desire and awe;
Muslim travelers circumambulated the lands and crossed the seas, so they measured the roads and paths, and suffered in the way of hardships and perils, then they told about the conditions of the kingdoms, their peoples and their cultures.
The travels of some of them were associated with political purposes, so they were ministers, postal workers, spies, and ambassadors. Some of them traveled for religious reasons such as Hajj and the spread of Islam, and others for purely commercial or scientific reasons.
And with writing their news;
The map of the globe expanded and illuminated its terrain, and historians, geographers, and cartographers transmitted the distances between countries and the conditions of the peoples residing in them.
Muslims roamed all the coasts of the Indian Ocean (the “Great Eastern Sea” as Ibn Khordadbeh called it, who died in 280 AH / 893 CE) from East Africa to the islands of Sila (perhaps the Korean Peninsula);
They fought the country of the Turks in the east and the Russians in the north, reaching Siberia ("the land of darkness" as Ibn Battuta called it, who died in 779 AH / 1377 CE).
They also toured the corners of Europe, which they used to call 'Urfi' (this is how Yaqut al-Hamawi, who died in 626 AH / 1229 CE - set it in the 'Dictionary of Countries' - and said: "This is how I found it in the handwriting of Abi al-Rayhan al-Biruni, accurate and verified." As for al-Masudi, who died in 346 AH / 957 CE, he made it - in ' Alert and supervision' - "Urfa", which is close in pronunciation to the current term 'Europe'), and they told about its inhabitants from the Galicians, the Franks, the Germans, the people of Britain, Austria and Hungary.
Perhaps they did not reach the far north of the continent, even if an ample amount of their currencies and money reached Sweden, Finland, Norway, Iceland, and others.
They also knew Africa - which they call 'Lobia' - its east, west, and center, and some of their cartographers drew its south;
Rather, some of them dared to wade into the "sea of darkness" (= the Atlantic) westward into the unknown, including the "deceived boys" whom Al-Masoudi mentioned in his book 'Meadows of Gold', and how they reached the Canary Islands in West Africa.
Among them - according to what Ibn Fadlallah al-Amri (d. 749 AH / 1348 CE) narrated in “Masalik al-Absar” - the Sultan of Mali Mansa Abu Bakr II (d. after 712 AH / 1312 CE), who relinquished the kingdom in the year 712 AH / 1312 CE to his brother Mansa Musa (d. 737 AH). 1336 AD) and sailed in the Atlantic Ocean with two thousand ships in search of the unknown in the West and did not return;
Did he arrive?
Did someone else arrive?
There are long debates about that between modern Muslim and Western historians, many of which are ill-advised.
This is not our topic. The literature of “The Journey”, “Trails and Kingdoms” and “Wonders” is broad literature that is not exhausted by lengths.
Rather, our topic is to deal with a specific cultural part in this broad literature, which is the knowledge and study of the "other".
What position did travelers and historians take when studying other peoples?
What is the method they followed?
And what pitfalls did they fall into?
And what did they achieve in terms of fairness or inclination?
Western Orientalism has been subjected to abundant criticism that affected its methodology, tools, and political function, and it is a valid criticism, although it could not obscure our eyes from the many fair efforts made by Orientalists with purely scientific and cognitive purposes.
But our question: To what degree were the errors of Orientalism specific to the West and not to others?
Doesn't every nation, a lady with imperial ambitions, fall into the tendency towards self-favoritism and belittling the other?
Then does it not seek to employ its knowledge of other nations in the service of its political, commercial and religious purposes?
I do not aspire to provide a definitive and adequate answer to these questions. Rather, all my intention is to touch them and refer to some of their chapters without presenting a comprehensive thesis.
The reason for this shortcoming is two things: we do not find a single systematic position between travelers and historians in their fairness or inclination;
Moreover, historians have taught us that the historical comparison between different eras is incorrect, due to the different formative conditions, political and economic structures, and the natures and aspirations of their states.
If it is necessary to compare, then let it be between those who were brought together in one era.
Openness and openness
There is no doubt that the universality of the Qur'an's message and its urging to get to know peoples and walk the land has contributed to making Muslim culture open to the other.
Muslims did not believe, like some Indians, “in the land that it is their land, in the people that they are their race, in the kings that they are their leaders, in the religion that it is their bee, and in the knowledge that it is with them, so they will be exalted. knowledge other than theirs, to the extent that if they were told of knowledge or a scholar in Khorasan or Persia, they ignored the informer and did not believe him.”
As Al-Biruni says in his book, “Achieving what India has of a saying that is acceptable in reason or rejected.” Rather, they saw in wisdom their straying wherever they found it, so they were more deserving of it.
However, another objective factor contributed to this openness, which is the commercial orientation that the Arabs knew in ancient times in the line of trade linking Yemen and Abyssinia and between the shores of the Gulf and the countries of India and China, and in the line of Quraish trade between Yemen and the Levant, and then it was confirmed with the Islamic conquests that included the extended central region. Between the Nile and Gihon rivers, the heart of the ancient world, and the strategic trade crossing between East and West, North and South.
