ISLAMIC CENTRES OF LEARNING

            From the advent of Islam in the 7^th century AD until the 12^th century AD, Muslims were the superior civilization. Not only had  a commonwealth emerged but a new environment favourable to intellectual growth had also appeared in the lands between Samarkand in the east and Cordova in the west. The Muslims had attained this superiority by hard work and acquisition of knowledge. There seems to be a lack of collective consciousness about this in the Muslim world today.

The most single striking effect of the unification of lands by the Umayyads from Persia to Spain under Islamic rule was the opening of formerly closed frontiers - frontiers that had been closed politically, linguistically and intellectually since the death of Alexander the Great in the 4^th century BC. An extraordinary cross-fertilization of once separate intellectual traditions occurred as a result of Muslim rule in the 7^th and early 8^th centuries. The interaction of Persians, Turks, Berbers, Andalusians, Egyptians, Indians, Chinese and Arabs and their cultures thus laid the foundation for the development of science in the lands ruled by the Muslims.

Not only were the social conditions generated by the Muslim rule favourable to intellectual growth, the religious factor too played an important part. Unlike the Romans who were preoccupied with power and wealth, or the Byzantines who were suspicious of classical science and philosophy, the early Muslims were actively encouraged by the Prophet (SAW) and the Quran to acquire and disseminate knowledge and wisdom. Religion and science are one in Islam, because religion constitutes knowledge of both the spiritual and the material world. In the regions which the Muslims ruled, Middle East, North Africa and Spain - the home of many earlier civilizations - Islam came into contact with a number of sciences which it absorbed, to the extent that these sciences were compatible with its own spirit and were able to provide nourishment for its own characteristic cultural life. The primordial character of its revelation, with its confidence that it was expressing the Truth at the heart of all revelations, permitted Islam to absorb ideas from many sources, historically alien, yet inwardly related to it.

This was especially true with regard to the sciences of Nature, because most of the ancient cosmological sciences - Greeks, as well as Chaldean, Persian, Indian and Chinese - had sought to express the unity of Nature and were therefore in conformity with the spirit of Islam. Coming in contact with them, the Muslims adopted some elements from each - most extensively, perhaps from the Greeks but also from the Chaldeans, Indians, Persians and Chinese. They united these sciences into a new corpus, which was to grow over the centuries and become part of the Islamic civilization, integrated into the basic structure derived from the Revelation itself. As far as the physical sciences or experimental sciences are concerned, the pre-Islamic Arabs had some knowledge of them. With their keen sense of observation, they gathered information on animals and on the plants of their desert. Some medicinal uses of these plants were also known to them. The names mentioned in the pre-Islamic Arab literature of various internal and external organs of the human and animal bodies suggest that their knowledge of anatomy was quite fair. The Arabs had some knowledge of astronomy and meteorology as well. They had some information on the fixed stars, the movements of the planets and the changes of weather.

Science is an organized and integral process in which every step forward is connected with the last. Every new generation acquires the ability to advance only on the basis of the achievements of its predecessors. Science arose in Europe as a result of a new spirit of enquiry, of new methods of investigation, of the method of experiment, observation and measurement, of the development of mathematics in a form unknown to the Greeks, and that spirit and those methods were introduced into the European world by the Muslim scholars.

As the newly formed Islamic society became more firmly established, and its energies turned from outward growth to inward development, educational institutions came into being, which played a vital role in the cultivation of the arts and sciences. We have before us a remarkable example of the first important centre to be particularly concerned with philosophy and the natural and mathematical sciences, namely, the Bait al- Hikmah (House of Wisdom), constructed in Baghdad by the caliph al-Mamun around 830 AD which included a library and an observatory. It was supported by the state treasury. The real cause for the sudden interest in pre-Islamic science, in contrast to the somewhat sporadic interest of the previous century, must be sought in the new challenge which Islamic society faced. It was for the purpose of safeguarding the interests of the Muslim community that the early Abbasid caliphs turned the attention of scholars to the study of Greek philosophy and science.

The distinctive feature in the history of the formation of the Arab caliphate's culture is its heterogeneous cultural traditions. The caliphate embraced such centres of ancient eastern civilizations such as Egypt, Mesopotamia, Iran, and Northern India, now part of Pakistan. The cultural traditions of these centres long had direct and indirect connection with the culture of ancient Greece. Another notable characteristic of the caliphate culture was the development of a unified scientific culture by breaking the linguistic, nationalistic, racial and religious barriers. Massive translation exercise of the ancient classical texts, whether Greek, Persian or Sanskrit, into Arabic was instrumental in breaking the language barriers.

A brief look at a few of the translators reveals something of the ethnic and religious variety they displayed and the degree to which the political establishment was involved in promoting their work. The phenomenal achievement by the Muslims was not the result of efforts by a few individuals, but it represented the outcome of an organized and sustained activity led by the political establishment.

Human factors of open-mindedness, liberality, and tolerance were also instrumental in the development of the arts and sciences during this age. Another important factor was the respect for the subject under study. As the philosopher Mohammed Iqbal has pointed out, the general empirical attitude of the Quran engendered in its followers a feeling of reverence for the actual, and ultimately made them the founders of modern science. It was a great point to awaken the emperical spirit in an age which had renounced the visible as of no value in man's search after God.

The lands destined to become parts of the medieval Islamic world - from Transoxiana to Andalusia - were consolidated into a new spiritual universe within a single century after the death of the Prophet (SAW). The language of the revelation provided the unifying pattern into which many foreign elements became integrated and absorbed, in accordance with the universal spirit of Islam.

