Ibn Sina (Avicenna)

The greatest systematic philosopher of the Islamic Peripatetic school; a leading representative of medieval medicine. His full name is Abu Ali al-Husayn b. Abdallah b. Ali b. Sina. He is known by the title al-shaykh al-ra'is, given him by medieval scholars and thinkers to express his unmatched standing in science and philosophy, and also by the epithets hujjat al-haqq, sharaf al-mulk and al-dustur. In the West he is known as Avicenna and styled «the prince of philosophers». Because the autobiography he dictated to his pupil Abu Ubayd al-Juzjani, with Juzjani's additions, was transmitted by Ibn al-Qifti and Ibn Abi Usaybi'a, more is known about him than about any other Muslim philosopher.

He was born about 370 (980-81) in the village of Afshana near Bukhara. His father Abdallah, originally from Balkh, had settled in the capital Bukhara in the reign of the Samanid ruler Nuh b. Mansur. Abdallah, who appears to have been well educated and to have adopted Isma'ili views, was in constant contact with Isma'ili missionaries, so that the house became a centre where philosophy, geometry and Indian mathematics were discussed; finding himself in the midst of these debates, Ibn Sina became familiar with philosophical questions at an early age.

His extraordinary intelligence drew attention while he was still a child. He first memorised the Qur'an, then studied language, literature, creed and law. Among his teachers of this period his autobiography names only the Hanafi jurist Abu Muhammad Isma'il b. Husayn al-Zahid. From his father he received his first knowledge of geometry, arithmetic and philosophy, and at his father's wish he studied Indian arithmetic with Mahmud al-Massah. When Abu Abdallah al-Natili came to Bukhara he was lodged in the father's house; with him Ibn Sina read Porphyry's Isagoge, the first books of Euclid's Elements and the opening of Ptolemy's Almagest, and worked out the rest of the books by himself. When al-Natili left for Gurganj he turned to physics, metaphysics and the other philosophical texts. Though he read Aristotle's Metaphysics many times he could not grasp it, probably because of its poor translation, until he chanced upon al-Farabi's treatise explaining the aim of that work.

Having equipped himself in every branch of philosophy, he took up the study of medicine. The sources name as his teachers in medicine Abu Sahl Isa b. Yahya al-Masihi and the Samanid court physician Abu Mansur Hasan b. Nuh al-Qumri; by his own account, when he was only sixteen many physicians already regarded him as an authority and drew on his knowledge. When Nuh b. Mansur fell gravely ill he was summoned to the palace; after the relative success of his work with the court physicians he was appointed court physician at eighteen, and in the rich palace library he was able to read many authors whose very names he had not heard before. In this period he composed al-Hikma al-Arudiyya and the roughly twenty-volume al-Hasil wa'l-mahsul.

After his father's death (393/1003) political ties came to dominate his life; when the Samanid state collapsed in 396 (1005) he was forced to leave Bukhara and travelled through various regions in search of a suitable place. His first stop was Gurganj in Khwarazm, where the philosophically minded vizier Abu'l-Husayn al-Suhayli presented him to the Amir Ali b. Ma'mun, who granted him a stipend. At the same court were al-Biruni, Abu Sahl al-Masihi, Ibn al-Khammar and Ibn Iraq; his disputations with al-Biruni on physics and astronomy took place at this time. When Mahmud of Ghazna demanded these scholars for his own court, Ibn Sina and al-Masihi decided not to go and left Gurganj; according to Nizami-i Aruzi, Sultan Mahmud had his portrait copied and sent to various regions to find him, without result. Passing through Nasa, Abiward, Tus, Shaqqan, Samniqan and Jajarm he went to Jurjan to meet the Ziyarid ruler Qabus b. Wushmgir; when Qabus was arrested and died in a fortress he moved on to Dihistan. In 403 (1012) he suffered a severe illness, returned the same year to Jurjan, and there met his pupil and biographer Abu Ubayd al-Juzjani, who would not leave him until his death. In a poem he says that he wandered for seven years because his worth was not recognised where he went. At Jurjan Abu Muhammad al-Shirazi bought him a house; the beginning of al-Qanun fi'l-tibb and works such as al-Mabda' wa'l-ma'ad were written there.

