A is for Arabs
From algebra and coffee to guitars, optics and universities -- an
alphabetical reminder of what the West owes to the People of the
Crescent Moon.
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By George Rafael
Jan. 8, 2002 |
Even before Sept. 11 forced the West to face the cultural friction
between it and the Arab/Islamic world, there was an unwarranted sense of
superiority. The renowned Italian journalist and interviewer Oriana
Fallaci wrote Arab culture off as a few interesting architectural
flourishes and the Quran. Apparently, it's easy to forget that history
is cyclical and the roles were once reversed. A millennium ago, while
the West was shrouded in darkness, Islam enjoyed a golden age. Lighting
in the streets of Cordoba when London was a barbarous pit; religious
tolerance in Toledo while pogroms raged from York to Vienna. As
custodians of our classical legacy, Arabs were midwives to our
Renaissance. Their influence, however alien it might seem, has always
been with us, whether it's a cup of steaming hot Joe or the algorithms
in computer programs. A little magnanimity is called for.
A is for algebra
From "al-jabr," Arabic for "restoration," itself a
transliteration of a Latin term, and just one of many contributions Arab
mathematicians have made to the "Queen of Sciences." Al-Khwarizmi
(c.780-c.850), the chief librarian of the observatory, research center
and library called the House of Wisdom in Baghdad, was the man
responsible for making my life miserable at school. The motivation
behind his treatise, "Hisab al-jabr w'al-muqabala"
("Calculation by Restoration and Reduction": widely used up to
the 17th century), which covers linear and quadratic equations, was to
solve trade imbalances, inheritance questions and problems arising from
land surveyance and allocation. In passing, he also introduced into
common usage our present numerical system, which replaced the old,
cumbersome Roman one. Al-Karaji of Baghdad (953-c.1029), founder of a
highly influential school of algebraic thought, defined higher powers
and their reciprocals in his "al-Fakhri" and showed how to
find their products. He also looked at polynomials and gave the rule for
expanding a binomial, anticipating Pascal's triangle by more than six
centuries. Arab syntheses of Babylonian, Indian and Greek concepts also
led to important developments in arithmetic, trigonometry (the
algorithm, for instance, thanks to al-Khwarizmi) and spherical geometry.
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B is for backgammon
Sheshbesh is what it's called in Beirut and Cairo, whence the savviest
players hail. Although this beautiful waste of time dates back to the
pharaohs, the form we enjoy today came to us via Moorish Spain in the
10th century. Ghioul and moultezim are two other variants of "the
game of kings," popular wherever the happy hookah is indulged.
C is for cough medicine
Necessity being the mother of invention, the Arabs were the first to
distill water, for long journeys across areas (such as the Sahara) where
supplies were uncertain. Their experiments with various chemical
compounds also gave us ethanol alcohol, sulfuric acid, ammonia (have you
ever noticed the uncanny resemblance between Mr. Clean and the genie in
"Thief of Baghdad"?) and mercury. In applied chemistry they
discovered better and more efficient ways for tanning leather and
forging metals. Messing around with mortars and pestles produced
camphor, pomades and syrups.
D is for Dante
Her countryman Silvio Berlusconi echoed Fallaci's ill-spoken sentiments
that, on the whole, Western civilization was superior to that of Islam.
She said she was quite happy with Dante, thank you very much. She spoke
too soon. Though the theory has long incited fierce debate, Dante may
have been acquainted with "ascension literature," a
fantastical literary genre that deals with Mohammed's ascent to Heaven
(using a spiraling, magical ladder; ascension literature is still
popular in the Middle East and Africa). Dante was undoubtedly acquainted
with Avicenna and Averroes ("who made the great commentary"),
assigned as they are to that benign circle of the Inferno reserved for
pagan and non-Christian worthies known as Limbo.
Moreover, according to the dean of Arabic
literary studies, the formidable Robert Irwin, "a full
understanding of the writings of Voltaire, Dickens, Melville, Proust and
Borges, or indeed of the origins of science fiction, is impossible
without some familiarity with the stories of the Arabian Nights."
