Arabic Authors Part 4

Yakub-bin Ishak Al-Kindi, the philosopher of the Arabs, known in Europe by the corrupted name of Alchendius, possessed an encyclopaedic mind, and being himself a living encyclopaedia, he composed one of all the sciences. He divided philosophy into three branches, the mathematical, the physical, and the ethical. He declared the nullity of alchemy, which Ibn Sina had again brought to honourable notice, till the physician Abdul Latif declaimed against it. But Al-Kindi was not sufficiently advanced to write against astrology, which is still in full force all over the East even in our own times. Only one of his works has as yet been published in Europe, and that treats on the composition of medicines, though we possess the t.i.tles of not less than two hundred and thirty-four works composed by him on a variety of subjects. He died A.D. 861.

Abu Nasr Al-Farabi (Alfarabius), called by the Arabs a second Aristotle, is generally considered to be the second Arab philosopher; Avicenna, who always quotes him in his works, the third; the first place being a.s.signed to Al-Kindi. Al-Farabi studied Arabic (he was a Turk by birth) and philosophy in Baghdad, where he attended the lectures of Abu Bishr Matta bin Yunus, who possessed, and also imparted to his pupils, the gift of expressing the deepest meanings in the easiest words. From Baghdad he went to Harran, where Yuhanna bin Khailan, the Christian philosopher, was teaching logic, and after his return he made all the works of Aristotle his special study. It is related that the following note was found inscribed in Al-Farabi's handwriting on a copy of Aristotle's treatise on the soul: 'I have read over this book two hundred times.' He also said that he had read over Aristotle's 'Physics' forty times, and felt that he ought to read it over again. Abul Kasim Said, of Cordova, says in his 'Cla.s.ses of Philosophers' that 'Al-Farabi led all the professors of Islam to the right understanding of logic by unveiling and explaining its secrets, as well as by considering all those points which Al-Kindi had neglected, and by teaching the application of a.n.a.logy to all occurring cases.' In his enumeration and limitation of the sciences, Al-Farabi embraced the whole system of knowledge as it then existed. He went to Egypt, and afterwards to Damascus, where he died in A.D. 950. During his residence at Damascus he was mostly to be found near the borders of some rivulet, or in a shady garden; there he composed his works and received the visits of his pupils. He was extremely abstemious, and entirely indifferent to wealth and poverty. The list of his works on philosophical and scientific subjects amount to sixty-one. Mr. Munk's 'Melanges de Philosophie Juive et Arabe' (Paris, 1859) contains good articles on Al-Farabi and Al-Kindi.

Ibn Sina (Avicenna) was a great philosopher and physician. At the age of ten years he had completed the study of the Koran in Bukhara, where afterwards a certain Natili became his tutor, with whom he first studied the 'Eisagoge' of Porphyry, and afterwards Euclid, and lastly the 'Almagest' of Ptolemy. Natili then departed, and an ardent desire to study medicine having taken possession of Ibn Sina, he commenced to read medical books, which not being so difficult to understand as mathematics and metaphysics, he made such rapid progress in them that he soon became an excellent physician, and cured his patients by treating them with well-approved remedies. He began also to study jurisprudence before he was thirteen. At the age of eighteen he entered the service of a prince of the Beni Saman dynasty, Nuh bin Mansur, at Bukhara, a paralytic, who entertained many physicians at his court, and Ibn Sina joined their number. There he composed his 'Collection,' in which he treated of all the sciences except mathematics, and there also he wrote his book of 'The Acquirer and the Acquired.' He then left Bukhara, and lived in various towns of Khurasan, but never went further west, spending his whole life in the countries beyond the Oxus, in Khwarizm and in Persia, although he wrote in Arabic. It would be superfluous to follow all his changes of fortune, but it may be mentioned that when he was the first physician and vizier of Mezd-ud-daulah, a sultan of the Bowide dynasty, he was twice deposed and put in irons. He also appears to have acted treacherously towards Ala-ud-daulah, a prince of Ispahan, who was his benefactor. He was four years in prison, but at last succeeded in deceiving his guardians, and escaped. His dangerous travels, and the depression of mind inseparable from reverses of fortune, however, never interrupted his scientific pursuits. His taste for study and his activity were such that, as he himself informs us, not a single day pa.s.sed in which he had not written fifty leaflets. The list of ma.n.u.scripts left by him, and scattered in various libraries of Europe, is considerable, and though many of his works have been lost, some are still in existence. The fatigues of his long journeys, and the excesses of all kinds in which he indulged, abridged the life of this celebrated scholar, who died in A.D. 1037, at the age of fifty-six, at Hamadan, where the following epitaph adorns his tomb: 'The great philosopher, the great physician, Ibn Sina, is dead. His books on philosophy have not taught him the art of living well, nor his books on medicine the art of living long.'

