THE SCIENTIFIC HERITAGE OF ISLAMIC CULTURE

Borneo Bulletin, 21/22 February 1998

 The Muslims’ contribution to science is well recognized by George Sarton in his monumental three-volume work, Introduction to the History of Science, published between 1927 to 1948. Sarton divides his story of the highest achievement in science into Ages, each lasting fifty years. With each Age he associates one central figure: thus 450 to 400 B.C. is the Age of Plato, followed by the Ages of Aristotle, Euclid, Archimedes and so on. From 750 to 1100 A.D., it is an unbroken succession of the Ages of Muslim scholars Jabir, Al-Khowarizmi, Al-Razi, Masudi, Abu Wafa, Al-Biruni and Omar Khayyam. In these 350 years, Arabs, Turks, Afghans and Persians – mathematicians, astronomers, physicists, chemists, clinicians and geographers of the commonwealth of Islam – held the world stage of science. Only after 1100 A.D. in Sarton’s scheme, do the first Western names begin to appear. Even then for another 250 years, they only share the honours with Muslims like Ibn Rushd, Nasiruddin al-Tusi and Ibn Nafis.

            The tradition of Muslim science is also a continuation of the work done previously in earlier ages. But science, before it was adopted by the Muslims, was in its elementary phase and what is now modern science is very different from the science of the pre-Muslim age. In the pre-Islamic civilizations, the state of science as it had earlier developed in Athens, Alexandria, Edessa (modern Urfa in Turkey) and Jundishapur in Sassanid Persia, had Euclid, Archimedes and Ptolemy among its foremost scholars. By the year 590 A.D. however, the intolerance of early Christian rulers completely extinguished free thought which had been so essential for intellectual activity, and thus the great tradition of scientific studies had come to a dead end by the seventh century.

            Scientific knowledge throughout the known world had become unproductive and intellectual activity thrived on past knowledge and worked almost in an imitative manner. With the advent of Islam however, not only a commonwealth had emerged but a new atmosphere favourable to intellectual growth had also appeared in the lands between Samarkand in the east and Cordoba in the west. The Muslims came into contact with sciences from various sources of pre-Islamic civilization. From the 8^th to the 10^th century, through the patronage of Baghdad’s House of Wisdom (Baitul Hikmat), almost the entire literature about scientific knowledge was translated into Arabic. The acquisition of all kinds of knowledge became very important in the curriculum of Islamic education. In fact, it attracted the full attention of the Muslims, and the study of the natural sciences and almost all branches of knowledge became a popular pursuit among the rising middle classes of the Muslim world.

            There were numerous reasons for this growing interest: the main reason being that scientific knowledge was regarded as the source of the growth of the human mind. The translation of about 200 years and a systematic reading of science, royal patronage, facilities for intellectual growth, free thought, prosperity, tolerance and freedom to know, had created a climate of fresh ideas in the Muslim world which eventually became the cause of the release of Muslim genius in all walks of life, particularly in mathematics, astronomy and medicine. This wave of intellectual awakening became very soon a world phenomenon and the centres of learning of the Muslim commonwealth not only attracted the Muslims but later, students from England, France and Italy also came to study there. It is interesting to note that Gerbert French (930-1003 A.D.) who had studied at Cordoba, was Pope Sylvester II of the Roman Catholic Church from 999 A.D. to his death.

            Thus, the Muslim civilization was to act as teacher to medieval Europe in all branches of knowledge. The West had become aware of the high level of culture and learning achieved by the Muslims in their own domain – the Moors in Spain. European envoys and individuals travelling for commercial reasons or as pilgrims were the first to bring news to Europe of the existence of a superior Muslim culture and science. Soon an influx of Latin scholars into Spain to acquire knowledge of Arabic and the sciences of the East began by the late 11^th century.

            In the 12^th and 13^th centuries, the main intellectual task was one of translation from the Arabic into Latin by the scholars of Europe, preserving the Muslim scientific tradition. Thus translation into Latin was made mostly by Christian scholars in Spain as well as by scholars from other parts of Europe travelling to Muslim centres of learning in Spain, especially Toledo, where the best work of this kind was done. Just as Baghdad had sought diligently to know Greek science, so Europe beginning in the 12^th century devoted great care to works on astronomy, arithmetic, trigonometry, optics, geometry, astrology and medicine that acquired reputation in the capitals of the Muslim caliphs. The fervour and eagerness in which the European scholars went out to seek and translate Arabic works is proof of the superiority of Muslim civilization from the 8^th to 11^th centuries A.D. Through these translations, the Muslims acquired an ascendancy in sciences that lasted for the next 500 years.