Thus, Baghdad and other urban cities of Iraq were the meeting place of the world’s markets, receiving merchants from the ends of the earth, and listen with me to al-Yaqoubi’s description - at the end of the third century - of Baghdad, when he says: “What is not in a city of the world gathered in it... so trades and merchandise come to it by land and sea and with the easiest effort, until it is complete.” In it every store is carried from the East and the West, from the land of Islam and other than the land of Islam, for it is brought to it from India, Sindh, China, Tibet, Turks, Daylam, Khazars, Abyssinia and all other countries, so that it will have more trade from countries than in those countries from which trade came out, and with that it is more effective and possible. It is as if the bounties of the earth were brought to it, and the treasures of the world were collected in it, and the blessings of the world were integrated with it.
It is the business of merchants to be broader in heart and more flexible, by virtue of their mixing with various types of people from the high and low, and to be broader horizons and openness to the stranger by virtue of their frequent wanderings and travels;
The cities of the merchants would imbibe these morals, and would receive the cultures of strangers with their goods, which undermines the characteristics of self-closure and encourages multilingualism and diversity of cultures.
and then;
Trade enriched Muslim cities with goods and science at the same time, and made Muslim cities cosmopolitan (global) cities that receive the whole world, as was the commercial city of Khanfu in China;
According to Al-Masoudi and others.
It is not strange that Al-Jahiz (d. 255 AH / 869 CE) tells us about the news of nations and peoples, but rather that he tells us about the conditions of countries (and he has a message in that), and he is the one who did not leave - most likely - the Fertile Crescent except occasionally.
This produced a high social dynamic in Muslim civilization - as the American orientalist Marshall Hodgson (d. 1388 AH / 1968 CE) explains in his book "The Adventure of Islam" - so the Muslims felt that they were global citizens, all the land for them a mosque and purification, and perhaps the clearest proof of that is what is presented to the reader in Travelers wrote about meeting their countrymen in exile, Ibn Fadlan met in the country of Saqqalabah with a tailor from Baghdad, and Ibn Battuta met in China with a jurist from Ceuta, and the strange thing is that after years he met a brother of that jurist in the country of Sudan from Central Africa.
In this article, I will focus on tracing three examples of the writings of travelers and historians, and showing their approach in narrating about the other and telling about his conditions: They are Ibn Fadlan (his journey took place in the years 309-310 AH / 1309-1310 AD, and the date of his death is not known) and Abu al-Hasan al-Masoudi (d. 346 AH / 957 AD). ), and Abu al-Rayhani al-Biruni (d. 440 AH / 1049 CE).
And let us start with the Baghdad Accord, whose beard froze in the turmoil of the Saqalaba country.
The adventure of a jurist
Like many travelers and geographers - who are mostly men from the middle classes - we do not know the date of Ibn Fadlan's birth, and Yaqoot al-Hamwi mentioned - in the "Dictionary of Countries" - that he was the guardian of the Abbasid military commander Muhammad bin Suleiman al-Hanaifi (d. 304 AH / 916 CE), He called him several times: “Ahmed bin Fadlan bin Al-Abbas bin Rashid bin Hammad, Mawla Muhammad bin Suleiman: Messenger of [the caliph] Al-Muqtadir” Al-Abbasi (d. 320 AH / 932 CE).
Perhaps the best source about him is his journey itself, in which it is stated that his name is “Muhammad”, and he is a scholar of the provisions of the Sharia with a good literary culture, and a beautiful language that is not burdensome in it, meticulous in observation, even if he has a wide imagination, bold in telling the truth and correcting the error, ancient in Civilization and its etiquette.
He left Baghdad in Safar of the year 309 AH / 921 AD - during the reign of Caliph Al-Muqtadir - for a specific purpose that he mentions at the beginning of his letter: “When the book of Al-Alamish bin Yiltawar (and it was later called by Ibn Fadlan Jaafar bin Abdullah) the king of the Saqalaba arrived to the Commander of the Faithful, Al-Muqtadir, asking him about it The mission is to someone who teaches him about religion and introduces him to the laws of Islam, and builds a mosque for him and erects a platform for him to establish the call for him in his country and all his kingdom, and asks him to build a fortress in which he will be fortified from the kings who oppose him (= the kingdom of the Khazar Jews), so he answered what he asked.
Islam entered the countries of the Bulgars and the Saqalaba before this date, and the “country of the Bulgars” meant here is their ancient kingdom, and there is a dispute over its appointment, but it is - according to the investigator of "Ibn Fadlan's Message" Sami al-Dahan (d. 1391 AH / 1971 AD) - located to the northeast of the Caspian Sea;
As for the “Salqaliba”, it is a general term that includes the peoples of the Slavs, the Germans, and the inhabitants of Eastern Europe, and it was also called some Turkish tribes living east of the Caspian Sea, especially the Volga River basin (= the Atl River), and their kingdom was within what is known today as the Russian Republic of Tatarstan.
Al-Masoudi says in 'Meadows of Gold' - "In the country of the Khazars ... a creation of the Saqlabs and the Russians ... and this gender is from the Saqlabs ... connected to the East."
