Vedic Knowledge in The Golden Age of Islam

By the light of an oil lamp, a turban clad man elegantly paints a letter onto a papyrus scroll. As his lines of Arabic script increase in length, it becomes clear he’s not just working on a simple story. Numbers, diagrams, and formulae are interspersed throughout the manuscript. Many words with strange appellations appear, along with detailed maps showing foreign terrain and lands to the East. Letting out a yawn, the man carefully rolls up the scroll and inserts it into a canister marked, ‘Kitab fi Tahqiq-i-Ma li’l-Hind’ (A Critical Study of Indian Doctrines). Putting out the light of his lamp, the writer retires for the night. The year is 1030 CE, and the Muslim scholar Abu Rayhan al-Biruni is recording his travels in India just prior to the Turkic invasion.

From the 8th century to the 11th century a vast Arabian empire flourished in the Middle East. This period was a renaissance of science, art, and invention now referred to as the Islamic Golden Age. It was during this time that many innovations such as the decimal system, algebra, trigonometry, surgery, and many other scientific contributions first appeared in the modern zeitgeist.

While Christian Europe remained in the dark in regards to astronomy, Arabic astronomers were making fine calculations of the globe’s precession, and the distance between the Earth and the Sun. As Medieval barbers were lancing boils and amputating limbs west of Hadrian’s wall, physicians were performing complex surgical procedures in Isfahān, Persia. While the rest of the world was using an abacus and tally marks to count, the Arabs were using a ten-based number system and mastering arithmetic. Technologically speaking, the Arabic world of the Middle Ages eclipsed Europe, a fact they proudly proclaimed to the world. This raises the question: where did they acquire such prolific knowledge?

In the folklore works of ‘One Thousand and One Nights’ (more popularly known as, ‘The Arabian Nights’), the colourful stories of ‘Aladdin’, and ‘Sinbad the Sailor’ are set in the Islamic Golden Age, and illustrate the sophistication of the Arabic world at that time. The stories contained within the collection are set in real places like the round city of Baghdad, and feature historical personalities such as the Abbasid emperor Harun al-Rashid, and his vizier Jā’far al-Barmaki.*

*In Disney’s major motion picture, ‘Aladdin’, Jā’far is fictionally cast as the film’s antagonist.

Jā’far belonged to an aristocratic family known as the Barmakids, who served in the royal court of the Abbasid Caliphate during its peak. The Barmakids originate from a historic city in Northern Afghanistan known as Balkh, and converted to Islam in the 7th century CE. The name Barmak actually comes from the Sanskrit name Paramaka (meaning superior), and refers to the title of the family’s patriarch and his elevated post in the Buddhist priesthood. Being well versed in Sanskrit and Vedic culture, the Barmakids played an integral role in bringing Indian sciences into the Arabic world.

Although not commonly known, the mountainous regions of Northern Afghanistan and Uzbekistan were at one time known as Gandhahara in Sanskrit, and belonged to the tract of land known as Bharata (ancient India). Gandhahara was distinguished for its high culture, and beautifully featured populace.*

*In the Epic of Mahabharata, it is told that Queen Gandhari, and her brother Shakuni come from Gandhahara.

Given its centralised location, the land of Gandhahara has changed hands many times throughout the ages. Twenty-five hundred years ago Gandhahara came under the Zoroastrian Empire of Cyrus the Great. During the conquest of Alexander of Macedon, Gandhahara became the capital of the Bactrian Greeks. During the reign of Buddhist Emperor Ashoka, Gandhahara was again brought under the control of the Mauryan Dynasty of India. In the third century CE the Sassanian Persians assumed rule over the region of Gandhahara and gave it a new name, ‘Khorāsān’.

Only twenty years after the death of Islam’s prophet Muhammad, the region of Khorāsān was converted to Islam after it was captured by the Umayyad Caliphate. A hundred years later into the mid 8th century CE, the Abbasid dynasty revolted against the Umayyads, and went on to establish one of the most prolific empires in known history, spanning eleven million square kilometres from the tip of Africa to the borders of modern day India.

It is critical to understand how important this region was to the Islamic Caliphate. Khorāsān had deep Vedic roots, Zoroastrian roots, Buddhist roots, and even Hellenistic roots. Khorāsān was a grand seat of learning at that time, and its libraries held many texts from these different cultures. Khorāsān occupied a key piece on the geopolitical chessboard, and it acted as a cultural crossroads between the Caliphate’s base in the West and India’s inestimable wealth which laid to the East. The next move of the Abbasids was in planting their centre in Arabian soil.

*When the Umayyads conquered the Sassanids between 632 and 654 CE numerous libraries were demolished and countless texts were lost.