While the earlier Abbasid caliphs had already undertaken translations of these foreign texts into Arabic, it was under al-Mamun that a more systematic effort was made to translate Greek scientific texts into Arabic. He founded an institution for the purpose which included a library and an observatory, and staffed it with salaried Christian and Muslim scholars. This was the most ambitious undertaking of its kind since the foundation of the Alexandrian School in the first half of the third century BC. The Bait al-Hikmah became a well-organized activity of unprecedented scope and vigour. Apart from the Elements, many other Greek mathematical works found their way into Arabic through the efforts of the scholars at the Bait al-Hikmah. The works of many Greek scholars such as Euclid and Archimedes were all translated at an early date, as were works of many Greek astronomers. Translators worked in groups, each supervised by an expert, and assisted by copyists. Works translated from Syriac were checked against the Greek originals when possible. Arabic translations from Greeks were later revised by succeeding caliphs in the light of newly acquired manuscripts. None of the Greek works on religion had been translated into Arabic, whereas, the science of hadith was fairly established by then.

The liberal attitude of the Muslim caliphs was evident even during the early period of Muslim rule. A look at some of the translators and other officials employed at the caliph's court reveals something of the ethnic and religious variety they displayed. Practically every Muslim ruler in the empire sought to out-rival the other in the cultivation and patronage of the arts and sciences. Luster and radiance of scholarship around the throne was considered essential to increase the international reputation and prestige of the dynasty. For physicians and scientists, attachment to the court was a coveted prize because this was a shortcut to professional fame and social prestige. Practically all the leading scientists and philosophers were attached to the royal courts.

Such an intellectual development could not have taken place without a plentiful and convenient supply of some suitable writing medium. The introduction of paper-making to the Muslims in this period, and from there later to the Europeans, provided an important impetus to learning. The availability of cheap writing material was accompanied by another social phenomenon in Iraq of the 8^th century - what today's sociologists would call 'upward mobility'. The cities of the Middle East during the medieval Muslim period contained a large number of literate people, many of humble origins. Officials would pay writers large sums of money for dedicating their books in their names. For example, Al-Jahiz received 5,000 gold dinars from an official to whom he dedicated his Book of Animals. Al-hijaz wrote over 200 works, although only 30 or so survive today.

There were two main centres of learning, besides Baghdad, namely Cairo and Cordova. Over in Egypt, the seat of another Muslim caliphate, the Fatimids, the rise of Cairo into another Muslim city of international learning and repute under the fourth Fatimid caliph, Al-Muizz (reigned 953-975 AD), added a spirit of rivalry to the patronage of learning by the Abbasid caliphs. Al-Muizz was al-Mamun of the west. Muslim Africa which then embraced the whole of the continent from the eastern confines of Egypt to the shores of the Atlantic and the borders of Sahara. During the reign of al-Muizz and his first three successors, the arts and sciences flourished under the especial and loving protection of the sovereigns and Cairo became a new intellectual and scientific centre. It was al-Muizz who established al-Azhar, the oldest still-functioning university in the world. It was in Muslim Cairo that the richest libraries of Islam were established. The library of Cairo, directed by a minister of the caliph al-Muizz, consisted of 40 storerooms containing books on all branches of science, 18,000 of which dealt with the 'sciences of the ancients'. Rich libraries were also founded under the reign of al-Muizz and al-Hakim (reigned 996-1021 AD), but the library that surpassed all others was the Dar al-Hikmah (Hall of Wisdom) founded by the latter caliph in 1005 AD, which contained a reading-room, halls of courses of study and an observatory. Efficient service was secured by means of paid librarians and the scholars were given pensions to enable them to pursue their studies. All the sciences were represented there. This institution, which lasted from 1005 to the end of the Fatimid regime (1171 AD), might be considered the second Muslim academy of science, the first being founded by al-Mamun at Baghdad almost two centuries earlier.

In the courtly society of the medieval Muslim period, the tastes and predilations of the ruler set the tone for society at large. Thus, in the first half of the 10^th century AD, the Muslim sovereigns further in the west over in Spain also gave the same kind of patronage to learning as their brethren in Baghdad and Cairo, in the determination to show the world that their court was in no way inferior to the court of the caliphs at Baghdad. Under the Umayyad caliph al-Rahman III (reigned 912-961 AD), Cordova became one of the greatest centres of civilization. Al-Rahman III actively recruited scholars by offering handsome inducements to overcome their initial reluctance to live in what many from the lands in the East considered the provinces. As a result, many scholars, poets, philosophers, historians and musicians migrated to Spain and established the basis of the intellectual tradition and educational system which made Spain so outstanding for the next 400 years.

Under another enlightened patron of learning in Spain, al-Hakam II (reigned 961-976 AD), the role of the scientific activity at Baghdad was paralleled at Cordova. Under this reign, Spain went through its golden age in literature and science. In Cordova, and also in Seville, Granada and Toledo, grew public libraries and colleges where free instruction in science and letters were given. As crown prince under the reign of his father al-Rahman III, and until his death in 976 AD,  al-Hakam showed real interest in promoting the cause of science and philosophy in his country. He sent emissaries to Egypt and Mesopotamia, among other Muslim countries in search of books, ancient and modern, at any price, and gradually built up at Cordova, a library that was said to equal the collection at Baghdad. The catalogue of this library consisted of 44 quartos. Copyists were employed to duplicate rare manuscripts. The ancient sciences received their first powerful impetus in Spain from the royal court, just as had happened earlier in Baghdad.

From every part of the world, students and scholars flocked to Cordova. Even Christians from remote corners of Europe attend Muslim colleges. One prominent bishop from Cordova was said to have complained that young Christian men were devoting themselves to the study of Arabic, rather than Latin - a reflection of the fact that Arabic had become the international language of science, just as English has today.