And Ibn Fadlan did not prove his arrival in the region of eastern Europe until he met Saqalbha.
And the geographer Ibn Rustah Al-Isfahani (d. 300 AH / 912 CE) says that most of the Bulgarians and Saqalaba impersonate Islam, but Islam was - during his reign - still weak in impact and presence in these peoples, and did not take root in their morals and customs.
We find evidence of this in Ibn Fadlan when he mentions much of what he denies about them in the rituals of "burial" and their ignorance of inheritance, and that they "wash naked" and do not cover up, and "if they do not commit adultery" and even kill the adulterer and the thief with severe penalties.
And we know from the traveler Abu Hamid al-Gharnati (d. 565 AH / 1170 CE) - who traveled around the Volga basin for about thirty years and traded between them and married one of them - that Islam had spread and settled there, and that mosques had multiplied during his reign.
The historian Ibn Al-Athir (d. 630 AH / 1233 CE) mentions - in Al-Kamil - that a delegation of them came for Hajj, and landed in Baghdad in 433 AH / 1043 CE.
Starlings and frogs
Ibn Fadlan walked - as part of an official delegation - through stations that led him to Khorasan, Khwarazm and Bukhara, then he made his way between the Ural Lake and the Caspian Sea, penetrating into the country of the Turks along the Volga River until he reached the country of the Saqalaba and the Russians;
On a journey that took - in its confirmed way of going - 11 months, during which it covered nearly 5,000 km, via a path that starts from Baghdad in the west to Bukhara in the east and from there to the outskirts of the Russian city of Kazan today in the north.
And since the man had come from Baghdad - which at that time was the capital of civilization replete with the etiquette of living, tact of speech, cleanliness of clothing and etiquette of behavior - it was natural for him to disapprove of what he saw of the "brutality" of those he met among the Turks, the Russians and the Slavs.
Therefore, when he descended in the city of Al-Jurjaniyyah - which is located today in western Uzbekistan and its days were the capital of the Kingdom of Khwarezm - he described its people as "the most brutal of people in speech and of course", and told us that "their speech is like something like the shouting of starlings" (= the plural of a starling, which is a small bird), and he told us about other people adjacent to them that their speech is like "the croaking of frogs".
There is no doubt that this kind of impressions regarding the description of the pronunciation of the languages of the peoples is hasty and stems from the ear getting used to its mother tongue;
Al-Biruni, for example - even if he recommends Arabic as a language for sciences - tells us - in his book 'Saidnah' - that "every nation deems it permissible for its language that it is familiar with, accustomed to, and used for its purposes with its thousands and forms."
And Ibn Fadlan’s words about the languages of these peoples are not far from the description of the Umayyad poet, Al-Nabigha Al-Shaybani (d. 125 AH / 744 CE) of the Roman language as:
the voices of non-Arabs if they approach them ** just as the hooks sound in the morning
Then Ibn Fadlan describes the "Ghazia" (= the Turkish tribes of Ghaz - or Oghuz - including the Seljuks and the Ottomans) in his talk about the nomadic herding life that they live;
That they are “like stray donkeys, they do not owe religion to God and do not return to reason, and they do not worship anything, but rather call their innocence as lords.”
And he adds that the Muslim merchants with them used to wash secretly because if they saw someone washing, they would think that he wanted to bewitch them, and that their women do not hide from men, but that women do not care about exposing their vagina in front of strangers, even if they "do not know adultery" and the punishment for the adulterer is to cut it in half!
Ibn Fadlan also spoke about the 'country of the Bashkirds', and he said that they are "a people from the Turks who are called the Bashkirds, so we warned them with the utmost caution, and that is because they are the worst, dirtiest, and most aggressive of the Turks in killing.
Accurate details
and away from the value judgments of disapproval and denial;
Ibn Fadlan is fluent in the work of the ethnographic researcher, who depicts the people's character, customs, and beliefs, and transmits them to us accurately.
It tells us about health policies taken by those peoples, such as the sanitary isolation - according to the Turks and the Russians - of the patient and not approaching him until he recovers or dies.
and about the pagan beliefs of some of them in the worship of twelve gods of natural phenomena: the winter has a lord, and the summer has a lord, and the wind and death... etc., and about the worship of some Turks to animals and the barking of dogs;
As for the Saqalaba habit of eating alone, each one is alone at his table and no one else shares it.
He also gave us information about the customs of the different peoples in burial.
He painted for us a detailed picture in ten pages of the burial of the Russians, one of their leaders, and some of his followers and slave girls volunteered to die with him, and how they burned his body (a note that came later in Al-Masoudi and Al-Biruni, who compared it to the act of India), and what they sing, drink, and do during those rituals.
Ibn Fadlan's description is still the most important description of death rituals for the Russians.
Ibn Fadlan was neither an audited geography nor a news reporter who scrutinized what he conveyed with the balance of reason or transmission, and he was - as usual with travelers - fond of mentioning wonders.
