Ask questions stubbornly, very proud men who seeing themselves right without knowing anything about the matter. This shows lack of piety, a tendency … - Ibn Hazm

(His book The Decisive word on sects, heterodoxies and denominations is)The first of its genre, and it is surprising that it was written in the 11th century when nothing like it existed in Christian Europe. Ibn Hazm proceeds like a scholar and a theologian who is acquainted through his own study and experience with the religions of his time and he analyses them in detail, quoting their texts.

If you attended (a study session) strictly adopt three attitudes; there is no fourth. First: You can lock yourself in the silence of ignorance. Second: If you do not behave as such, ask for the questions a man seeking to learn asks…. This man will ask only about what he does not know, not about what he knows. Asking about matters one knows is making proof of ineptitude; this is only ranting, waste of time for everyone…. If the person you are questioning does not give satisfactory answers, stop questioning… Third: You can answer like a scientist, refuting clearly the other’s arguments. If you are not capable of that, do not insist….”

What fixes and preserves a nation’s language, as well as its sciences and its history, is simply the strength of its political power, accompanied by the happy welfare and leisure of its inhabitants.