A brief notice must be given of the celebrated physician and philosopher, Ali bin Ridhwan, who died A.D. 1067. He was such a prodigy of precocious learning that he began to lecture on medicine and philosophy at Cairo from his fourteenth year. He afterwards also taught astronomy. At the age of thirty-two he had attained a great reputation as a physician, and was a rich man at sixty. He left more than one hundred books which he had composed, and he himself says: 'I made abridgments of the chief philosophical works of the ancients, and left in this manner five books on philology; ten on law; the medical works of Hippocrates and Galen; the book of plants of Dioskorides; the books of Rufus, Paulus, Hawi, and Razi; four books on agriculture and drugs; four books for instruction in the 'Almagest' of Ptolemy, and an introduction to the study of it, and to the square of Ptolemy; as also to the works of Plato, Alexander, Themistios, and Al-Farabi. I purchased all these books, no matter what they cost, and preserved them in chests, although it would have been more profitable to have sold them again rather than have kept them.' Ibn Batlan, a clever physician, was a contemporary of Ibn Ridhwan, and travelled from Baghdad to Egypt only for the purpose of making his acquaintance, but the result does not appear to have been satisfactory to either party.

He died A.D. 1063, leaving a number of works on medical and other subjects.

Abu Hamid Al-Ghazali was born A.D. 1058. He was considered chiefly as a lawyer and a mystic, but here he will be noticed chiefly as a philosopher and the author of 'The Ruin of Philosophers,' noticed at length by Haji Khalfa in his 'Encyclopaedical Dictionary,' under No.

3764. But Ghazali's most celebrated work is 'The Resuscitation of Religious Sciences,' which is so permeated by the genius of Islam that, according to the general opinion of scholars, the Muhammadan religion, if it were to perish, might again be restored from this work alone. Orthodox fanatics, nevertheless, attacked his works as being schismatic, and they were even burnt in the Mugrib. He was born at Tus (the modern Mashad), in Khurasan, and pa.s.sed his life partly there, also at Naisapur, Baghdad, Damascus, Egypt, and finally returned to Tus, where he died A.D. 1111. His works are very numerous, and all of them are instructive.

Ibn Bajah (known to Europeans under the name of Avempace) was a philosoper and a poet of considerable celebrity, and a native of Saragossa, in Spain. He was attacked by some people for his religious opinions, and represented as an infidel and an atheist, professing the doctrines held by the ancient sages and philosophers. Ibn Khallikan defends Ibn Bajah, and says that these statements were much exaggerated, but adds: 'G.o.d, however, knows best what his principles were,' Abul Ha.s.san Ali al-Imam, of Granada, was of opinion that Ibn Bajah was the greatest Arab philosopher after Al-Farabi, and places him higher than Ibn Sina and Al-Ghazali. He left numerous logical, grammatical and political works, and died at Fez in A.D. 1138.

Averroes, whose full and correct name is Abul Walid Muhammad bin Rashid, was a celebrated Arab scholar, born at Cordova A.D. 1126, and the author of many writings. He taught in his native town philosophy and medicine, two sciences which appeared for a long time to be inseparable, and the vulgar considered those professing them to be of almost supernatural attainments. The period of Averroes is that of the decadence of Arab dominion in Spain, a period when this great nation also lost the taste for sciences which it had brought to Europe.

Considering the prodigious number of works composed by Averroes, who filled at the same time the offices of Imam and Kadi, his entire life must have been one of labour and meditation. He is the author of an Arabic version of Aristotle, but it is not the first which existed in that language, as some of his biographers a.s.sert, because this work had been produced already at Baghdad during the brilliant Khalifate of Mamun. There are various ma.n.u.scripts of Averroes extant treating on physics, pure mathematics, astronomy and astrology, from which it would appear that, in spite of their encyclopaedic attainments, the celebrated men of these times still believed in some popular errors.

Science was at that time surrounded by a kind of superst.i.tious halo of respect, to which Averroes, like so many others, is indebted for a good part of his renown. He died A.D. 1198, in the city of Morocco; his corpse was transferred to Cordova and there interred.

Medical science had already, under the second Khalif of the house of Abbas (A.D. 754-775), enjoyed the highest honours, which it ever afterwards retained. Great physicians were brought from the Persian hospital of Jondshapur, and between the years A.D. 750 and 850 the number of physicians was considerable, but only the most celebrated will be noticed.