Therefore, Yaqut al-Hamawi - who said about Ibn Fadlan's journey that it is "a well-known blog written by people's hands. I have seen several copies of it." Indeed, he was quoted in the "Dictionary of Countries" close to two-thirds of it, according to the estimation of its investigator, al-Dahan - corrects many of his descriptions in geography and falsifies some of his statements. He sets some of the customs he mentioned, saying that they are specific to the countryside, not the city, and so on.
And sometimes he puts responsibility for what he transmits from him, disavowing his accuracy, saying: "And he has the responsibility of what he told, and God knows best about its authenticity."
Ibn Fadlan also tells us that the custom of raising the hat has been in place in the country of the Saqqalabah since the tenth century AD, and if the king passed the market, “no one was left but got up and took his cap from his head and placed it under his armpit, and if he passed them, they returned their caps to their heads,” and also if they entered the king.
What he said here refutes the well-known saying that the custom of raising the modern hat dates back to the Middle Ages, when the European knight used to remove his military helmet from his head for ladies, kings, or his peers, to indicate that he is safe from them and that he does not need to protect himself in their presence, or for Christians to take off their hats at the door. churches homage;
These Saqlabiya were not Christians before their conversion to Islam, but rather they were pagans.
The cutoff in this matter requires further investigation.
Among the anecdotes of his news among the Saqalaba is that a man from them who is called “Taloot” embraced Islam at his hand, so he was called “Muhammad”, then his wife and children converted to Islam, so the man asked him to name them all “Muhammad”!
Ibn Fadlan passed - on his way back - to the country of the Khazar kingdom, where he quoted from them a nice mechanism for the transfer of power, which is that if a king reigns for more than forty years, his subjects kill him, and they say: "This man has shortened his mind and his opinion is disturbed."
I said: Forty years is a lot, but at least they set a limit that the king should not cross!
Ibn Fadlan was an expressive example of the state of travelers and their approach, and it is a method characterized by the accuracy of the description and the truthfulness of the news - as possible - without the implementation of criticism in the news received, neither in terms of comparing it with other news nor in terms of presenting it to the mind (= the current habit), which allows the passing of myths And wonders without explaining their reasons or interpretation, and it is an approach that relies in its rulings on personal impressions - sometimes hasty - so it is lonely from what it is not familiar with, and it deems what violates the morals and law of Muslims, and what deviates from their morals.
An encyclopedic shift
Since the fourth century - whose first decade witnessed the organization of Ibn Fadlan's journey and perhaps the writing of his treatise on it - a class of encyclopedic authors appeared who took the approach of studying the "other" a major step forward.
The authors of this class - including Al-Masoudi and Al-Biruni - were not mere travelers, and the doors of their scientific work cannot be limited to "history". Studying civil policy and comparing it between different nations.
Perhaps the classification proposed by the French orientalist Andre Michelle to describe the field of their work (Al-Masudi and Al-Biruni) is true as “human geography”, in that this geography was not satisfied with measuring the distances between countries and telling about their architecture, but rather it placed people at the center of its perceptions, as they are the subject and the subject of study. .
The Belgian science historian George Sarton (d. 1376 AH / 1956 CE) had previously realized - in his book 'Introduction to the History of Science' - the scientific importance of both Al-Masoudi and Al-Biruni;
He called the first half of the fourth century "the era of Al-Masoudi", and the first half of the fifth century AH "the era of Al-Biruni".
Before proceeding to talk about the methodology of Al-Masoudi and Al-Biruni, and what they meet and part in it;
A brief introduction to them is required.
This is because their method of narrating about the other was affected by their scientific formation, their intellectual doctrine, their economic and political position, and even their personal character.
As for Al-Masoudi;
He is Abu Al-Hassan Ali bin Al-Hussein bin Ali, and his lineage is connected to the great companion Abdullah bin Masoud (d. 32 AH / 654 CE).
He was born in the Babylon region of Iraq, to which he yearns and is proud of him, and we do not know the date of his birth. As for his death, it was “in Jumada al-Akhirah in the year three hundred and forty five (345 AH / 956 AD)”;
As al-Dhahabi (d. 748 AH / 1347 CE) says in “Biography of the Flags of the Nobles.”
He was "a Mu'tazilite," as al-Dhahabi asserts, and a "Mu'tazili Shiite," as Ibn Hajar (d. 852 AH / 1448 CE) says in Lisan al-Mizan.
It seems that he was a student of the sheikh of historians al-Tabari (d. 310 AH / 922 CE), so he quoted a lot from his encyclopedia and his historical methodology.
As we find him saying in his book 'Al-Tanbih and Supervision': "Abu Jaafar Muhammad bin Jarir al-Tabari told us ... etc."
Cognitive
diversity Al-Masoudi’s writings varied from speech and the origins of religion to geography and astronomy, and Ibn Hajar said that “his writings are dear (= rare in circulation) except for ‘Al-Mourouj’, as he became famous.” We only get a small part of it.
It appears that Al-Masoudi was from a rich family, and that he was traveling at his own expense, independent of any political purpose, so his goal was to write his most famous book, 'Promoters of Gold and Minerals of Essence': soon.”
