From: Thomas Hockey et al. (eds.). The Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers, Springer Reference. New York: Springer, 2007, pp. 42-43 |
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ʿĀmilī: Bahāʾ
al‐Dīn Muḥammad ibn Ḥusayn al‐ʿĀmilī
Behnaz Hashemipour
Born Baʿlabakk near Jabal al‐ʿĀmilī, (Lebanon), 18 February 1547
Died Isfahan, Iran,
1 September 1621
Bahāʾ
al‐Dīn Muḥammad ibn Ḥusayn al‐ʿĀmilī,
better known in Iran as Shaykh‐i Bahāʾī, was probably
the last scholar in the chain of universal and encyclopedic scholars that
Islamic civilization was still producing as late as the 16th century. A major
figure in the cultural revival of Safavid Iran, he wrote numerous works on
astronomy, mathematics, and religious sciences and was one of the very few
in the Islamic world to have propounded the possibility of the Earth's movement
prior to the spread of Copernican discoveries in astronomy.
Bahāʾī's
family came from the village of Jubaʿ near the coastal town
of Sidon in southern Lebanon, in the vicinity of Jabal ʿĀmil, whence his name. He was still a young boy when his whole
family, as part of a wave of Shīʿa
scholars, migrated to Iran to escape the persecutions of the Shiite Muslims
by the Ottomans.
Bahāʾī's
father, a prominent scholar with an impressive reputation, was well received
in the court of the Safavid monarch Shah Ṭahmāsb,
assuming the office of chief jurisconsult in the Safavid administration. Bahāʾī's
father takes the credit for Bahāʾī's early education, by virtue
of which he mastered the religious sciences. He further studied logic, philosophy,
mathematics, and astronomy under the most prominent scholars of the day, excelling
in these sciences as well.
Bahāʾī
soon rose to prominence in the Safavid court and was appointed to the office
of chief jurisconsult in the court of Shāh ʿAbbās
the Great. Nevertheless, court engagements and public duties never seem to
have deterred him from his scholarly activities, both as a teacher and as
a writer. He trained many students, some of whom became the most prominent
scholars of the period.
Bahāʾī
may be counted among the most prolific writers of Islamic civilization, having
written more than 100 treatises and books. His works cover a wide range of
subjects, from religious sciences to mathematics, astronomy, and the occult
sciences. In addition to these, he wrote a literary‐religio‐scientific
anthology known as Kashkūl, which, apart from its literary and
scientific merits, is of utmost importance in understanding the man and his
thoughts. Bahāʾī's Khulāṣat
al‐ḥisāb (Essentials of arithmetic),
was to become the most popular textbook throughout the Islamic lands from
Egypt to India until the 19th century. This book was translated into German
by G. H. F. Nesselmann and published in Berlin as early as 1843; a French
translation appeared in 1854.
Our sources
do not provide a definitive list of Bahāʾī's astronomical works.
However, he seems to have written as many as 17 tracts and books on astronomy
and related subjects, including a number of glosses and commentaries on the
works of past masters. He also wrote Risālah dar ḥall‐i
ishkāl‐i ʿuṭārid
wa qamar (Treatise on the problems
of the Moon and Mercury), in an attempt to find solutions to the inconsistencies
of the Ptolemaic system within the context of Islamic astronomy. In his summary
of theoretical astronomy entitled Tashrīḥ al‐aflāk (Anatomy
of the celestial spheres), he upholds the view of the positional rotation
of the Earth, arguing that no sufficient proof has been offered so far to
the contrary. In expressing this view, Bahāʾī stands out as
one of the very few Muslim scholars to have advocated the feasibility of the
Earth's rotation as early as the 16th century, this independent of Western
influences.
Since
no serious study of Bahāʾī's scientific works (especially those
related to astronomical fields) has been made so far, one cannot make a critical
assessment of his achievements and contributions in this area. Yet his works
clearly demonstrate the fact that he was a scholar with a critical and disciplined
mind. Furthermore, Bahāʾī's works demonstrate the clarity and
discipline of a mathematician's mind that is able to present scientific issues
in a simple and easy‐to‐understand manner.
