 It is clear that Ibn Rushd comments on the Republic only for lack of Aristotle’s superior work. At the end of his paraphrase on the Nicomachean Ethics, he describes the shortcomings in Plato’s treatise, and criticizes Ibn Bājja for having judged the Republic as the perfect treatise on the virtuous city. What is less clear is exactly what Ibn Rushd’s own textual sources were. Did he deal directly with Plato’s text, with the assistance of Galen, al-Fārābī, and Aristotle’s Rhetoric? Or was the Platonic text not in his hands, which means that he was commenting on Galen’s Compendium on Plato’s Politics, with the help of al-Fārābī and Aristotle? While the use of Aristotle’s and al-Fārābī’s texts is clear, the question of his access to Plato remains obscure (Mahdi 2016).