Ibn Daud's Concept of Evil and Its Relationship to Free Will

Abstract

Abraham Ibn Daud's The Exalted Faith (al-ʿAqīdah al-rafīʿah), composed around 1160, is a seminal work that represents an ambitious and pioneering attempt to reconcile Aristotelian philosophy with Jewish theology. Despite its rigorous philosophical style, which closely follows Avicenna's ideas and phrasings, scholars have highly praised Ibn Daud's integration of Aristotelian and Neoplatonic concepts, his engagement with Islamic philosophical traditions, and his influence on subsequent Jewish thinkers. Although his work was somewhat overshadowed by Maimonides, it remains a valuable resource for understanding the development of Avicennian thought in late medieval Judaism. Since Ibn Daud defines the purpose of The Exalted Faith as a solution to the problem of free will, I aim to explore this idea in this brief article. To do so, I will focus on the second chapter of the sixth principle, where Ibn Daud declares that he fulfills the aim of his book by linking the problem of free will with divine omnipotence, foreknowledge, and providence. I will argue that his innovation lies in integrating free choice within the framework of divine providence, preserving an absolute possibility within the causal chain.