Aladdin, Sinbad the Sailor, Ali Baba and Scheherazade, archetypes each
and every one, are honorary members of the Western canon. The mock,
allegorical travelogues and cautionary tales of Montesquieu, Voltaire,
Johnson and other 18th-century writers and philosophes, are
inconceivable without the garrulous, wayward conceits of "The
Arabian Nights." They're detectable as well in the parodic chivalry
of Don Quixote and in Calvino's postmodern children's fable "Marcovaldo."
E is for equestrian
Although the ancestors of Mr. Ed and Secretariat probably originated in
Central Asia (with the "Heavenly Horses" of the King of
Ferghana), our equine friends were first bred for speed in the desert
sands of the Empty Quarter. Arab historian al-Kelbi (c. 786) traced the
Arabian to the pedigreed horses of Bax, great-great-great grandson of
Noah. The conquest of the Arabian Peninsula, North Africa and Spain was
due in no small part to the aptly named beast (and the indefatigable
camel), mount of choice for the tribesmen who swept all in their path.
The descendents of these terrible swift steeds were brought to the New
World by the Conquistadors, to devastating effect, particularly in
ancient Peru where the Incas mistook the horsemen for gods. (By the time
they learned the truth it was too late.) Appropriately enough, the
largest and most successful stable today belongs to Sheikh Maktoum of
Dubai.
F is for Fitzgerald
Edward, translator of that beloved chestnut of yore, "The Rubáiyát
of Omar Khayyám" (a jug of wine, a loaf of bread -- and thou). My
concern here, of course, is not with Fitzgerald, nice duffer though he
was, but with Khayyám himself (1048-1131) -- gifted physician, Persian
bard and geometer extraordinaire. In his seminal "Algebra" he
attempted a fusion of algebraic and geometric methods, discussing the
solution of cubic equations by geometric means, anticipating analytical
geometry. (Descartes took up this thread 500 years later, though it's
unlikely he knew Khayyám's work.) Khayyám also dabbled in astronomy,
his lunar calculations leading him to reform the calendar in 1079 (there
are references to this throughout the Rubáiyát). Furthermore, Islamic
astronomers invented the pendulum, improved upon the sundial,
prognosticated the existence of sunspots and studied eclipses and
comets. And al-Biruni calculated the length of the solar year to within
24 seconds and discussed the earth's rotation on its axis -- 500 years
before Galileo. Arabian and Islamic astronomers also constructed the
first observatories, in Toledo, Cordoba, Baghdad and Cairo.
G is for guitar
If the Moors had known they would be responsible for the spectacle of
Mick Jagger shaking his scrawny ass onstage into his late 50s, they
might have thought twice about schlepping the early prototypes of the
instruments that make up the typical rock band to Spain and Southern
Italy. Percussion in the form of cymbals and timpani, bowed instruments,
the lute (from "al-ud," the wood; see "The Buena Vista
Social Club" for more), the Spanish guitar (or guitarra morisca as
it was originally called 800 years ago), the zither (brought west from
Greece), the dulcimer began keeping the neighbors awake as early as the
9th century. There's also that unique Near Eastern sound and rhythm,
which, aside from early Spanish music, made itself felt in 18th-century
classical music, most famously in Mozart's "The Abduction from the
Seraglio." (Turkish things were so "in" then. Witness all
those wonderfully exotic 18th-century Venetian scenes by Longhi and
Reynolds' costumed, turbaned toffs.) Miles Davis accented the
"Oriental," Near Eastern strain in his "Sketches of
Spain." The godfather of world music, Davis incorporated Middle
Eastern elements into his fusion of jazz and rock in the late '60s and
'70s. Nowadays nobody thinks twice about such hybridization.
H is for "Havi"
Expanding on the legacy of the Greek physician and philosopher Galen was
Rhazes (c. 865-c. 930), the greatest doctor of the Middle Ages. His
extensive medical treatise in nine volumes, "Havi" ("The
Virtuous Life"), was used as a textbook in the Sorbonne as late as
1395. In addition to case studies and clinical reports that still have
anecdotal interest, Rhazes also wrote a celebrated monograph on
smallpox. (Knock wood.)
