subject: Post-Islamic Iran [print this page] If Iran's contribution to the world culture in the pre-Islamic phase is shrouded in the mist, its contribution in the Islamic period is quite clear. Unfortunately, as most of the Iranian scholars of the time accepted Arabic as the lingua franca of their scientific and philosophic works and thus wrote their books in Arabic, the legacy of Iran today, is at times erroneously attributed to the Arabs. But we have the word of many European scholars on this point who have demonstrated how grand and prolific the Iranian legacy has been. Italian scholar Aldo Mieli tells us that: "The principle part of Arab science of the Orient is created by the Persians. Without any possible contestation, in fact it is to Persia that belongs the best names of these greatest of Savants such as Razi, Avicenna and Biruni."
The late Professor Edward Browne says: "Take from what is generally called Arabian Science, from Exegesis, Tradition, Theology, Philosophy, Medicine, Lexicography, History, Biography, even Arabic Grammar, the work contributed by Persians and the best part is gone." As Professor Rene Grousset writes in L'Ame de l'Iran: "Iran enters in earnest into Islam and finds in it, Iran. Better still, it finds new means of action, a new emanation, because Islamisation of Iran had for its counter-attack, in a large measure, the penetration of Iranian spirit into vast sectors of the Islamic world. Besides, history is unanimous in recognizing the capital role that the Iranian thinkers, authors and artists as well as the Iranian administrators have played in the Abbassid civilization as much at the court of Arab Caliphs as at the courts of Turkish Sultanates."
Sir William Muir writes that: "With the rise of Persian influence, the roughness of Arab life was softened and there opened an era of culture, toleration and scientific research."
But unfortunately European scholars are traditionally in the habit of belittling the share of Iranian post-Islamic scholars in the independent research and speculation in theoretical matters. They only try to give these scholars the role of "transmitters" of Greek culture, philosophy, science and no more. However, this view is quite unfair and shows a bias of old standing. The true share of post-Islamic Iranian savants, in scientific development is really much more than "an intermediary and transmitter". These scientists and scholars not only improved the old scientific data by shrewd study, interpretation, experimentation and recalculation of the results found by the ancients, but they also broke fresh grounds and discovered new ideas by independent research and even created new sciences which were not extant in classical times.
AbuReyhan Mohammad Ibn Ahmad Biruni (973-1048 A.D.), one of the greatest scholars the world has ever known, shows in the following passage the broad-mindedness and the scientific maturity of the Iranian scholars of the Islamic period. He says: "...and I have truly done what every scientist is bound to do in respect to any particular science - that is, to accept gratefully the original contributions of my predecessors, to correct fearlessly the errors that came to my attention, and to preserve what I myself discover and to leave it as a record for the future generations that are to follow me."
On the Nebulae and the Milky-way, in 'Qanun Mas'oodi', a bookauthored by Biruni nearly 966 years ago, he remarks: "In the skies we have some objects not resembling the stars in their roundness and light. They are the white patches called the Nebulae. Some of these are considered to be composed of the clusters of the stars." Biruni disagreed with Aristotle and his supporters' opinion that the position of the Milky-way is below the sphere of the planets and rightly believed them to belong to the highest sphere of the stars. Similarly he had discarded the view held in Astrology and supported by Aristotle that the fixed stars injure the sight and cause sorrow and misfortune!! Biruni and his predecessors knew of Earth's center of gravity many centuries prior to Newton.
AbuBakr Mohammad Ibn Zakarya Razi (865-925 A.D.), also known as Rhazes, the greatest Iranian scientist of the early Islamic age tells us that: "Science and philosophy cannot accept complete surrender. Sheer copying of the sayings of the masters without regard for reason, and thus toleration is not allowed in these matters. A philosopher does not like his students to capitulate without questioning whatever he states." According to Dr. Max Meyerhof: "Rhazes was undoubtedly the greatest physician of the Islamic world and one of the greatest physicians of all times. He studied Medicine in Rey [near Tehran] and was acquainted with Greek, Persian and Indian Medicine." Razi was the frst surgeon who used alcohol as a disinfectant.
The most celebrated of his works is that on "measles and smallpox". This book was first translated into Latin and later into other languages including English. It was printed some forty times between 1498 and 1866. Razi also pioneered the use of sheep's intestines to sew up the skin with stitches. He was also the first to give an account of the cataract operation and was the first to describe the pupil's reflex to light.
Today in Chemistry, Razi is recognized and considered as the father of Modern Chemistry. We are told by H.E. Stapleton that: "We may safely claim that henceforth Razi must be accepted as one of the most remarkable seekers after knowledge that the world has ever seen...his Madkhal and Kitab-ol-Asrar will alone be sufficient to ensure for Razi a permanent and distinguished place in the history of scientific thought."
AbuAli Hoseyn Ibn Abdollah Sina (980 - 1037 A.D.) also known as Ibn Sina or Avicenna, was another great contribitor to the science of Chemistry by refuting the case of alchemists who thought baser metals could be converted into precious ones. His books and works on this subject were quoted by Albertus Magnus and later authors, for many years. Ibn Sina developed the theory of impetus. He discovered that in a void, once the impressed force caused a violent motion, the latter will persist indefinitely. Furthermore, he stated that bodies moving by a given power would travel inversely proportional to their weights and the bodies moving with a given velocity would travel distances directly proportional to their weights.
