Author: Dalia Elramly

I was reading another article about Science and Islam during the Golden Ages and the author referred to Leonardo Da Vinci and his drawing of the Vitruvian Man and mentioned that Da Vinci said a man’s center was not at his navel but lower. As you may or may not know FIVE centuries earlier the Brothers of purity or Ikhwan Al Safa said the same thing. I wonder if the exhibition had that fact or is this another thing that Mr. Leonardo left out. On that note I personally loved the exhibition I love art galleries, I find them really fascinating and it actually made quiet a good conversation with one of my friends the other day. Hope you all enjoyed it! I came out of the gallery wishing that I knew how to read Italian. And Yes Muslim scientists are amazing and it’s sad that they weren’t credited but we can’t deny that western scientists discovered some pretty amazing things too. We shouldn’t (not saying that we do) glorify one civilisation over the other whether it be Islamic or European civilisation.

So today in Arabic class we were learning more words and their roots. Every word in Arabic is derived from a root and one of the words we learnt is توحيد (tawhid) which is derived from وحد (wahad). The word tawhid means to promote oneness and wahad means to unify. Then the teacher says a lot of Islamic art ex. The dome and patterns, are seen as symbol of tawhid in Islam. At that point I was confused and intrigued at the same time. I was like is she saying that Islamic art is unifying because it’s structural? Or what? at the same time I wanted to learn more about this because we talked about Islamic art in class. Unfortunately the fire alarm rang, disrupted our class and I couldn’t ask her to elaborate. So I’m like ok whatever I’ll just Google it when I get home. From what I found on the internet (which was not much and if any not very thorough) is that there is a unifying characteristic about Islamic art which the Qur’anic message of tawhid produced. One particular site talked about how Islamic art is the unifying of history and geography together because Islamic art is spread over a vast region reaching from Spain to Asia and going south to Africa and history through the different materials used from the span of the 7th century to modern day. As we all learnt and saw, Islamic Art had a geometric element to it. Another website said that this geometric pattern might have expressed “the logic and order inherent in the Islamic vision of the universe.” Also noting the importance of science especially the study of geometry and astronomy, this in turn may have “nourished the Arabic passion for creating infinite, decorative pattern” or going back to tawhid, this form pattern unified both art and science to create Islamic art. There are probably tons more explanations but I thought this “unification” was the most interesting, because I think this is what truly represents Islam.

So I said I would try to post the article that I had in my presentation because I found it interesting and somewhat relevant to our class. Taken from my human geography class it focuses more on the social and economic aspect of the world; Although this article does not concentrate on Science and Islam, this article sheds some light as to why the Muslim Golden Ages are forgotten and not given credit. The author, Janet Lippman Abu-Lughod, points out that “most western scholars began their histories in about 1400 A.D., just when both east and west were at their lows…. and when the organizational systems that had existed prior to this time had broken down.” By selecting to start history here a similar plot was written in which the West “rose” apparently out of nowhere. So what would happen to the narrative if one started a little earlier? The century between 1250 – 1350 A.D. clearly seemed to constitute a crucial turning point in world history. Before that “the strongest centres and circuits were located in the Middle East and Asia.” Especially the Middle east which linked the east and the west (Europe at this time) with its proximity to the Mediterranean and Indian Ocean. It’s true that much of Europe entered the period of the “dark ages” after the fall of the Roman Empire, but it wasn’t true for southern Europe, even parts of Italy prospered due to its proximity to the Mediterranean. Not to mention that the Iberian Peninsula was under Muslim rule and its economy was linked the Muslim world. The 9th century was a highpoint for the Middle East (under Abbasid rule) and in China (under the Tang Dynasty). I think it’s clear that the conception of the dark ages is wrong and there was a great Civilisation that existed outside European boundaries.
So why did the 13th century world system not simply persist and continue to grow? Why did the west rise when it did? Bank and System failures and recessions hit the economy hard. Not to mention Plagues, the well known Black Death and Bubonic plague broke out in the 1320s in a Mongol-patrolled area near the Himalayas. The plague moved to China, central Asia, Black Sea, Mediterranean and so on. As a result major centres of trade had experienced heavy die-offs and of course Political change started to occur. I guess you can say the dark ages hit us late. Although this explains a bit of reasons why the Islamic Civilisation collapsed I think that it’s played up a bit and probably the political change that occurred had more of an effect and also the invention, modernisation, capitalism, and colonialism that occurred by the European had more of an effect. I think that the Muslim world did not want to advance with the European methods and as a result Europe and the West started dominating.
Any thoughts on the reasons behind the decline?

So I was watching an interview about a Muslim scholar and I remembered the other day talking about well known Arabic scholars with some friends. I know that our class focuses on the science aspect of the Islamic Civilisation, but I think it is also very important to note and remember the importance of the literature during that time. Today Muslims around the world for the most part are seen as close minded people, who aren’t well read especially when it comes to philosophy. The Disney Aladdin and Pixar’s Sinbad would not exist without the existence of “One thousand and One nights.” This collection was compiled during the Islamic Golden Age and is a collection of Middle Eastern and South Asian stories and folk tales. The work as we have it was collected over many centuries by various authors, translators and scholars across the Middle East and North Africa. The tales themselves trace their roots back to ancient and medieval Arabic, Persian, Indian, Egyptian and Mesopotamian folklore and literature. We should not forget the literature of the golden ages; it inspired many Arabic and Muslim writers such as the noble prize winner Naguib Mahfouz in his book “Arabian Nights and Days.” In my opinion Muslim literature has not declined, there are many great writers and scholars today such as Tariq Ramadan, Naguib Mahfouz, Edward said, Burhan Galioun, Fahmi Huwaidi, Samir Amin and the list goes on. The problem isn’t that there is a decline in scholars and writers but a close minded mentality of today’s middle-eastern governments that ban these amazing writers.