"The Book of Healing," by the
Persian physician and philosopher Avicenna (980-1037), is a masterwork
on hygiene and therapeutics that was used as a reference well into the
16th century. With Averroes (1126-1198), the Andalusian physician and
philosopher, Arabian medicine attained its peak. Muslim surgeons in the
11th century knew how to treat cataracts and internal hemorrhaging, and
they pioneered the usage of anesthetics, which they derived from herbs.
Arabian hospitals anticipated our modern ones in combining teaching
facilities and libraries, and in offering specializations such as
internal medicine, opthamology, orthopedics and pharmacology (on the
last, Ibn al-Bayter, who died in 1248, described 1,400 different
medicines of vegetable and mineral origin alone). They also set
standards for cleanliness and hygiene that in the West shamefully
weren't met till the 19th century.
I is for Ibn Khaldun of Tunis
(1332-1406)
He invented the scientific study of history (and, indirectly it could be
argued, sociology) centuries before the French Enlightenment, Hegel,
Weber and Braudel. His "Muqaddimah" ("The
Prolegomena"), the introduction to a general survey of Islamic
history with a specific focus on North Africa, was begun in 1377 and
updated several times to account for sociopolitical changes. In it, he
attempts to order the raw material and outward phenomena of history
under basic principles.
"Wise and ignorant are at one in
appreciating history, since in its external aspect it is no more than
narratives telling us how circumstances revolutionize the affairs of
men, but in its internal aspect it involves an accurate perception of
the causes and origins of phenomena. For this reason it is based on and
deeply rooted in philosophy, worthy to be reckoned among its branches.
"Human society in its various
manifestations shows certain inherent features by which all narratives
must be controlled ... The historian who relies solely upon tradition
and who has no thorough understanding of the principles governing the
normal course of events, the fundamental rules of the art of government,
the nature of civilization and the characteristics of human society is
seldom secure against straying from the highway of truth ... All
traditional narratives must invariably be referred back to general
principles and controlled by reference to fundamental rules."
Of Olympian detachment, Ibn Khaldun was
less prone than most historians, then and now, to fiddle the books and
force facts to fit preconceived theories. He saw that the course of
history is governed by the balance of two forces, which for him were the
nomadic and the settled life. He identified history with civilization
and, having established this theory, expounded in minute detail upon
civilization in all its religious, administrative, economic, artistic
and scientific layers.
Ibn Khaldun briefly made headlines in the
early 1980s, when President Reagan quoted him in a speech. His name
mystified the White House press corps, driving them to their
encyclopedias to bone up on this Ibn guy; within hours they were
speaking knowledgeably of him. As an undergraduate at the time, I was
taking a yearlong seminar entitled "Oriental Humanities." One
of our assigned texts in the Arabian section was "Muqqadimah."
Professor Meskill, an old China hand, informed us of the Great
Communicator's "erudition." We all had a good laugh.
J is for jihad
This word, which has been misinterpreted as "religious war"
but really means "an effort" or "striving," is one
of many Arabic words that have entered the English language. Besides
mullah and ayatollah, which have also acquired pejorative connotations,
a partial list of Arabic words or derivatives thereof includes: alcohol,
orange, coffee, sofa, caravan, tariff (from Tarifa -- the village
through which the Moors invaded Spain, near Gibraltar), citrus, lemon,
alembic, algebra, chess, sugar, cataract, magazine, seraphim, arsenal
(also the name of a London soccer club, Osama bin Laden's favorite,
appropriately enough), apricot, sandal, Satan (from "Shaitan,"
the Evil One), rice (from "al-ruzz"), sherbet and sorbet,
talisman, artichoke, rack (from "arrack," perspiration, also
the name of the fiery spirit, raqi; wrack your brains on that one),
almanac, alcove, albatross (from "al-kadas," which the
Portuguese corrupted into "alcatraz"; now what would the
author of "Kubla Khan" make of that?), castle (from
"alcazar"), albacore, Abyssinia, ginger, ghoul, zircon (from
which we derive "jargon," one being a mixture of stones, the
other of tongues), banana (from "banan," finger or toes),
nadir, zenith, cipher, zero and monsoon (from "mausim," or
season).