One of the first ways the Abbasids established their legacy was by constructing the impressive ‘Madīnat al-Salām’, or what we know today as Baghdad, Iraq* as the home base of the empire. Not only was Baghdad strategically located at the intersection of many important trade routes, it was a marvel of engineering which featured the finest architectural designs found anywhere in the Middle East.

*Baghdad was also constructed only 90 km north of ancient Babylon.

The planning of Baghdad was exclusively carried out by Khalid al-Barmakid, the grandfather of Jā’far and first vizier to the Abbasid Empire. Although the Barmakids superficially converted to Islam, Khalid showed his true colours by laying out the design of Baghdad in the form of a Buddhist mandala.* He also brought numerous Indian scientists into Baghdad at this time, (notably the astronomer Kanaka) to begin the transmission of Vedic knowledge into the empire.

*Still today Baghdad is remembered as the ‘round city’.

In the late 8th century work began on the construction of ‘The House of Wisdom’ or Bayt al-Ḥikmah’, an impressive library/university which sat near the centre of Baghdad. For this ambitious project the Abbasids again sought the advice and patronage of the Barmakids – this time from Khalid’s eldest son Yahya. Yahya, who was himself educated in Arabic, Syrian, Farsi, and Sanskrit headed a team of scholars in the translation work of many ancient texts. After constructing a number of hospitals in Baghdad, Yahya posted Indian physicians to the hospital’s medical boards and paid emissaries to bring back native Indian plants to be used in the making of medicines.

The relationship between the Barmakids and the royal family was quite intimate. Yahya acted as a mentor and stand-in father figure for prince Harun al-Rashid, personally tutoring him in political science, as well as other subjects like history, poetry, and science. The third son of Yahya, Jā’far, grew up alongside the prince. The two were even nursed by the same mother.

As the caliphate of Harun al-Rashid rose to prominence, rulers as far West as Europe began to take notice. Notably, the Frankish emperor Charlemagne began a correspondence with the young emperor in 797 CE. It is recorded that Rashid once sent a mechanical water clock to Charlemagne as a gift. The clock was so complex that the attendants of Charlemagne were suspicious that witchcraft was involved, and tried to dissuade the king from allowing it into the castle.

The Abbasids inherited the ruling style of their ancestors, wherein kings depended on the guidance of an intellectual class for sound governance. This advice came not only in relation to military strategy, but also in providing ethical administration to the citizens, and detailed accounting of the caliphate’s resources. One anonymous 8th century poet praised the work of Yahya and his sons:

“Let the caliphate of Rashid be praised,
For he has drawn tight the reins of power.
He added a second reign to a first,
And this was due to Jā’far alone.
The sons of Barmak have established his dominion.
And made the throne secure for his heir.” (Mas’udi, pg. 108)

The Barmakids met a tragic fate when, in a single night, they and their supporters were arrested. Amidst rumours of heresy, Harun al-Rashid had Jā’far al-Barmakid executed and Yahya imprisoned for life. Approximately 2,000 members of the Barmakid family were killed, and their vast estates were seized. The exact reasons remain a subject for debate, but most historians agree that the Barmakids’ policies lost favour with the military. As Rashid’s succession was broken amongst his two sons, the empire began to fragment by the mid-8th century. Despite all of the turbulence, the House of Wisdom’s translation project carried on uninterrupted.

In the year 830 CE, an influential treatise on mathematics was released – ‘Kitab al-Jabr wa-I-Muqabala’ by the House of Wisdom’s head professor al-Khwarazmi.* This book, shortened to ‘al-Jabr’ became known later as algebra. Al-Khwarazmi’s book is considered the first literature to introduce the decimal system to the western world in the form of Arabic numerals. The word algorithm also comes from the name of the author.

*Khwarazm and Khorāsān are eponyms. al-Khwarazmi refers to the author’s origin from Khorāsān (Modern day Afghanistan/Iran).

Until only two hundred years ago, the origins of al-Khwarazmi’s mathematical ideas remained unknown to the western world. The mystery was cleared up when the earlier works of Indian astronomers Brahmagupta, and Bhāskara were rediscovered, revealing the exact formulas, equations, and theorems which al-Khwarazmi codified in his book.* Remarkably, the source materials for the works of Fibonacci, and even Pythagoras are now known to have originated in India.

*Brahmagupta lived from 598 – 668 CE, and Bhāskara I from 600 – 680 CE

Another icon who passed through Baghdad’s ‘House of Wisdom’ was the physician Abu Bakr al-Razi (865-925CE). Al-Razi’s book ‘Kitāb al-Ḥāwī fī al-ṭibb’ or ‘The Comprehensive Book on Medicine’ was written in the beginning of the 10th century and contains a survey of Greek, Syrian, and Indian medical knowledge collected in the library. In particular, ‘al-Hawi’ quotes extensively from the Sushruta and Charaka Samhitas.* These several thousand year old Vedic texts contain detailed information on subjects ranging from surgery to pharmacology. These works were among the first to be translated by Yahya and his team of scholars, and were practically demonstrated in Baghdad’s early hospitals.