Georgios (Jorjis) bin Bakhtyeshun, of Jondshapur, lived at the commencement of the Abbaside dynasty, and was the author of the book of Pandects. When Al-Mansur was building the city of Baghdad he suffered from pains in his stomach and from impotency, and Georgios, the director of the medical college at Jondshapur, was recommended to him as the most skilled physician of the time. Accordingly, the Khalif directed Georgios and two of his pupils, Ibrahim and Serjis, to come to Baghdad, appointing Gabriel (Jebrayl), the son of Georgios, as director of the hospital in the place of his father. Georgios cured Al-Mansur, and received from him three thousand ducats for his reward, along with a beautiful slave girl; the latter was, however, returned to the Khalif with thanks, and the remark that, 'being a Christian, he could not keep more than one wife.' From that moment the physician attained free access to the harem, and enjoyed high favour with the Khalif, who greatly pressed him in A.D. 770 to make a profession of Islam; but this he refused to do, and died shortly afterwards, in A.D.

771. Before his death Georgios asked to be allowed to return to Jondshapur, to be buried there with his ancestors. Al-Mansur said, 'Fear G.o.d, and I guarantee you paradise.' Georgios replied, 'I am satisfied to be with my ancestors, be it in paradise or be it in h.e.l.l.' The Khalif laughed, allowed him to return home, and presented him with ten thousand pieces of gold for his travelling, expenses.

Gabriel (Jebrayl), the son of the above-named Georgios (Jorjis), was also a celebrated physician. He enjoyed great favour with Harun-ar-Rashid, who used to declare that he would not refuse him anything. When, however, this Khalif fell ill at Tus, and asked Gabriel for his opinion, the latter replied that if Harun had followed his advice to be moderate in s.e.xual pleasure, he would not have been attacked by the disease. For this reply he was thrown into prison, and his life was saved only by the chamberlain Rabi'i, who was very fond of him. Amin, the son and successor of Rashid, followed the advice of Gabriel more than his father did, and would not eat or drink anything without his doctor's sanction. In A.D. 817 Gabriel cured Sehl bin Hasan, who recommended him to Mamun; but Michael, the son-in-law of Gabriel, was his body physician. In A.D. 825 Mamun fell sick, and, as all the medicines of Michael were of no use, Isa, the brother of Mamun, advised him to get himself treated by Gabriel, who had known him from boyhood; but Abu Ishak, the other brother of Mamun, called in Yahya bin Maseweih, and when he could do nothing, then Mamun sent for Gabriel, who restored him to health in three days, and was handsomely rewarded in consequence. When Mamun marched, in A.D. 828, against the Byzantines, Gabriel fell sick and died, whereon the Khalif took Gabriel's son with him on the campaign, he being also an intelligent and skilled physician.

The works of Gabriel are:

(1) A treatise on food and drink, dedicated to Mamun.

(2) An introduction to logic.

(3) Extracts from medical Pandects.

(4) A book on fumigatories.

Isa bin Musa, who flourished about A.D. 833, was also one of the most distinguished physicians of the period. He left the following works:

(1) Book on the forces of alimentary substances.

(2) A treatise for a person who has no access to a physician.

(3) Questions concerning derivations and races.

(4) Book of dreams, indicating why medicines should not be given to pregnant women.

(5) Book of the remedies mentioned by Hippocrates in his treatise on bleeding and cupping.

(6) Dissertation on the use of baths.

Without giving any details about Maseweih, Yahya bin Maseweih, Honein bin Ishak, and Kosta bin Luka, all of whom were distinguished for medical knowledge, some fuller mention must be made of Abu Bakr Ar-Razi (Rhases), who has been described as 'the ablest physician of that age and the most distinguished; a perfect master of the art of medicine, skilled in its practice, and thoroughly grounded in its principles and rules.' He composed a number of useful works on medicine, and some of his sayings have been handed down to us, and are still worthy of record, such as:

(1) When you can cure by a regimen, avoid having recourse to medicine.

(2) When you can effect a cure with a simple medicine, avoid employing a compound one.

(3) With a learned physician and an obedient patient sickness soon disappears.

(4) Treat an incipient malady with remedies which will not prostrate the strength.

Till the end of his life he continued at the head of his profession, finally lost his sight, and died in A.D. 923. A new and much improved edition of Razi's 'Treatise on the Small-Pox and Measles' was published in London in A.D. 1848 by Dr. Greenhill, and an article on him will also be found in Wustenfeld's 'History of the Arabian Physicians.'