A
number of architectural and engineering works have been attributed to Bahāʾī
as well, though none can be substantiated by the sources. He is credited with
the distribution of the waters of the Zayandeh‐Rud River through a complex
network of irrigation canals, based on a distribution map known as Bahāʾī's
scroll. Furthermore, according to a popular legend he engineered a heating
system for a public bath in Isfahan that drew all the energy needed for heating
the water and the bath itself from a single candle!
In
addition to his many‐faceted scientific capabilities, Bahāʾī
was a gifted poet and has bequeathed some very fine pieces of poetry, mostly
with mystical themes, which are still cherished by the public. Some of Bahāʾī's
works, particularly the Kashkūl, demonstrate very strong mystical
tendencies of the author. He spent part of his life traveling in Ottoman territories,
which brought him into close contact with prominent scholars of his time in
Aleppo, Damascus, Jerusalem, Cairo, and elsewhere. Brief reports of some of
these meetings and exchanges have been recorded in his Kashūkl.
Bahāʾī
was also famed for his works of charity, which had turned his home into a
shelter and refuge for orphans, widows, and the needy. Bahāʾī
has remained a very popular figure in public memory, and many anecdotes about
him have passed from generation to generation, some even attributing miraculous
acts to him. Bahāʾī died in Isfahan and his body was carried
to Mashhad (in northeast Iran) to be laid to rest in the shrine of Shiʿism's eighth
īmām, ʿAlī ibn Mūsā.
ʿAbbās, Dalāl (1995). Bahāʾ al‐Dīn
al‐ʿĀmilī: Adīb–an, Faqīh–an, ʿĀlim–an (Man
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al‐Ḥiwār.
ʿĀmilī, Bahāʾ al‐Dīn,
Sharḥ
Tashrīḥ
al‐aflāk (Commentary on Tashrīḥ
al‐aflāk). Tehran,
Majlis Library, MSS 3280 and 6345, Fols. 75–87 and 80–109.
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——— (1976). Mathematical Works, edited
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of Aleppo.
Bosworth, C. E. (1989). Bahāʾ
al‐Dīn al‐ʿĀmilī and His Literary Anthologies.
Journal of Semitic Studies, Monograph No. 10. Manchester: University of Manchester
Press.
Dhihnī Tehrānī, M. J. (1992). Tuḥfat al‐aḥbāb (A short Persian commentary on al‐ʿĀmilī's Tashrīh
al‐aflāk). Qum:
Ḥādhiq Publishing House.
Kohlberg, Etan
(1989). “Bahāʾ al‐Dīn ʿĀmilī.” In Encyclopaedia Iranica, edited by Ehsan Yarshater. Vol. 3, pp. 429–430. London: Routledge
and Kegan Paul.
Nafīsī, Saʿīd
(1982). Aḥwāl
wa ashʿār‐i fārsīy‐i
Shaykh‐i Bahāʾī
(The life and the Persian poetry of Shaykh‐i
Bahāʾī). Tehran: Nashr‐i
Chakāmeh.
Nasr, Seyyed Hossein (1976). Islamic
Science: An Illustrated Study. London: World of Islam Festival Publishing
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——— (1986). “Spiritual Movements,
Philosophy and Theology in the Safavid Period.”
In The Cambridge History of Iran. Vol. 6, The Timurid
and Safavid Periods, edited by Peter Jackson
and Laurence Lockhart, pp. 656–697. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Stewart, Devin J. (1990). “Review
of Bahāʾ al‐Dīn al‐ʿĀmilī and
His Literary Anthologies, by C. E. Bosworth.” Studia
Iranica 19: 275–282.
——— (1991). “A Biographical Notice
on Bahāʾ al‐Dīn
al‐ʿĀmilī (d.
1030/1621).” Journal of the American Oriental Society 111: 563–571.
——— (Spring 1996). “Taqiyyah as Performance: The Travels of Bahāʾ
al‐Dīn al‐ʿĀmilī in the
Ottoman Empire (991–93/1583–85).” Princeton Papers in Near Eastern Studies
4: 1–70. (Special issue on Law and Society in Islam.)
——— (Spring 1998). “The Lost Biography of Bahāʾ al‐Dīn
al‐ʿĀmilī
and the Reign of Shāh Ismāʿīl
II in Safavid Historiography.” Iranian
Studies 31, no. 2: 177–205.