K is for kebab
Next time you're munching on a Nathans, or, in my case, disputing the
nutritional value of chorizo with the missus, you have the Moor to
thank. Cured meats and sausages and the humble kebab, usually lamb or
beef (never pork), were among the culinary delights that came to Europe
via Islamic Spain. Likewise the hotter spices and spicier condiments.
The Moors were also the first to crystallize sugar (which they also
brought to Europe).
L is for latte
As you sip one of those wimpy, froufrou confections in Starbucks, think
about this: Arabica. Yes, the humble coffee bean. First cultivated and
brewed as rocket fuel by Yemeni tribesman way back when -- though it's
disputed whether the beans were transplanted from Abyssinia (Ethiopia)
to the Arabian Peninsula or whether it was the other way around. As an
afterthought, we might not now have this plague of Starbucks and chi-chi
cafes were it not for the Ottoman Turks, the Viennese getting the clever
idea of the coffeehouse from them in the late 17th century.
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M is for mosque
Funny, thinking about what Oriana Fallaci said earlier, the
architectural flourish commonly attributed to the Moors, the curved
arch, was actually copied from the Visigoths in Spain. Byzantine art and
architecture, above all the Hagia Sophia in what was then
Constantinople, had a profound influence on Islamic builders and
artisans. However, it's the humble church steeple (via the mighty
cathedral tower) that has an Islamic antecedent, the minaret.
N is for navigation
Without Arabian improvements upon the compass, the astrolabe, nautical
maps and seaworthy lanterns, Magellan, Cabot, Vasco da Gama, Columbus,
et al., might have had trouble pulling anchor and leaving port. The
Arabs also pioneered the usage of hydraulic presses and water clocks,
which tracked the passage of time and phases of the moon.
O is for optics
The concept of camera obscura, which is indispensable to the later
development of photography, was first suggested in "The Treatise on
Optics," by Hassan Ali Aitan (963-1009).
P is for paradise
Consider the varieties of roses -- the damask and the gallica, to name
the two most common -- brought to Europe through Spain and Southern
Italy by the Moor. Perhaps a rose is a rose is a rose, but what
signifies here is where they're planted, and to Islamic sages and poets,
gardens were symbolic of the paradise to come, a "blue green"
paradise, blue for water, naturally, and green for greenery. The word
"paradise" is of Persian origin ("paradaeza"); it
literally means garden. Paradise as a garden or pleasure ground with
swaying houris (heavenly handmaidens), the one that's promised to good
male Muslims, figures heavily in the Quran, in contrast to Genesis where
the Garden of Eden is a paradise lost. (And there are no houris in the
Old Testament and definitely none in the New; is it any wonder Islam won
so many converts?)
Q is for Qasim
Can you name the mystical Sufi poet who inspired Spiritual Girl Madonna
to whirl like a dervish in "Speed of Light"? The one who is
beloved by Demi Moore, quoted by Deepak Chopra and read by New Age
ninnies from Beverly Hills to Notting Hill? (None of this, incidentally,
should be held against him.) A Persian of Greek descent, who's up there
in the Persian pantheon with Attar, Firdausi, Hafiz, Khayyam and Sadi?
OK, OK, you know already: It's Jalad'din , but actually before him there
was another, more carnal Rumi. Ibn al-Rumi (836-896) was an expansive,
unforgettable, larger than life figure, Walt Whitman and Dylan Thomas
rolled into one. He was magnificently ugly, unkempt and unwashed,
pugnacious and ferociously sarcastic ("Those who kiss ass shouldn't
complain of wind"), promiscuous, gluttonous, bibulous, blasphemous
and irredeemably bohemian -- and he wondered why he couldn't get a
position at court. And Qasim, you ask? He was the Caliph's vizier, who,
fearful of the poet's wicked tongue, graciously poisoned him at supper.