His travels expanded to include Persia, Sindh, India, China, the eastern coast of Africa and its islands, then Azerbaijan, Armenia, Syria, the Levantine frontiers and Palestine. He settled in Egypt, where he died.
He knew of the languages: Arabic, Persian, Hindi, Syriac and Greek.
Therefore, the Russian orientalist Alexander Vasiliev (d. 1373 AH / 1953 CE) says - in his book 'The Arabs and the Romans': "We see that Al-Masoudi deserves the title 'Herodotus of the Arabs', which Cromer gave him."
He means what the Austrian orientalist von Kremer (d. 1306 AH / 1889 CE) said about him in his book 'History of Culture in the East'.
As for Abu Al-Rayhan Al-Biruni;
He was born in 362 AH / 974 AD, and attributed - in one of the sayings - to the city of "Birun", which was then within the Khwarizmian state and is located today in western Uzbekistan, and he died in 440 AH / 1050 AD in "Ghazni", which was then the capital of the Ghaznavid state, which is located today in Afghanistan.
His books amount to about 180 books, distributed between history, medicine, mineral sciences, astronomy, and more.
Al-Biruni - who had contact with the physician-philosopher Avicenna in his youth - was faithful to the tradition of philosophy and its arts.
He was a scholar of Greek, Syriac, Khwarizmi, Persian, and Sanskrit (and translated from them) in addition to Arabic.
Al-Biruni contacted the Ghaznavid court, and accompanied Sultan Masoud Al-Ghaznavid (d. 432 AH / 1042 CE) in his conquest of northwestern India, but we know that he remained self-made and independent of opinion, and he informed a witness to that - if the historical account is correct - that the sultan wanted to reward him for his book "Masoudi Law" in Astronomy and meteorology, so he was sent to carry three camels of silver!!
But Al-Biruni replied apologetically.
The political position of Al-Biruni cast a shadow over his book on India 'Achieving what India says';
When he indicated his purpose for writing it, he mentioned that the “professor” (probably meant Abu Sahl Abd al-Mun’im bin Ali al-Taflisi, who died after 423 AH / 1033 CE) was “keen to edit what I knew from their side (= the Indians) to be a support for those who wanted to contradict them and ammunition for those who wanted to mix with them ".
But he immediately follows up by saying: “And he asked that, so I did it without falsifying an opponent (= slandering him about what he did not say), nor evading the story of his words, even if the truth was clear and his hearing was horrible to his family, so it is his belief and he is aware of it.”
Methodological commonalities
when reviewing the approach of Al-Masoudi and Al-Biruni;
We will find that they shared two basic methodological determinants, and differed in two.
They agreed in the following:
1- The two men agree that the aim of their books (most notably here is 'Promoter of Gold' by al-Masoudi, and 'Achieving India's Saying' by al-Biruni) is to tell and tell about the "other", without arguing with him or judging the correctness of his opinion from his mistake.
Al-Masoudi says: “This book of ours is a book of news, not a book of opinions and bees,” and he repeats this meaning several times.
Al-Biruni praises the approach of "the abstract story without inclination or flattery," and says about his book that "it is not... a book of pilgrims and arguments until I use it to present the arguments of opponents and contradict those who deviate from the truth, but rather it is a book of a story, so he cited the words of India on his face."
Al-Masoudi - who lived at the height of the populist controversies - mentioned some of these controversies and the responses to them, but - despite the antiquity of his argument - he concluded an important ethical and methodological principle, which is that "the duty of the one of honorable lineage and lofty glory not to make this a ladder to indolence from deeds ... The honor of lineage encourages the honor of deeds.
As if by this he wants to end the debate about bragging about lineages, knowing that every nation claims credit for itself and thinks that it is unique to him, and this is really the case of those who traveled, experimented, and mixed with nations;
Didn't Al-Biruni say - in the context of his criticism of the Indians' closure on themselves and their ignorance of others - that "if they had traveled and mixed with others, they would have retracted their opinion."
and, most importantly;
That Al-Masoudi - in his practical application - was open to the wisdom of all peoples, as he dwells at length in mentioning the commandments of the Persian kings (Ardashir and Khosrau Anushirwan in particular) and elaborates on the wisdom of India and Greece, even in what contradicts the norms of Arabs and Muslims;
And so we find him - may God bless you, my reader - conveying the wisdom of the Indians in forbidding the imprisonment of the wind in the hollow, and their lack of modesty in releasing it due to the harm it generates, and he does not express any objection to that, but the apparent meaning of his saying is admiration for their wisdom!
And with Al-Masoudi's description of the Negroes of East Africa that "they have races [a] with specific teeth that eat each other," and that they "have no law to refer to, but rather drawings of their kings and types of policies with which they govern their subjects";
He praises their political justice and the strength of their keenness on it, because they believe in their kingdom that God "chosen him for their kingdom and justice is in them, so when the king violates them in his judgment and deviates from the truth, they kill him and deprive his successor of the kingdom."
He also praises their linguistic eloquence, saying: "The Zanj are first eloquent in their tongues, and among them are preachers in their language. The ascetic man among them stands and addresses many of them, and desires them to be close to their innocence (= their creator), and sends them to obey him and intimidates them from his punishment."