*In 1030 CE the famous scholar al-Biruni also mentions these contributions in his book, Kitab fi Tahqiq-i-Ma li’l-Hind (A Critical Study of Indian Doctrines).

Possibly the most renowned scholar of the Islamic Golden Age was Avicenna or ‘Ibn Sina’ (980–1037 CE). Like the Barmakids, Avicenna’s paternal family originated from Balkh, Khorāsān. Being educated from an early age by his father,* Avicenna went on to become the advisor of several prominent monarchs, eventually establishing his own school in the city of Isfahān (modern day Iran). In his book, ‘al-Qānūn fī l-ṭibb’ (The Canon of Medicine) Avicenna builds upon the work of Abu Bakr al-Razi. Although Avicenna fails to give reference to India as the origin of the surgical arts, he nevertheless popularised the techniques learned from his predecessors, and was instrumental in passing that knowledge on to the western world. Avicenna’s books on medicine went on to be translated into European languages and used as standard college textbooks up until the 1650s.

*It is recorded that as a child, Avicenna’s father took him to an Indian grocer to learn arithmetic.

Though by the 10th Century the focus of Arabic scholars began to shift towards Greco-Roman culture and away from Vedic sciences, they remained keenly aware of the immensity of India’s scientific achievements. In his encyclopaedic work, ‘Book on the Category of Nations,’ another notable Islamic scholar Sa’id al-Andalusi wrote in 1068 CE:

“The first nation to have cultivated science is India. This is a powerful nation having a large population and a rich kingdom. India is known for the wisdom of its people. Over many centuries, all the kings of the past have recognised the ability of the Indians in all the branches of knowledge. The Indians are the essence of wisdom, the source of fairness and objectivity. They are peoples of sublime pensiveness, universal apologues, and useful and rare inventions.
That which has reached us from their work on numbers is al-Ghubar, which was simplified by Abü Ja‘far Muhammad ibn Miisa al-Khawarsmi. This method of calculating is the simplest, fastest, and easiest method to understand and use and has a remarkable structure. It is a testimony to the intelligence of the Indians, the clarity of their creativity, and the power of their inventiveness.
That which has reached us from the discoveries of their clear thinking and the marvels of their inventions is the game of chess. The Indians have, in the construction of its cells, its double numbers, its symbols and secrets, reached the forefront of knowledge. They have extracted its mysteries from supernatural forces. How the game is being played and its pieces are being manoeuvred, the beauty of structure and greatness of harmony appear. It demonstrates the manifestation of high intentions and noble deeds, as it provides various forms of warnings from enemies and points out ruses as well as ways to avoid dangers.” (Sa’id al-Andalusi, Kitab Tabaqat al-‘Umam 1068 CE)

Whether it be the Barmakids, al-Khwarazmi, al-Razi, Avicenna, or al-Biruni, they all came from lands steeped in cultural heritage. Thanks to the contributions of the Barmakids and the scholars they funded, many distinct elements of Vedic culture can be traced through the Islamic Golden Age. That knowledge and influence made its way westward during the Middle Ages, and helped dispel the heavy shroud of darkness which enveloped Europe at the time.

Today it’s hard to even fathom a world without the decimal system and basic arithmetic, what to speak of surgery, and the basic anatomical knowledge required to perform it. Simply put, without the transfer of these sciences to the western world, the lifestyle most of us take for granted wouldn’t exist. We can only imagine how much more wisdom is hidden in ancient India’s storehouse, if only a small kernel of mundane knowledge was able to accomplish so much.

References:

1. al-Azraq al-Kīmānī “Ahkbār al-Barāmkida wa-fadā’iluhum” (Historical accounts of the Barmaid family and their merits) by Ibn ‘Asākir
2. Kennedy, Hugh “The Barmakid Revolution in Islamic Government.” Charles Melville (ed). Pembroke Persian Papers: History of Literature in Iran.
3. Mas’udi. “The Meadows of Gold” Translated and Edited by Paul Lunde and Caroline Stone
4. al-Kwarazmi “Kitab al-Jabr wa-I-Muqabala” (The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing)
5. Abu Bakr al-Razi “Kitāb al-Ḥāwī fī al-ṭibb” (The Comprehensive Book on Medicine)
6. Henry Colebrooke “Algebra: With Arithmetic and Mesuration, From the Sanskrit of Brahmagupta and Bhaskara”
7. Avicenna “al Qānūn fī-tibb”, “The Canon of Medicine”
8. al-Biruni “Kitab fi Tahqiq-i-Ma li’l-Hind” (A Critical Study of Indian Doctines)
9. Sa’id al-Andalusi “Kitab Tabaqat al-‘Unam” (Encyclopedia on the Category of Nations)

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