Rumi, though, had the last laugh. Upon quaffing the fatal potion and
having a good burp, Rumi rose to leave. Qasim asked where he was off to,
and Rumi replied he was going where the vizier had sent him. "In
that case, convey my greetings to my father," Qasim said, thinking
himself very witty. "I am not going to the fires of hell,"
Rumi replied. (Well, I needed something for Q.)
R is for religious tolerance and
racial equality
Yes, hard as that might be for some to believe, Islam was the first
major religion, certainly the first monotheistic one, to practice
religious tolerance. Not that Muslim tribesmen didn't put to the sword
those who refused to convert -- they committed their fair share of
well-documented massacres early on -- but military success came so
swiftly to them and on such a vast scale, that they found themselves
burdened with an empire, and needed all the help they could get from
their cleverer subjects to run it. They were, after all, warriors, not
administrators. As rulers they were lenient, even generous (unlike the
Germanic tribes that ravaged the late Roman Empire). Besides, Jews and
Christians were "People of the Book" -- Islam borrowed much
from its elders; Abraham, Moses and Christ are recognized prophets in
the Koran -- and as long as they paid their tithe to the Caliph and kept
out of trouble, they were free to do as they wished (the Zoroastrians in
Persia were treated in similar fashion). "Holy Toledo," the
meeting point of the three great religions, became a model of religious
tolerance and harmony -- an idyll that ended when the Christian kings of
the north recaptured it in 1085. (Until the rise of Holland in the 17th
century, if you were Jewish it was generally better for your overall
health and well-being to live in Muslim lands such as North Africa, the
Levant or Turkey than almost anywhere in Christendom, particularly those
places where Catholicism prevailed. French missionaries are to blame for
introducing the virus of anti-Semitism to the Middle East in the 19th
century.) Of the three great thinkers who flourished under Islamic rule,
one was non-Muslim, Maimonides of Cordoba (1135-1204), author of
"The Guide for the Perplexed," who was Jewish. Like Avicenna
and his fellow Cordoban, Averroes, Maimonides attempted to reconcile
Aristotelian philosophy with religious belief. He died in Alexandria,
where he founded the great synagogue.
Regarding race, Islam is colorblind,
which came as a surprise to Malcolm X on his pilgrimage to Mecca, where
he found himself worshipping alongside blond-haired, blue-eyed white
devils. Unlike Christianity, which justified racial slavery (blacks were
inferior, less than human and so forth) by citing Ham in the Old
Testament, Islam emphasized the equality of man before the eyes of God,
whether black or white, rich or poor, man or woman. But, as we all know,
what is preached isn't necessarily what is practiced. The cruel irony of
Malcolm X's revelation, which challenged his ideas and changed the
course of his life, was that he had it in a country that didn't abolish
slavery until 1973. (Slavery exists today, despite claims to the
contrary, in Mauritania and in the Sudan, both Muslim nations, the
latter a fundamentalist state that has prosecuted a genocidal war
against its southern, African half for more than 20 years. None of this,
of course, was brought up at the United Nations conference on slavery in
September.) And although the British, Dutch and Portuguese dominated the
Atlantic slave trade in Caryl Philips' "Atlantic Sound," the
Arabs held a firm whip hand in East Africa, built entire ports and
cities devoted solely to that very profitable end, and played a
significant role as middlemen throughout the continent. Still, it is
good to know that Islam is colorblind.
S is for shatranj
Although modern chess originated in Northern India in the 7th century
A.D., where it was called chaturanga, it was introduced to Spain and
Sicily a century later by Moorish invaders and Saracen traders. Shatranj,
which means "king's game" (shah tranj), differs slightly from
the game we know today, in that instead of a queen there was a firzan,
and in place of the bishop there was a fil (of course). The game was
slower, with pawns allowed to advance but one square in the opening and
no castling allowed. Victory came from checkmate (from the Persian,
"Shah mat," the King is lost or helpless), stalemate or a
"bare king" (the king alone, like Richard III at Bosworth
Field). Some caliphs played "living chess" -- human pieces,
slaves or prisoners -- the downside for the participants being possible
decapitation if one was captured. As depicted by the Elizabethan
playwright Christopher Marlowe, Tamburlaine -- in real life infamous for
the Sack of Baghdad in which a million people died -- was fond of this
pastime.