Poetry flourished to a very great extent during the reigns of the early Abbaside Khalifs, and, as all Arab _litterateurs_ were more or less poets and writers of verses, it is somewhat difficult to select the most celebrated.

The first collection of Arabic poems was compiled by Al-Mofadhdhal in the work called after him--'Mofadhdhaliat.' He was followed by Abu Amr as Shaibani, by Abu Zaid bin A'us, Ibn-as Sikkit, Muhammad bin Habib, Abu Hatim es Sejastani, and Abu Othman al Mazini. Abu Tammam and Al-Bohtori, the collectors of the two Hamasas, are considered to be the two greatest poets of the third century of the Hijrah (A.D. 816-913).

And it may here be observed that in the great bibliographical dictionary of Haji Khalfa, who enumerates seven Hamasas, the names of Ibn-ul Marzaban and of Ibn Demash, each of whom composed one, are not mentioned.

Zukkari made himself a reputation by editing several of the Mua'llakat, as also the poems of the great pre-Islamite bards, Al-Aasha and Al-Kama, whilst Abu Bakr as Sauli likewise acquired great merit by publishing ten of the master-works of Arabic poetry.

From the many poets of this period some of the most celebrated have been selected--viz., Farazdak, Jarir, Al-Akhtal, Abul-Atahya, Bashshar bin Burd, Abu Nuwas, Abu Tammam, Al-Otbi, Al-Bohtori, Al-Mutanabbi, and An-Nami, and a few biographical details about them will be given, as also some remarks about Al-Mofadhdhal, the first collector and compiler of Arab poetry, and of Abul Faraj-Al-Ispahani, the collector of the great anthology called 'Kitab-ul-Aghani,' or the Book of Songs.

Jarir and Al-Farazdak were two very celebrated poets, who lived at the same time and died in the same year, A.D. 728-729. Ibn Khallikan has given their lives at considerable length, and says that 'Jarir was in the habit of making satires on Al-Farazdak, who retorted in the same manner, and they composed parodies on each other's poems.' Jarir always used to say that the same demon inspired them both, and consequently each knew what the other would say. On all occasions they seem to have been excessively rude in verse to each other, and did not at all mind about having recourse to actual insult. The lives of Al-Akhtal, Al-Farazdak, and Jarir, translated from the 'Kitab-ul-Aghani'

and other sources, have been given by Mr. Caussin de Perceval in the _Journal Asiatique_ for the year 1834. Prom this it would appear that the verses of these three poets were much discussed during their lifetime, and often compared with the productions of the other poets who followed them. Some writers are in favour of one and some of the other, but the general opinion of them is that their effusions resembled the Arab poetry written before the period of Muhammad much more than any poetry that was written during the reign of the Abbasides. Al-Akhtal belonged to a Christian tribe of Arabs, and was much patronized by the Omaiyide Khalif Abdul Malik (A.D. 684-705), in whose glory and honour he composed many verses, and, indeed, such good ones, that Harun-ar-Rashid used to say no poet had ever said so much in praise of the Abbasides as he (Akhtal) had written in praise of the Omaiyides. He died at an advanced age some years before Jarir and Farazdak, who were much younger men, but the exact year of his death does not appear to have been recorded.

The blind Bashshar bin Burd and Abul-Atahya were two of the princ.i.p.al poets who flourished in the first ages of Islamism, and ranked in the highest cla.s.s among the versifiers of that period. The former was put to death, or rather beaten, by the orders of the Khalif Al-Mahdi, for certain satirical verses which the poet is said to have written, and from the effects of these strokes of a whip he died in A.D. 783.

Abul-Atahya wrote many verses on ascetic subjects, and all his amatory pieces were composed in honour and praise of Otba, a female slave belonging to the Khalif Al-Mahdi, and to whom he appears to have been devotedly attached. He was born A.D. 747, and died A.D. 826.

Abu Nuwas was a poet of great celebrity. His father, Hani, was a soldier in the army of Marwan II., the last Omaiyide Khalif, and the poet was born in A.D. 762, some say in Damascus, others at Busra, and others at Al-Ahwaz. His mother apprenticed him to a grocer, and the boy became acquainted with the poet Abu Osama, who discovered his talent, and induced him to accompany him to Baghdad. There Abu Nuwas afterwards became celebrated as one of the chief bards at the court of the Khalif, and his most famous Kasida is that which he composed in praise of Amin, the son of Harun-ar-Rashid. According to the critics of his time, he was the greatest poet in Islam, as Amriolkais had been before that period. When Merzeban was asked which he considered the greater poet, Abu Nuwas or Rakashi, he replied, 'A curse of Abu Nuwas in h.e.l.l contains more poetry than a laudation of Rakashi's in paradise.' He was a favourite of Amin, whom his brother Mamun reproached for a.s.sociating with him, because Abu Nuwas enjoyed the reputation of being the greatest libertine of all the poets.