Hey guys i found this interesting article on BBC news. The article is titled “chemists’ opt-out over beliefs: your comments.” This article talks about how some pharmacists in the UK are no longer giving out or supplying drugs that are seen as prohibited in their personal. Obviously the big opt-outs are morning-after pill and contraception. Is that fair for those who don’t believe in the same faith? This also leads me to think and wonder if the Islamic scientists ever discovered a scientific fact or thing (whether it be an invention, drug…) that conflicted with Islam. And if they did what did they do with it ? what about the pharmacy code of ethics, which states “make the care of patients your first concern”. Should one’s own personal beliefs impact the your advice to a patient? This is very closely tied with ethics you can say the same about abortions, transplants, etc. Enjoy the article its very short! Its mostly comments and they’re quite interesting!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8586937.stm
Dalia Elramly

I wrote about Şerafeddin Sabuncuoğlu a Turkish surgeon. Initially i wanted to delete all of what it had and just have my stuff but wiki wouldn’t let me so i posted my paragraph at the beginning because the previous person didn’t write much and what they wrote was plagiarised from another webpage.

So here is the link and the new links

OLD page: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%C5%9Eerafeddin_Sabuncuo%C4%9Flu&oldid=333347124

NEW page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Şerafeddin_Sabuncuoğlu

and this is what i posted:

Serafeddin Sabuncuoglu was born in 1385 and died in 1470 at the age of 85. He was not only the author but also calligrapher and graphic artist of this surgical textbook. He is best known for 3 scientific books: 1. Pharmacognosy, which is mainly a translation of Zahire-i Hazemsahi, but also added his own chapter. 2. Mucerrbname (the experiment book), 3. Cerrahiyyetu-i Haniyye “surgery of the imperial court.” He told his students “Keep your compassion separate from your fame and ambition.” ^[1] Born in Amasya, one of the ancient cities of central Anatolia, he was an Ottoman,Turkish surgeon and physician (doctor). He practiced 14 years in Amasya hospital. He is most famous for his surgical book “the earliest paediatric surgical atlas: Cerrahiye-i Ilhaniye.” He wrote the book in 1465 in Turkish. It contains pictures and diagrams of paediatric surgical procedures, trials and new techniques. The book contributed many vital and key information and presented several new ideas to surgical literature. His contributions were based from the Greek, Roman, Arabic and Turkish paediatric surgeries. The book includes 4 major parts: Cauterisation techniques, General surgery including paediatric and plastic surgery, Orthopaedics, and Medical preparations innovated by him (Sabuncuoglu). In his manuscript he illustrated and explained numerous surgical techniques, incisions and instruments. It included theoretical and practical points about paediatric surgery. He was one of the first surgeons to utilize and draw on various drainage techniques and materials for neurosurgical procedures in paediatric cases. He also mentioned the importance of the implications of haemorrhage during neurosurgical operations and supposed that contact of cerebrospinal fluid and blood was associated with a extremely lethal outcome. He was a immense advocator of a long post-operative drainage period for prevention of haematoma and infection. Serafeddin Sabuncuoglu was the first person to describe the classical position for gynaecological examination and pointed out the importance of female physicians rather than the midwives which was not at all the case with . There are 3 original handwritten copies of sabuncuoglu’s book two of which are found in the Istanbul in (the Istanbul national library of faith and the Capa Medical history department. The third copy is in Paris’s National library. ^[2] He lived in the 15th century in Amasya during the early period of the Ottoman Empire. He practiced medicine in Amasya Hospital and at the age of 80 wrote his book. He wrote the first Turkish medical text book. The book (Cerrahiye-i Ilhaniye) consisted of 3 chapters, 191 topics and 472 pages. None of the 3 copies that exist at the moment are complete and they all differ somewhat from one another. Serafeddin Sabuncuoglu operated through the human body well before the advance progress of the sterile technique and modern anaesthesia. He used mandrake root and almond oil for analgesia and general anaesthesia. He discusses surgical and operational anaesthesia and says some patients might resist the anaesthesia, in other words their bodies might reject it and the outcome might not be the same and so he suggest a narcotic medicine called murkid to be set for just in case. ^[3]

And here are my sources:

1. Sungur , Mukadder . “Anaesthesia and surgery in 15th century in Anatolia: Art and Illustrations of Serefeddin Sabuncuoglu .” Anestezjologia i Ratownictwo 3 (2009): 10-12.Anesthesiology and Rescue Medicine – Poland and the world . Web. 7 Mar. 2010.
2. Buyukunal, S. N. Cenk, and Nil Sari*. “MuslimHeritage.com – Topics.” MuslimHeritage.com – Discover 1000 Years of Missing History. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 Mar. 2010. <http://www.muslimheritage.com/topics/default.cfm?ArticleID=541>.
3. Basagaoglu, Ibrahim , S Karaca, and Ziya Salihoglu . “Anesthesia techniques in the fifteenth century by Serafeddin Sabuncuoglu .” Anesth Analg102 (2006): 1289-1290.anesthesia-analgesia . Web. 7 Mar. 2010.

serafeddin sabuncuoglu <– a surgeon guy