Purpose of Hayy Ibn Yaqzan

 


I think the premise of Hayy Ibn Yaqzan was to condense the evolution of the human mind into a short story. To me, (someone who does not understand the text very well), the ending where Hayy meets the other people seems out of place and not conducive to the story line I had pictured in my head. Maybe the religious creation story at the time involved a man growing up alone, but I do not know that. As for its purpose, I think we can look at the book with a past lens as well as a current one. In essence, the purpose for its publication is different than its purpose as to why it is still around today. As for its purpose of publication, I think, as I said previously, that it was just to show how humans evolve. An alternative is that it shows how, as we discussed in class, different learning styles allow someone to reach a higher level of learning. For example, Hayy, having learned everything on his own, was able to reach a godly state of learning, so high that he essentially ascended into the heavens. The people he meets from the neighboring island, however, are stuck in their ways, because they were taught what to think instead of being taught how to think. It is not entirely clear which one is better. Hayy, who learned how to analyze the world around him, went through bouts of mania and obsession. Whereas the town people have stable lives and jobs. All in all, I think this book did not have a purpose that strongly made me like it or dislike it, it just is.


Comments

  1. Michelle BNovember 13, 2021 at 1:31 PM

    It's interesting to realize that the book was originally just a manuscript that circulated in the court among thinkers and philosophers. It's publication came later, with its translation into Hebrew and Latin and English. Is it possible that its purpose changed in these different contexts?

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