After probably two years in Jurjan he went to Rayy, where he treated the Buyid Amir Majd al-Dawla for melancholia; thus began his relationship with the Buyids. By way of Qazvin he moved to Hamadan, where he cured the Buyid ruler Shams al-Dawla of colic and won his friendship; he accompanied him on the campaign against Karmisin and on their return was made vizier. When unrest in the army turned into revolt, the rebels besieged his house, imprisoned him, seized his property and demanded his execution; the ruler refused but dismissed him from office. Ibn Sina hid for forty days in the house of Shaykh Abu Sa'd al-Dakhduk. When Shams al-Dawla's illness recurred and he called him back, he became vizier once more. Occupied with affairs of state by day, he taught at night, reading with his pupils the completed parts of al-Shifa and al-Qanun; among them are named Abu Abdallah al-Ma'sumi, Ibn Zayla and Bahmanyar b. Marzuban.

When Shams al-Dawla died on the road during the Tarum campaign and was succeeded by his son Sama' al-Dawla (412/1021), he refused the new ruler's offer of the vizierate; unable to leave Hamadan, he lived out of sight in the house of Abu Ghalib al-Attar. The natural-science and metaphysical parts of al-Shifa were largely completed there. Shams al-Dawla's other son Taj al-Mulk accused him of secret correspondence with the Kakuyid ruler Ala' al-Dawla; though Ibn Sina denied it he was imprisoned in the fortress of Fardajan (414/1023). During the four months he spent there he wrote al-Hidaya, Hayy b. Yaqzan and al-Qulanj. When Ala' al-Dawla took Hamadan he was released and completed the unfinished logic of al-Shifa. Distrusting Taj al-Mulk's promises, most probably in 415 (1024) he left Hamadan secretly with his brother, two servants and al-Juzjani and reached Isfahan.

In Isfahan he joined the circle of Ala' al-Dawla Muhammad b. Rustam and was held in great honour. Nizami-i Aruzi says that Ala' al-Dawla made him vizier and left the most important affairs to him, adding: «Truly, since Aristotle became vizier to Alexander no ruler has been granted a vizier like Abu Ali.» The scholarly gatherings the ruler held spread his fame; he completed his unfinished works, wrote al-Najat and the Danishnama-i Ala'i, named after Ala' al-Dawla, carried out astronomical observations at the ruler's command to correct the errors of the calendars, and took part in the campaigns to Saburkhwast and Hamadan.

When Sultan Mas'ud of Ghazna took Isfahan his house and library were plundered; he suffered a great shock, his health broke down, and he contracted the colic that was widespread in his day. He tried to treat himself and seemed for a while to recover, but never fully. While accompanying Ala' al-Dawla on a campaign to Hamadan he fell ill again on the road and died when they reached Hamadan (428/1037). His grave is in Hamadan.

The source describes him as highly intelligent, industrious and prolific, and, alongside an irascibility born of excessive confidence in his intellect and learning, as a man who could not bear defeat. As an instance of this character it records that when the philologist Abu Mansur al-Jubba'i told him in Ala' al-Dawla's presence that he knew nothing of language, he studied language for three years, wrote books in the field, and finally reduced al-Jubba'i to an apology.

