SOURCE: Gibb, H. A. R. “The Golden Age (a.d. 945-1055).” In Arabic Literature: An Introduction, pp. 33-81. London: Oxford University Press, 1926.

In the following excerpt, Gibb mentions Ibn Hazm's Kitāb al-fasl fi al-milal wa al-ahwā' wa al-nihal, calling it “the first systematic and critical work on the religions of mankind.”

The chief figure in the prose literature of the eleventh century is Ibn Hazm of Cordova, the grandson of a Spanish convert. In his early years he was pre-eminently a poet, but, belonging to the narrowest school of Islamic theology, his activities were diverted to bitter attacks on his theological opponents; the sharpness of his tongue, which became proverbially linked with the sword of the tyrant al-Hajjāj, eventually forced him to give up political life and brought about his practical excommunication. Of his immense theological and historical activities little has come down to us...