Despite Al-Masoudi's assertion of Ibn Fadlan's conclusions - without mentioning his name - when he describes, for example, the Russians as a "pre-Islamic" nation that does not obey a king or a law;
We do not find - in his chronicle of their events and telling about their conditions - the tone of disapproval and disapproval that we find in the folds of Ibn Fadlan's story.
Rather, he was committed to avoiding that explicitly when he said: "Let those who looked at it (= his book 'Promoter of Gold') know that I did not defend it for a doctrine, nor did I take sides with a saying, and I did not speak about people except for their news councils, and I do not offer anything else."
2- Al-Masoudi and Al-Biruni agree on the necessity of explaining the phenomena and not being satisfied with the news without analysis and interpretation.
Al-Masoudi conveys to us what Galen mentioned about the character of Sudan, and he says, “Galenus mentioned ten characteristics in lions that met in him and were not found in others: flabby hair, lightness of the eyebrows, spreading of the nostrils, thick lips, defined teeth, stinky skin, darkening of the pupils, and cracked hands and feet.” , the length of the remembrance, and the abundance of rapture.”
However, Galen attributes "abundance of rapture" to brain corruption, which Al-Masoudi responds to, and begins to establish the principle of "illness" for the Canadian philosopher (d. 256 AH / 870 CE).
Al-Masoudi's reasoning for people's natures is based on two reasons: the influence of astronomy and the environment (climate and soil).
And if today we describe these two causes as naive and classify them as “pseudo-sciences” in the language of researchers in knowledge issues (epistemology);
Approving the principle of reasoning and using it according to the sciences of the time is a definite scientific virtue.
The explanation of the climate of peoples remained in circulation until recently before the development of genetics sciences and more complex economic / social analyses.
The French philosopher Montesquieu (d. 1169 AH / 1755 CE) used it, and Saed Al-Andalusi (d. 462 AH / 1071 CE) and Ibn Khaldun (d. 808 AH / 1406 CE) used it before him.
And if their opinions differed in defining the natures of peoples, the coldness in the north bequeathed the activity of the mind and the love of adventure for Montesquieu, while it bequeathed dullness and lack of accuracy of understanding in a rising man.
Perhaps Al-Biruni's smartest remarks in explaining and explaining phenomena - which were preceded by students of the science of human societies (anthropology) - are what he said in explaining the Indians' prohibition of cows and refraining from slaughtering them, as he suggests a dispensational or "political" reason, in Al-Biruni's expression;
And it is that “cows are the animals that serve on travels, carrying loads and burdens, and in farming with distress and agriculture … and with milk, and what comes out of it, then it benefits from its offspring (= its dung), but in winter with its breath; it was forbidden [among the Indians] just as the pilgrims prohibited it when it was complained of ruin Al-Sawad (= agricultural region in Iraq).
That is, the economic benefit resulting from keeping the cows is greater than the economic benefit resulting from slaughtering them and benefiting from their meat.
This reasoning is the same one whose faces we read in the book of the American anthropologist Marvin Harris (d. 1422 AH / 2001 CE) 'Sacres, Taboos and Wars'.
Differences and Contradictions
As for the methodological differences between them, they are differences within a circle of agreement, and they are summarized as follows:
1- The two men agree on the necessity of scrutinizing the news and not transmitting everything that reached them, but their methodology in scrutinizing the news is different.
Al-Masoudi relies on the method of the hadith scholars in judging the news through its chains of transmission and comparing it with other narrations, but if the chain of transmission is accepted, then the approach of mental acceptance is based on the fact that everything that enters the circle of mental possibility is permissible, waiting for a narration that testifies to it in order to accept it.
And the mental possibility here is not equal to the “current habit” of Al-Biruni, but rather the existential possibility, in accordance with the theologians’ division of the conditions of existence into: necessary, impossible, and possible.
On this basis, Al-Masoudi transmits, for example, news that exaggerates the size of the whale, and he transmits the news of the centenarians whose age exceeded three hundred years!!
Perhaps that is what prompted a speaker like al-Dhahabi to describe him as "the owner of ... oddities and wonders."
Later, we will discuss some of the exaggerations and mistakes that he made about India and compare them with what Al-Biruni mentioned shortly.
It is generally noted that Al-Masoudi was more critical and scrutinizing in matters of geography than in matters of people, their customs and their drawings.
As for Al-Biruni, he relied more on the mind, so we see him rejecting the “rationally abstaining” by virtue of the current habit, even if it was included in the “existential possibility” according to the custom of the theologians.
Therefore, he explains the magic of the Indians as a kind of camouflage and games of lightness, and not finding the abstaining as the common people believe, and he mentions what they are famous for in hunting antelopes with tunes until they take them in their hands, and he mentions that this and its like are “characteristics in which sophistication has no entry .. In this sense all nations are equal. ";
So, they are natural techniques that can be equally used by all peoples.