His Circle of Influence — He stands at the summit of the Islamic philosophical tradition that began with al-Kindi; he owes much to al-Farabi, may in a sense be regarded as his pupil and successor, yet surpassed his master. Foremost among his pupils is al-Juzjani, who wrote his biography under the title Sirat al-Shaykh al-Ra'is; Ibn Zayla of Isfahan and al-Ma'sumi — of whom the master said «what Aristotle is to Plato, al-Ma'sumi is to me» — were others. The most learned pupil, who carried his ideas to later generations, was Bahmanyar b. Marzuban; from Bahmanyar the chain passes through al-Lawkari, Afdal al-Din al-Gilani, Sadr al-Din al-Sarakhsi and Farid al-Din Damad to Nasir al-Din al-Tusi, and thence to Anatolia and the Ottoman world. Al-Ghazali wrote the Tahafut al-falasifa to refute him, yet according to the source remained largely under his influence; Fakhr al-Din al-Razi too, while criticising him, built his system upon his philosophy. After the criticisms of al-Ghazali and Ibn Rushd, Avicennan philosophy was reshaped within Sunni and Shi'i theology and became the dominant system of thought down to the modern period; the source says this development determined some eight centuries of Islamic thought. In the West al-Qanun was translated into Latin at Toledo by Gerard of Cremona at the end of the XIIth century and taught as a textbook in European universities from the XIIIth century; it is held to have eclipsed the fame of Hippocrates and Galen. In the XVIIth century a chair of Avicenna was founded at the University of Valladolid; the title page of the Pavia edition of 1510 shows him enthroned in the centre with Hippocrates and Galen seated on either side. That physicians such as Ibn al-Nafis and Hacı Paşa were called «the Ibn Sina of the age» shows that this authority endured in the Islamic world.

His Poetry and Sufi Line — Ibn Sina belongs to the Farabian school of the Islamic philosophical tradition, the essence of which is the idea that religion is an indispensable divine institution for society. The source states that in all his major works he crowns with prophecy the philosophy he begins with pure reason, and explains in a fluent style the necessity of religion for the happiness of individual and society. In his view the prophet's soul has the power to act upon matter, and this is not contrary to the laws of nature, for the righteous servants who are God's friends can likewise exert certain effects upon bodies. He is an artist-philosopher who wrote philosophical works in prose, verse and narrative: the al-Qasida al-ayniyya on the soul, the al-Urjuza that set medicine in verse, the symbolic tale Hayy b. Yaqzan, and the treatises attributed to him such as al-Tasawwuf, Kalimat al-sufiyya, al-Ilm al-laduni, al-Karamat wa'l-mu'jizat, al-Ishq and Mahiyyat al-huzn are the traces of this line.

His Works — He is among the most prolific of the Muslim philosophers. George C. Anawati identified 276 works attributed to him in the libraries of the world, while Yahya Mahdavi said that of the 242 he recorded some 100 are doubtful or cannot count as independent works. The principal ones: ① al-Shifa — his most important philosophical work; an encyclopaedic book in parts on logic, natural science, mathematics and metaphysics, first published in twenty-two volumes (Cairo 1952-1983). ② al-Najat — written in 417 (1026) or 418 (1027), in the nature of a summary of al-Shifa. ③ al-Isharat wa'l-tanbihat — an original late work in its style and new systematisation. ④ Danishnama-i Ala'i — the first philosophical encyclopaedia written in Persian; al-Ghazali's Maqasid al-falasifa is claimed to be its interpreted Arabic translation. ⑤ al-Mabda' wa'l-ma'ad, ⑥ Uyun al-hikma, ⑦ al-Ta'liqat, made up of the lecture notes of his pupil Bahmanyar, ⑧ al-Mubahathat, collecting his correspondence with his pupils, ⑨ al-Hidaya. ⑩ al-Qanun fi'l-tibb — his most important medical work, in five books: the general principles of medicine, simple drugs, diseases of the organs, diseases of the parts, and compound drugs; first printed at Rome in 1593, translated into Latin by Gerard of Cremona and into Turkish in twenty-one volumes by Tokatlı Mustafa Efendi. ⑪ al-Urjuza fi'l-tibb — a versified summary of al-Qanun. His medical works approach forty in number; among them is al-Qulanj, on the colic of which he himself died. He also wrote commentaries on the surahs al-Ikhlas, al-Falaq, al-Nas and al-A'la and on certain verses, and treatises on prayer, destiny and the hereafter.

His Tomb and Complex — The only information the source gives is that his grave is in Hamadan; the article mentions the structure over the grave only in an image caption, as «the mausoleum of Ibn Sina – Hamadan/Iran». On the history, architecture and present function of the building the source gives no information.