            It was these translators who were instrumental in introducing the whole range of knowledge of Muslim science into the West. Many of the works of Muslim scholars of the 8^th to 11^th centuries found their way into the West through the Latin translations. For instance, the works of Ibn Rushd, better known in the West as Averroes, an ardent Aristotelian, had a lasting effect in their Latin translations on the development of European philosophy. Many Oxford astronomers in the 17^th and 18^th centuries drew on Muslim sources, including Edmund Halley, famous for his observation of the comet known by his name. Al-Farabi’s book Catalog of Sciences in its Latin translation had a considerable influence upon the curricula of medieval European universities.

            In the history of medicine too, a number of books from Arabic sources became standard textbooks reproduced first in manuscript and later in print.  Hunain ibn Ishaq, who is said to have translated one hundred books by Galen, Hippocrates and other ancient physicians, wrote Introduction to Medicine which was translated into Latin and remained a popular manual of instruction for six hundred years. The 14^th century English poet Geoffrey Chaucer’s (1342-1400 A.D.) writings, full of references to Arabic sources, whether in the form of tales or of learning, show how far such Arabic thinking had penetrated the general thinking of his day.

            The level of achievement and the originality and calibre of science during the Muslim period of history can be seen from the bulk of literature on this subject. There exists at the present day, inspite of many losses by destruction, nearly a quarter of a million manuscripts of this period of Muslim civilization in various libraries of the Muslim world and in the great libraries of Europe and America. A large part of this wealth deals with scientific subjects and includes both Arabic translations of ancient Greek works and original works by Muslim scholars themselves. In 1981, Oxford University’s Bodleian Library, which houses one of the world’s largest collection of medieval Arabic manuscripts, organized an exhibition of its Arabic manuscript collection to mark the opening of the 15^th Islamic century.

            The importance of this Muslim science to the general progress of culture is beyond question. One proof of this is the number of technical words that passed from Arabic into Latin and the other languages of Western Europe, especially terms used in mathematics, astronomy, chemistry and navigation, for example, zenith, nadir, cipher and almanac. The present words ‘algebra’ and ‘algorithm’ are traced back to the noted Muslim mathematician, Al-Khowarizmi. In observational astronomy, a large number of star names, particularly those of the fainter stars, are Arabic. Well-known examples are Aldebaran, Vega and Rigel, among the brighter stars, and Algol, Alcor and Mizar, among the fainter ones. In other fields of life too we find a number of words of Arabic origin in European languages which bear witness to the Muslim contribution. The word cotton is from the Arabic ‘qutn’ and sugar from Arabic ‘sukr’. The manufacture of a variety of cotton and silk textiles was first introduced by the Muslims to Europe, and thus muslin, damask, satin and gauze are all names of Arabic origin.

            The Islamic legacy can be seen not only in the advancement of knowledge in individual subjects but more important in the whole scientific phenomenon. Scientific research in the post-Islamic era became fundamentally different from that in the pre-Islamic era because of the Muslims’ contribution. In the works of Greek scholars, except for a few like Archimedes, physical knowledge is usually mixed up with metaphysical speculations. Although the Greeks were not usually inclined to make observations and conduct experiments for studying Nature, certain Greek scientists like Archimedes had made some observations and had performed a few experiments as well. The Greeks, who borrowed their scientific knowledge from the Babylonians, were usually contented with their borrowed experimental knowledge.  Their ability of scientific inquiry depends upon pure reasoning. They dealt with scientific problems with the help of reflection aided by a minimum of observations. For instance, Aristotle believed that one could solve all the problems of the universe by thinking about them. There were two schools of thought which relied entirely upon the force of understanding. One school of thought had confidence in the spontaneous act of the mind while the other employed various forms of logic to understand a phenomenon. According to the 20^th century writer and philosopher, Bertrand Russell (1872 –1970 A.D.), the Greeks avoided experiments.

            The Muslims on the other hand, in compliance with the Quranic injunctions, not only keenly observed natural phenomena but also made observations under artificially controlled conditions. A number of facts have been explained in the Quran through reasoning, and various methods of reasoning, such as analogical, deductive and inductive have been adopted. Medieval Muslims applied this technique in their pursuit of scientific knowledge. This mode of reasoning itself was a phenomenal achievement which gave birth to science in the modern sense.