And his story about India is devoid of mentioning the wonders that Buzurg bin Shahryar al-Ramahramzi (died in the fourth century AH) described in his book 'The Wonders of India';
Al-Biruni did not mention it except as "they claimed that such-and-such."
And Al-Biruni is more reliable in reasoning and analysis than Al-Masoudi, and he is more insightful.
He justifies, for example, the worship of idols by the tendency of the public's nature towards the tangible and the personified, and he may suffice with the news without explanation and say, "The mind has no entrance in this."
His analysis may lead to investigating the difference between the theoretical ideal of the people and the practical application that is subject to human nature and the constraints of politics.
Al-Biruni opens the door that he held for punishments in India by saying: “The situation in them is similar to the case in Christianity, as it is based on good and the cessation of evil from abandoning killing in the first place (= the principle of ‘ahimsa’ / non-violence) … and empowering the lap of the other cheek, and supplicating the enemy with goodness and prayers upon him. For my life, it is a virtuous biography, but the people of the world are not all philosophers, but most of them are ignorant astraders who can only be corrected by the sword and the whip. The establishment of the mechanism of political governance among them and the statement of their penalties for crimes.
2- Al-Masoudi and Al-Biruni stress the necessity of examining the countries they study and not being satisfied with the news received from them from others.
The first issue that Al-Biruni holds in his book is sight, news, and the pests attached to the news, and an example of that in the introduction to Al-Masoudi mentioned him inquiring about “the deposits of nations by witnessing” and knowing “the properties of the regions by inspection.”
Rather, Al-Masoudi criticizes those who "commit to the embers of his homeland and are satisfied with what has grown to him of the news," and he has that Al-Jahiz is one of them.
Despite this, Al-Masoudi sometimes reports the news of the countries he did not visit from those whose knowledge and understanding he trusts among its people.
When he tells us about the "country of oases" in western Egypt and the power of its prince, he says: "I saw the owner of this man (= prince) residing in the oases..., and I asked him about many news of their country, and what I needed to know about the characteristics of their land, and so it was with others - in all The times - those whose countries I did not reach.
شمولية وتخصص
ولذلك نجد المسعودي يقسو على الجاحظ في أكثر من موضع، ويصف كتابه ‘الأمصار وعجائب البلدان‘ بأنّه "في غاية الغثاثة، لأنّ الرجل لم يسلك البحار ولا أكثر الأسفار ولا تقرّى الممالك والأمصار، وإنّما كان صاحب ليل ينقل من كتب الورّاقين". وعلى سبيل المقارنة بين مزاجيْ الرجلين؛ نذكر أنّ البيروني ردّ رأي الجاحظ في نفس المسألة بأدبٍ جمّ بأن قال: "حتى ظنّ الجاحظ -بسلامة قلبه وبُعده عن معرفة مجاري الأنهار وصور البحار- أن نهر مهران (يقع جنوب غربي إيران) شعبة من النيل".
فضرورة المعاينة إذن مسألة مُقرّرة لدى الرجلين؛ ولكنّهما يختلفان في جزئيّة مهمّة حكمتها أقدارهما وظروفهما، وأثّرت من ثمّ في جودة أعمالهما؛ وهي اتساع الجغرافيا التي يُغطّيها المسعودي في مقابل اختصاص البيروني بالهند وحدها. فصحيحٌ أنّ البيروني كان يُقارن باستمرار بين حكمة الهند وحكمة اليونان وبين عقائد الهند وعقائد الصوفيّة والنصارى "لتقارب الأمر بين جميعهم في الحلول والاتحاد"، إلا أنّه ظلّ مُخلصاً لدراسة منطقة بعينها، الأمر الذي سمح له بمزيد من التعمّق والرسوخ في أحوالها ولغاتها، والتدقيق في عقائدها وتمحيص سِيَرها وخرافاتها، وهو ما جعل منه مرجعاً أكثر دقّة وموثوقيّة في وصف أحوال تلك البلاد.
يظهر أثَر هذين الاختلافين المنهجيين في المقارنة بين ما نقله المسعودي عن الهند وما حكاه البيروني عنها؛ فالمسعودي يقول إنّ "الهند تمنع من شرب الشراب ويعنّفون شاربه، لا على طريق التديّن لكن تنزّهاً عن أن يوردوا على عقولهم ما يغشيها ويزيلها عمّا وضعت له فيهم. وإذا صح عندهم عن ملك من ملوكهم شربه استحق الخلع عن ملكه، إذ كان لا يتأتى له التدبير والسياسة مع الاختلاط". أما البيروني فإنّه يُبيّن أنّ حرمة الخمر مخصوصة بالطبقات العليا دون الطبقة الدنيا (أي طبقة الشودرا = المنبوذون) في نظام الطبقات الهندوسي.
