1001 Inventions: Muslim Heritage in Our World

Chief editor Professor Salim T.S. Al-Hassani

Plan

• Background to the book• Factual highlights – interesting tidbits• 30 mins talk• Q+A• Spiritual dimension• Personal conclusions• Feedback

• Science Museum Exhibition 2010

• Accompanying guide book

• High profile launch• Tony Blair holding book

in 2006

Realms of discovery

• Home – cleanliness, fine dining, three course menu, fashion and style

• School – Schools, libraries, Chemistry, Word power, translating knowledge

• Market – Farming manuals and ecological balance, raising water, commercial chemistry, Paper

• Hospital – Teaching Hospitals, blood circulation, Vaccination, Pharmacy

Realms of discovery

• Town – Arches, Vaults, Bookshops, Public Baths, Gardens

• World – Maps, Castles and keeps, Social science and Economy, Post and Mail

• Universe – Astronomy, Observatories

Cleanliness

• ‘Allah is beautiful and he loves beauty’ Prophet Mohammad – Muslim

• Soap made - mixing olive oil and al-qali, boiling and leaving to harden – used in hammams

• 13th Century manuscripts confirm multiple recipes

• Al-Zahrawi’s Al-Tasrif – chapter devoted to cosmetics – care and beautification of hair, teeth bleached, mouthwashes, incense to perfume clothes, hair removing creams, straightening lotions, suntan lotions

Cleanliness• Al-Kindi – Book of the Chemistry of Perfume and

Distillation - >100 recipes for oils/perfumed waters

• Processes and Ideas filtered into Europe – Haute Provence France where climate enabled establishment of perfume industry

• Henna as per the eg of the Prophet – modern science found it to be anti-bacterial, anti-fungal and anti-haemmorhagic

• Miswak – teeth – Swiss Pharmaceutical Pharba Basle – anti-bacterial/anti-inflammatory

Fine Dining

• Ziryab – 9th Century – Musician and Fashion designer – Iraq to Cordoba – trendsetter and celebrity of his time

• Melodious voice and dark complexion• Brought in tablecloths, drinking crystal, 3

course meals, summer and winter wardrobes/fashion industry, toothpaste, deodorant, short hair for men, chess and polo

House of Wisdom

• Baghdad 1200 years ago – thriving capital of Islamic world – cream of intellectuals, richest city in the world 2nd only to Constantinople

• House of Wisdom – Dar al-Hikmah hub of books and scholars of the sciences and arts

• Muslims first translated international works e.g. Aristotle, Plato, Hippocrates etc into Arabic – at a time when unknown to the West then built on it, conveying all eventually to the West

House of Wisdom

• Medieval brains of met daily to translate, debate and discuss – Arabic, lingua franca, Farsi, Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, Latin and Sanskrit all spoken

• Al-Kindi, Yuhanna ibn al-Bitriq al-Turjuman• Lead by Caliph al Ma’mun – who facilitated

discussion, wrote to other world leaders requesting their libraries etc – ‘Master of Arab Civilisation’

• Lead 332 higher institutions of learning!

Schools• Prophet Mohammad (pbuh) made the mosque

the main place of learning• First school appeared in Saudi Arabia – 653CE –

idea spread like wildfire then on• By late 9th Century every mosque had an

elementary school for boys and girls• Little distinction between religion and learning –

science and religion sat comfortably side by side• 4 categories of school devpd – regular schools,

‘high schools’, houses of Hadiths and medical schools

Schools

• Education free – Charitable donations - Waqf• Regular schools – commonest - corner of every

village i.e. Primary schools from 6-11• High schools – houses of readers – Taught Arabic

and Qur’an recital – trained Imams and Muezzins• Houses of hadith – gave degrees to work as

Friday lecturers/Khatibs• Medical schools – 1st established 1231 Damascus

(prior to this had been hospital apprenticeships)

‘It was this great liberality which they (the Muslims) displayed in educating their people in the schools which was one of the most potent factors in the brilliant and rapid growth of their civilisation. Education

was so universally diffused that it was said to be difficult to find a Muslim who could not read and write’