AbuNasr Mohammad Ibn Mohammad Farabi (874 - 950 A.D.) along with Ibn Sina added much to what the Greeks taught in the theory of Music. On the theory of the physical bases of sound, Iranians certainly made great advances, especially in the question of the spherical propagation of sound. Farabi was studied in Europe, and both him and Ibn Sina were quoted often on the treatises on Music that appeared in Europe up to the 17th century. Farabi also realized the importance of politics in the philosopher's search for truth about God, the universe, reality and man. He said that: "philosophy must aim at the perception of the Creator and the philosopher must strive to become in his actions like God." According to him, the end of man is happiness. This was a tenet of Zoroastrians and the Achaemenids, where it is stressed that: "Ahura Mazda - The all-knowing God created Man and created happiness for man." For Farabi, the central issue of politics was the highest good or hapiness of man.
In Mathematics, Iranian contributions are indeed execptional. In Algebra, Professor Aldo Mieli tells us that: "Al-Khwarazmi's book on Algebra has not only created the term 'algebra', and given it its actual meaning but has really inaugurated a new era in the science of mathematics even if we find some fore-runners in this type of calculation".
The late German Orientalist, Paul Luckey, tells us that Ghiyath-Oddin Kashani in his book 'Miftah-ol-Hissab' (the key of arithmatic), defined and used the decimal fractions 160 years before the Belgian mathematician Simon Stevin published his book in 1585 A.D. discussing the same notions.
In Trigonometry the contribution of Iranian mathematicians is monumental. In fact they developed and perfected both the Plane and the Spherical Trigonometry. Names of eminent Iranian scientists such as Abolvafa (940 - 998 A.D.), Battani and Khawjeh Nassir Tusi (1201 - 1273 A.D.) are quite conspicuous in this branch of science. The latter's book "Treatise on Quadrilateral" is considered as one of the most illuminating scientific books on spherical Trigonometry.
In Astronomy, Baron Carra de Vaux tells us that "whatever be the renown of the Orientals such as philosophers, physicians and alchemists, one can say that in no other branch of science, have they intermingled in the intellectual life of the Occidentals as they have done in astronomy". These scientists improved and perfected the Astronomical instruments. They have made some new and improved methods and made many new observations. They were keen researches who considered and discussed theories proposed by their predecessors with a critical mind. The science of astronomy was indeed enriched by their works. Walter Fischel tells us that the calendar devised by the well-known Iranian philosopher and mathematician of the 11th century A.D., Omar Khayyam, may have been more accurate than the Gregorian one designed 5 centuries later.
It was through Tusi's effort that the building of an observatory as an independent institution came to be recognized. The Observatories in which the Danish and the German astronomers, Tycho Brahe and Johannes Kepler worked in the 16th century A.D. were a direct continuation of the Maragheh Observatory (in Northwestern Iran), built 3 centuries earlier. It was through Khawjeh Nassir Tusi's effort and speculative insight that the "Tusi Couple" was discovered. Tusi's revolutionary invention has been the basis for all the computations made by Copernicus, Galileo and other European Astronomers up to the advent of Kepler.
In many other branches, Iranian scientists observed new facts and by registering them helped to create the nucleus for new sciences. Biruni is considered by many, the founder of the science of Geodesy. He was the forerunner of the English economist Thomas Malthus on the latter's theory of population, for about 800 years. Iranian scientist and mystics were not bashful to talk about the origin of species and the theory of evolution even in the early Islamic period.
Iran was for several millennia an enormous civilizing force in the greater part of Asia, Africa and Europe. In later years, it imposed its cultural influence through the Saljuqs and the Ottoman Sultans in Eastern Europe. The late British historian, Professor Arnold Toynbee, tells us that the Ottoman Emperors up to the advent of Shah Ismail (the founder of the Safavid Dynasty), looked to Iran for intellectual light and guidance. According to him: "The territories which were conquered from the Orthodox Christendom by the Saljuqs and the Osmanlis, were a kind of Colonial extension of the Iranic world and, the representatives of the Iranic Society in these partibus infidelim, like its representatives in Hindustan, depended for the maintenance of their culture upon a steady flow of arts, ideas, and of immigrants to import them from the homelands of the Iranic civilization in Iran itself." The same was true of Transoxania. Mongol India was completely under the charm of the radiating Iranian culture. As Dr. Percival Spear says in his History of India: "Persian tastes, ideas and attitudes are so imbedded in North India that they are often thought to be local products."
Even in the Safavid times, Iranians never abandoned their special love of sciences. Jean Chardin, who came to Iran in the early 17th century, tells us that: "The Persians love and honor the scientists and those who study the sciences to such an extent that one can easily say that their dominant taste is the respect and study of the sciences. They give it the entire span of their lives, their marriage, number of children, their professional obligations, even poverty cannot dissuade them from its persuance..."
The obscurant and despotic rule of the mullahs and the catastrophies they have brought upon the benevolent people of Iran will indeed someday come to an end. Sooner, if we dispose of such paltry prescriptions like the emergence of an "Ayatollah Gorbachev"and/or a futal search for moderate elements in an outlaw regime. Nonetheless, the kindhearted, peace-loving people of Iran, namely, the primary victims of the current anti-Iranian regime, ought to receive the full moral and political support of the world community and indeed not be the brunt of remarks of the "rogue"and "terrorist" genre. Simply said, in a nation where cultural tolerance, noble thoughts, deeds and speech have been promoted, practiced and propagated for several millennia, the 'current regime' in Iran, represents nothing other than a cancerous phenomenon.
