Court Physician in Marrakesh
Served as personal physician to the Almohad caliph Abu Yaqub Yusuf in Marrakesh. The position gave him security and time to think, and it gave him influence over who else the caliph met.
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Ibn Tufayl served as court physician in Marrakesh. His single surviving work, Hayy ibn Yaqzan, tells the story of a boy raised alone on an island who discovers natural philosophy, metaphysics, and mystical union with God through observation and reason. When he meets people from a nearby island who follow a revealed religion, he finds their beliefs are the same truths he discovered, expressed in images for those who cannot reason abstractly. The book was translated into Latin in 1671 and influenced Locke and Defoe.