Sulaiman, the son of Al-Mansur, complained to the Khalif Amin that Abu Nuwas had insulted him with lampoons, and desired him to be punished with death; but Amin replied: 'Dear uncle, how can I order a man to be killed who has praised me in such beautiful verses?' and thereupon recited them.

Mamun, the son of Harun, states that he asked the great critic Yakut bin Sikkit to what poet he gave the preference. He replied: 'Among the pre-Islamite ones to Amriolkais and Al-Aasha, among the older Muslim poets to Jarir and Farazdak, and among the more recent to Abu Nuwas.'

Otbi, having been asked who was the greatest poet, replied; 'According to the opinion of the people, Amriolkais, but according to mine, Abu Nuwas.'

Al-Khasib, the chief of the revenue office in Egypt, once asked Abu Nuwas from what family he came. 'My talents,' replied he, 'stand me instead of n.o.ble birth,' and no further questions were asked him. He was a freethinker, who joked about the precepts of Islam. Once a Sunni and a Rafidhi desired him to be the umpire in their quarrel, as to who occupied the most exalted position after the Prophet. He said: 'A certain Yazid,' and on their asking who this Yazid might be, he replied: 'An excellent fellow, who presents me with a thousand dirhems every year.' He used to say that the wine of this world is better than that of the next; and, being asked for the reason, replied: 'This is a sample of the wine of paradise, and for a sample the best is always taken.'

Ismail bin Nubakht said: 'I never saw a man of more extensive learning than Abu Nuwas, nor one who, with a memory so richly furnished, possessed so few books. After his decease we searched his house, and could only find one book-cover containing a quire of paper, in which was a collection of rare expressions and grammatical observations.'

He died on the same day as the mystic Al-Kerkhi, whose corpse was accompanied to the grave by more than three hundred persons, but that of Abu Nuwas by not one. When, however, one of the three hundred exclaimed: 'Was not Abu Nuwas a Muslim? And why do none of the Muslims recite the funeral prayer over his body? all the three hundred who had a.s.sisted at the interment of Kerkhi recited the prayer also over the corpse of Abu Nuwas.

He is considered to have been an equally good narrator, scholar, and poet; and, being asked by Sulaiman bin Sehl what species of poetry he thought to be the best, replied: 'There are no poems on wine equal to my own, and to my amatory compositions all others must yield,' He used to boast that he knew by heart the poems of sixty poetesses, and among them those of Khansa and Leila, as also seven hundred Arjuzat, or poems in unshackled metre, by men. He said that he could compose nothing except when he was in a good humour, and in a shady garden. He often began a Kasida, put it away for several days, and then took it up again to rescind much of it.

According to Abu Amr, the three greatest poets in the description of wine are Aasha, Akhtal, and Abu Nuwas. Abu Hatim al Mekki often said that the deep meanings of thoughts were concealed underground until Abu Nuwas dug them out.

His end was tragic. Zonbor, the secretary, and Abu Nuwas were in the habit of composing lampoons against each other; whereon the former conceived the idea of propagating a satire against Ali, the son-in-law of the Prophet, in the name of Abu Nuwas; and this became the cause of his death. In an already half-drunken circle Zonbor recited the satire on Ali as the work of Abu Nuwas; on which all fell upon the poet, ripped open his belly, and pulled his entrails about till he expired.

Others a.s.sert that Ismail bin Abu Sehl administered a poisonous potion to Abu Nuwas, because he had composed a lampoon against him; but its operation was so slow that he died only four months after he had drunk it. His death took place at Baghdad in A.D. 810.

Al-Otbi was a poet of great celebrity, and taught traditions to the people of Baghdad; but was more generally noted for drinking wine and composing love verses about his beloved Otba. Being of the tribe of Koraish, and of the family of Omaya, he and his father held a high rank, and were regarded as accomplished scholars and elegant speakers, Otbi both composed and collected poems. One of his verses has now acquired the force of a proverb: 'When Sulaima saw me turn my eyes away--and I turn my glances away from all who resemble her--she said: "I once saw thee mad with love;" and I replied: "Youth is a madness of which old age is the cure."' He died in A.D. 842.