adder has stung, and his body is relieved by cutting it off. Similarly scammony is essentially harmful, though useful for one who is ill. A short account of these matters has been given in the Nicomachean Ethics. It is clear that every view except the view of its people which appears in the perfect city is false, and every action which takes place in it, except the customary actions, is wrong. Now the false has no definite nature and cannot be known at all... Ibn Bajjah's Rule of the Solitary, translated by By D. M. Dunlop, 75-76
This morning I listened to Peter Adamson's lovely podcast on Ibn Bajjah [Avempace] and Ibn Tufayl. It made me re-read Ibn Bajjah's Rule of the Solitary. As it happens Ibn Tufayl is explicitly rather critical of Ibn Bajjah and, implicitly, he seems to be (recall) scathing. At the end of this post, I will return to this polemic. But first I focus on Ibn Bajjah's treatment of the best city quoted above.
Rule of the Solitary starts with a conceptual analysis of the linguistic diversity of 'rule' in Arabic. To simplify: rules involve teleological generalizations. The "absolute" and "noblest" rule is God's providence. One set of rules is the subject matter for "political science," and this includes rule of commonwealths and "households." (73) When it comes to cities (and households) rule can be right and wrong. Ibn Bajjah asserts that "Plato has made clear the nature of the rule of cities in the Republic." (74) Ibn Bajjah treats Aristotle's Politics as a work by Plato, and insists that it consists of the nature of the rule of households.
One complication, thus, is that he treats the Republic and Politics as two parts of one science (by one author). A further complication is that it is not obvious he has access to either text, especially doubtful that he would have had an Arabic version of Politics (and may be working from summaries).* I mention this, too, because household management (οἰκονόμοι) is mentioned at Republic 417a as something the lower classes do, although the Republic is, in a certain sense, indeed ignoring the principles of it.
He treats household management as the occasion to enunciate a general principle: "That home only is perfect in which no increase is possible, lest it may turn to loss like a sixth finger. For it is characteristic of what is exactly right that an increase is loss." (74) So, a perfect social organization is in balance or equilibrium. Presumably "increase" here refers to population and/or goods (but Ibn Bajjah does not say).
Okay, with that in place, it seems pretty clear that the four ignorant cities are a reference to the timocratic, oligarchic, democratic, and tyrannical cities. it is striking, however, that Ibn Bajja treats the city without magistrates and physicians as the best city. For, while it is true that Socrates thinks it is unworthy or unfitting to discuss these matters and to legislate on them, and leaving them to the citizens of Kallipolis to discover, he clearly implies that the city will require magistrates [425c-d]. Presumably this is one of the lesser tasks of the guardians. Something similar can be said about the role of physicians in Kallipolis. While Socrates is clearly against the kind of medicine that keeps or prolongs badly diseased bodies alive, the implication seems to be that the medicine that keeps folk doing proper their function in the state is available in Kallipolis [407cd & 409d]. In addition, the eugenics project of Kallipolis is articulated in a medicalized fashion [459C]
So, I think an alternative is possible: Ibn Bajja is treating the 'true city" (372e) or 'city of pigs' as the very best city. For despite the existence of commerce and trade, it seems to be a city without magistrates. Of course, it is (recall) a city with carers of bodies, and (369d), and because of 341C it is natural to understand these as physicians.** But in context it is quite natural to treat these carers of bodies as akin to fitness trainers.
There are three other reasons to think that Ibn Bajja may be referring to the 'city of pigs' as his model of the best city. (I have some fondness for this city; recall extensively here; a bit here; and also more here)) First, he claims that in it there is no falsity at all. This is manifestly not true of the Kallipolis, which requires some noble lies [414cff]. In addition, in the heart of Socrates' eugenics deception is also explicitly practiced [459CD].
The second reason is more tricky. Above I noted that Ibn Bajja clearly assumes that the best city is in fine balance, an increase would be a loss. It respects some kind of equilibrium condition. Those familiar with Kallipolis, will naturally think of the passage where the guardians are taught to follow the rule: “that they should let it grow so long as in its growth it consents to remain a unity, but no further [[423bc]. And it is natural to read into this population control because Socrates implies that there are only a thousand warriors in the polity. But that leaves quite inexact how large the total population is (as distinct from the exactitude of Magnesia in Plato's Laws).
By contrast, there is no doubt that the true city practices (recall) strict population control: using Reeve's translation: "they will produce no more children than their resources allow, lest they fall into either poverty or war." [372bc] Moreover, the way Socrates puts it allows a trade-off between population and goods, which is the ambiguity I noted in Ibn Bajja.
Third, Ibn Bajja is adamant that "all actions in the ideal city are right." (This is why there is no need of a qadi). Strikingly, this is not because all the inhabitants are sage-like philosophers. (Spinoza makes the point somewhere that a city of sages would not require laws.) But, rather this is so because people behave correctly from tradition ("custom"). I think this fits the true city very nicely; it seems to lack philosophy altogether. By contrast, as is well known, in Kallipolis correct behavior is the consequence of extensive drilling and censorship (etc).
Okay, let me wrap up. Remember that Ibn Tufayl's explicit criticism of Ibn Bajja was two-fold: Ibn Bajja is mistakenly anti-mystical (and rejects the intuitive faculty) and he is personally materialistic. The more subtle criticism is that it reduces religion to the regulation of human desires as a set of customs or practices; it leaves no space for higher things. And so, religion cannot be a conduit to a philosophic life (which Ibn Tufayl and Ibn Rush claim just is living according to the inner truth of the Qu'ran). And, indeed, that argument makes sense if we understand Ibn Bajja as treating the true city, where there is a natural religion of the flesh, 'singing hymns to the gods in pleasant fellowship,' as ideal, but decidedly odd if he were taken to be thinking of the Kallipolis.
*A final complication is that while Adamson (in the podcast) treats Ibn Bajjah as a kind of follower of Al-Farabi, Ibn Bajjah clearly thinks that household management is a proper part of political science, whereas Al-Farabi seems less inclined to think so. I don't want to deny that Ibn Bajjah is in dialogue with Al-Farabi; he has a whole treatment of the treatment of political "weeds" that is clearly a response to Al-Farabi's, but he takes up a contrasting position. (Michael Kochin is good on this.)
**I am indebted to Eric Brown here.
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