ثمّ نجد أنّ المسعوديّ يبالغ فيما يحكيه عن مقامرات أهل الهند، فيقول: "والأغلب عليهم القمار في لعبهم بالشطرنج والنرد على الثياب والجواهر؛ وربما أنفد الواحد منهم ما معه فيلعب في قطع عضو من أعضاء جسمه… فإذا لعب في إصبع من أصابعه وقُمِر (= خسر في القمار)، قطعها.. [بـ]ـالخنجر وهو مثل النار… ثمّ عاد إلى لعبه، فإن توجّه عليه اللعب أبان (= قطع) إصبعاً ثانيةً، وربما توجّه عليه اللعب في قطع الأصابع والكفّ، ثمّ الذراع والزند وسائر الأطراف"!! وهذا خبر تأنف منه العقول ويمتنع في العادة الجاريّة، ولا يذكره البيروني.
وإضافة إلى ما سبق؛ يُصحّح البيروني ما ذكره غير واحدٍ من الرحالة (السيرافي المتوفى بعد 237هـ/851م وابن خُرْدَاذَبَه) من عقوبات الهند وقتلهم الزاني والسارق؛ فيذكر عقوباتهم بتفصيل دقيق قائلا إن من "كبائر الآثام" عندهم "قتل البقر ثم شرب الخمر ثم الزناء…، وأما السرقة فعقوبة السارق بمقدارها، فإنّها ربما أوجبت التنكيل بإفراط والتوسّط (= شقّ جسد المجرم نصفين)، وربما أوجبت التأديب والتغريم، وربما أوجبت الاقتصار على الفضيحة والتشهير…، وعقوبة الزانية أن تخرج من بيت الزوج وتنفى".
معوقات ونقد
يُحمد للبيروني وعيه بالمنهج ومزالق الحكاية عن الآخر، وأعتقدُ أنّ الدرسَ الإبستمولوجي الذي قدّمه في الإنصاف لا يزال صالحاً إلى اليوم. فقد عَرضَ -في مقدّمة كتابه- لبيانٍ مفصّل للآفات التي تلحق بالخبر، فذكر أنها: 1- تفاوت الهمم بين المخبرين؛ 2- والانحياز الناجم عن "غلبة الهراش والنزاع بين الأمم"؛ 3- والخبر الكاذب الذي يقصد به المُخبـِر "تعظيم جنسه"؛ 4- أو الخبر الكاذب عن "طبقةٍ يحبّهم لشكر أو يبغضهم لنُكْر"؛ 5- أو الخبر الكاذب بنيّة التقرّب إلى خير ومنفعة أو اتقاء الشرّ؛ 6- والجهل والتقليد لمن سبق؛ 7- ومنها -وانظر دقّة الفهم- أن يميل المُخبـِر ويداهن بحكم طبعه "كأنّه محمولٌ عليه غير متمكّن من غيره".
وهذه الآفة الأخيرة هي أشدّ أنواع الانحيازات فتكاً لأنّها تأتي من الانحياز اللاواعي. وفي وجه هذه المزالق؛ يُذكّرنا البيروني ويُذكّر نفسه بأنّ الصدق "مرضيّ محبوب لذاته مرغوبٌ في حسنه"، وأنّ واجب المؤرّخ -بل والمسلم عموما- هو أن يقول الحقّ ولو على نفسه، وأنّ هذه الدرجة من الصدق لا تتأتّى إلا بالشجاعة، والتي هي في حقيقتها "الاستهانة بالموت"!
ثمّ إنّ البيروني يتواضعُ بين يديْ موضوع دراسته، إذ يذكر المعوّقات التي تحول دون المعرفة الصحيحة واستشفاف أحوال الهند: فـ"القوم يباينوننا بجميع ما تشترك به الأمم، وأوّلها اللغة" التي تحوز مخارج حروف لا نظير لها في العربيّة، وتلتقي فيها السواكن، وتتعقّد فيها أساليب التعبير وتكثر فيها المجازات، ويحكم معانيها سياق العبارة، ويقع فيها الاسم الواحد على عدّة مسمّيات. ثم يُفصّل في منهجه في نقل المصطلحات وتعريبها.
وثاني هذه المعوقات "أنّهم (= الهنود) يباينوننا في الديانة مباينة كلّية لا يقع منّا شيء من الإقرار بما عندهم ولا منهم بشيء مما عندنا"؛ و"يباينوننا في الرسوم والعادات" ويستوحشون من عادات المسلمين ويستنكرون "تسويتنا بين الناس"، أي رفض التقسيم الطبقي للمجتمع (وهو ما يرى البيروني أنّه من أعظم الحوائل دون دخول الهنود في الإسلام)؛ ويرون غير الهنديّ -ويسمّونه "مُليج" (= القذر)- نجِساً لا يؤاكل ولا يُخالط، ويضنّون عليه بعلومهم وأخبارهم؛ ثمّ إنّ غزو المسلمين أرضَهم قد زادهم استيحاشاً من المسلمين.
In addition to these obstacles;
Al-Biruni admits his shortcomings - and the shortcomings of every researcher - in collecting all that the people wrote about themselves and repeatedly declares that he transmits to us what he heard from their sciences "until the time of editing these letters", as if he intends to add to them and correct them if new knowledge reaches him;
And he admits that one of the obstacles is reading their sciences "from the outside", and this is a precise understanding, because the difference is great between knowing the cultural tradition from within, and trying to understand it from outside, which is something that the Orientalists rarely understood!