Educationalist EH Wilds

Libraries• Muslims produced books

from 8th Century – made paper

• Caliph al Ma’mun paid translators weight in gold of all translated Greek texts

• 36 libraries and >100 book dealers before Mongols decimated Baghdad 1258

• >100,000 volumes in the library on left at one point

Libraries

• Cataloguing systems• Reading rooms, lighting, seating and

mattresses• Borrowing allowed• Position of librarian reserved only for most

learned

Chemistry• Word chemistry derives from Arabic – kimia. Al-

kimia= Alchemy• Jabir ibn Hayyan, Mohammad ibn Zakariya al-

Razi, al-Kindi• Jabir=Geber – founder of Chemistry, lived in Kufa,

Iraq – devised and perfected Sublimation, Distillation, Crystallisation, Purification, Evaporation, Oxidation, Filtration etc

• Jabir – discovered sulphuric acid, nitric acid• Weighing scales, dyes, ink etc

‘The first essential in Chemistry is that you should perform practical work and conduct experiments, for he who performs not practical work nor makes experiments will never attain to the least degree of mastery’ - Jabir ibn Hayyan, Muslim Chemist (722-815 CE)

Chemistry

• Al-Razi/Rhazes – classified substances into animal, vegetable, mineral

• Wrote ‘Secret of the secrets’• Laid foundations of modern chemistry- set up

a lab with >20 instruments still in modern use e.g. Crucible, curcubit for distillation

• Al-Kindi – Book of the Chemistry of Perfume and distillations

Water management

• Muslims inherited ideas from previous civilisations and honed them further – system of qanats – underground water conduits from the Persians

• Water waste banned in Spain – strict rules, any disputes handled by special courts at the mosque every Thursday – ‘the tribunal of the waters’

• Pioneered running water – al Jazari 12th and 13th Centuries designed 5 water raising machines which pumped water

Al Jazari’s reciprocating pump

Paper

• 751CE Muslims acquired knowledge of paper making from Chinese

• Spread to Damascus – major suppliers to Europe• Originally hemp – better for the environment and

cheaper to produce• 800CE – Paper reached Egypt• 10th Century – earliest copy Qur’an on paper• 1309CE – first use of paper in England• Led to expansion of dye industry/calligraphy

Teaching Hospitals

• ‘Whosoever treats people without knowledge of Medicine becomes liable’ Prophet Mohammad – Al-Bukhari and Muslim

• Muslims had University Hospitals 800 years ago with lectures and bedside teaching e.g. Al Nuri Hospital Damascus founded in 12th Century

Surgery

• Al-Zahrawi – introduced new procedures and instruments many of which are still in use today

• Introduced catgut for stitching – only natural substance capable of being dissolved by body

• Tracheotomy, plaster casts, management of renal calculi, cosmetic surgery for sagging breasts

• Awareness of patient sensitivities – avoided putting patient through painful procedures, concealed knife to open abscesses

Other Underrated discoveries• Blood circulation• Ibn Nafis – 13th Century understood this far

ahead of William Harvey to whom it is attributed – 17th Century

• Vaccination• 1716-1718 Lady Montagu argues for vaccination

after hearing of Turkish methods of vaccine with cowpox

• 1796 – Edward Jenner hears of vaccination - ultimately given credit for the eventual eradication of Smallpox

Pharmacy

• 9th century – many existed as independent businesses in Baghdad

• 12th and 13th Centuries – pharmacies inspected periodically by government officials

• Al-Biruni wrote Book of Pharmcology• Al-Zahrawi used catgut to cover pills – 1st ever

capsules

Spiritual reflections

• Is there something intrinsic to Islam that encouraged such great discovery – the drive for knowledge, qur’anic challenges to man, hadith?

• Necessity the mother of invention• Setting the pleasure of Allah as your goal• How did the Muslims achieve such stability for

such a length of time?

Other reflections

• Immense level of civilisation totally unknown about in the West

• Inspiring period of history – can we derive lessons for our lives e.g. Sustainability, environment, simplicity