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T is for turban
Let's face it, the turban, the burnoose, that wild and crazy Arafat
thingy the college kids love to wear, whatever you wish to call it, is a
brilliant fashion accessory. Imagine Edith Sitwell, Audrey Hepburn or
David Hume without theirs; you can't, can you? With a little bit of
water moistened about the inside you have a portable air conditioner.
The turban was an early instance of form following function, though I
have a feeling Sitwell, Hepburn and Hume were unaware of all this.
Speaking of turbans, you need the right setting for one, too, something
out of an odalisque by Ingres or Matisse: muslin, damask, chintz to
cover sofas and pillows -- Moorish appurtenances on which to seat your
little keester and to rest your weary head -- while being fanned by
eunuchs, of course.
U is for university
The concept of the university originated with the madrassas, which were
centers devoted to religious instruction, as they are in considerably
less cosmopolitan forms in Muslim nations today. The first madrassas in
Spain, in Malaga, Zaragoza and Cordoba, which later evolved into
universities, started in the 11th century. The foundation of Damascus
University dates back to the 8th century.
V is for venetian glass
Venetian glass blowers, famed for their miraculously intricate and
delicate creations, learned their secrets from the Arabs (and went on to
monopolize the glass trade for centuries). Islamic artisans and
craftsmen, renowned for their ceramics, armory and masonry, made a deep
impression on their Spanish, French and Italian counterparts. One could
easily compose an alphabet of objects, decorative and otherwise, from
Aubusson tapestries to the engravings on Zildjian cymbals, that bear
traces of Arabic and Islamic design and calligraphy.
W is for watermelon
This is just one of the many crops the Arabs introduced to the West.
Others include artichokes, rice, cotton, asparagus, oranges (from "naranj"),
lemons, limes, figs, dates, spinach and eggplants. Arab methods of
irrigation, which made the desert bloom, are still utilized today in
North Africa and the Iberian Peninsula, as are the wells and aqueducts
they built.
X is for Xenophon
Have you heard of him? Friend of Socrates and Plato, guest at the
Symposium, author of a treatise on horses (the Hippike), Xenophon, in
truth, was a bit of bore. Nevertheless, we're better off for knowing him
because of the company he kept. Aristotle was a special favorite of
Islamic scholars and thinkers such as Avicenna and Averroes,
particularly for his "Ethics." Much of what remains of the
Greek classics was salvaged, translated -- into classical Arabic,
Hebrew, Latin, Persian and vernacular languages such as Castillian --
and interpreted under the aegis of the Arabs, with non-Muslims,
anonymous scribes and great thinkers alike playing their parts (Maimonides
comes to mind). Contrary to popular belief, it was Christian fanatics
who sacked the Great Library of Alexandria (they followed up with a
pogrom), decades before Muhammad was born.
Y is for the yearning one (el
taleb)
Like Scotsmen and their kilts, there's more going on under those burqas
than you might think. El taleb, or "the yearning one," is one
of the 46 different kinds of vulvae described in the ninth chapter of
the Arabian equivalent of "The Kama Sutra," "The Perfumed
Garden of the Shaykh Nefzawi," translated by my favorite roaming
Brit (a very short list, that), the randy Sir Richard Burton. "This
vagina is met with in a few women only. With some it is natural; with
others it becomes what it is by long abstinence. It is burning for a
member, and having got one in its embrace, it refuses to part with it
until its fire is completely extinguished"; talk about vagina
monologues. (Note, fair ladies, there's a similar chapter on male
equipment.) Other chapters deal with the act of generation, with
praiseworthy men and women, with contemptible men and women, with
positions other than the missionary (mullah position, anyone?), with
arousal techniques, with impotence and sterility, with pregnancy, and so
on and so forth. In contrast to the early Christians, the Arabs had a
refreshing view of sex -- it was for pleasure, too, not just
procreation.
Z is for zero
From "zefira," or cipher. Nought, nothing, nil. What a
concept. Carried over from India to the West by the Arabs. Less than
zero? Well, you're getting into negative numbers there ...
