Athīr al‐Dīn al‐Mufaḍḍal ibn ʿUmar ibn al‐Mufaḍḍal al‐Samarqandī al‐Abharī, also known as Athīr al‐Dīn al‐Munajjim (d. in 1265 or 1262
Shabestar
Shabestar ( fa, شبستر; also known as Chabiastar, Shabiastar, and Shabistar) is a city and capital of Shabestar County, East Azerbaijan Province, Iran. At the 2011 census, its population was 25,663, in 4,824 families. The population is Azerb ...
,
Iran
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
) was an Iranian muslim
polymath
A polymath ( el, πολυμαθής, , "having learned much"; la, homo universalis, "universal human") is an individual whose knowledge spans a substantial number of subjects, known to draw on complex bodies of knowledge to solve specific pro ...
,
philosopher,
astronomer
An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, moons, comets and galaxies – in either ...
,
astrologer and
mathematician
A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems.
Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, structure, space, models, and change.
History
On ...
. Other than his influential writings, he had many famous disciples.
Life
His birthplace is contested among sources. According to
Encyclopedia of Islam
The ''Encyclopaedia of Islam'' (''EI'') is an encyclopaedia of the academic discipline of Islamic studies published by Brill. It is considered to be the standard reference work in the field of Islamic studies. The first edition was published i ...
and
Encyclopedia Islamica,
he was born in
Abhar
Abhar ( fa, ابهر) is a city in the Zanjan Province of Iran. It has historically served as a place of importance due to lying right between the cities of Qazvin and Zanjan.
Name
"Abhar" is a combination of the words ''āb'' (water) and ...
, a small town between
Qazvin
Qazvin (; fa, قزوین, , also Romanization, Romanized as ''Qazvīn'', ''Qazwin'', ''Kazvin'', ''Kasvin'', ''Caspin'', ''Casbin'', ''Casbeen'', or ''Ghazvin'') is the largest city and capital of the Qazvin Province, Province of Qazvin in Iran. ...
and
Zanjan.
Encyclopedia Iranica
An encyclopedia (American English) or encyclopædia (British English) is a reference work or compendium providing summaries of knowledge either general or special to a particular field or discipline. Encyclopedias are divided into articles ...
mentions that he was born in
Mosul
Mosul ( ar, الموصل, al-Mawṣil, ku, مووسڵ, translit=Mûsil, Turkish: ''Musul'', syr, ܡܘܨܠ, Māwṣil) is a major city in northern Iraq, serving as the capital of Nineveh Governorate. The city is considered the second larg ...
,
but according to
Encyclopedia Islamica, none of his oldest biographers mentioned Mosul as his birthplace.
Beside the city of Abhar, his epithet al-Abharī could suggest that he or his ancestors originally stem from the
Abhar
Abhar ( fa, ابهر) is a city in the Zanjan Province of Iran. It has historically served as a place of importance due to lying right between the cities of Qazvin and Zanjan.
Name
"Abhar" is a combination of the words ''āb'' (water) and ...
tribe. He may have died of
paralysis in
Adharbayjan.
He is said to have been a student or teacher in various schools at
Khurāsān,
Baghdad
Baghdad (; ar, بَغْدَاد , ) is the capital of Iraq and the second-largest city in the Arab world after Cairo. It is located on the Tigris near the ruins of the ancient city of Babylon and the Sassanid Persian capital of Ctesiphon. I ...
, and
Arbil, living for some time in
Sivas
Sivas (Latin and Greek: ''Sebastia'', ''Sebastea'', Σεβάστεια, Σεβαστή, ) is a city in central Turkey and the seat of Sivas Province.
The city, which lies at an elevation of in the broad valley of the Kızılırmak river, is ...
.
Ibn Khallikān
Aḥmad bin Muḥammad bin Ibrāhīm bin Abū Bakr ibn Khallikān) ( ar, أحمد بن محمد بن إبراهيم بن أبي بكر ابن خلكان; 1211 – 1282), better known as Ibn Khallikān, was a 13th century Shafi'i Islamic scholar w ...
reports that he was student of
Kamāl al‐Dīn ibn Yūnus, but other sources state that he worked as an assistant to
Fakhr al‐Dīn al‐Rāzī.
Works
; Astronomy
* ''Risāla fī al‐hayʾa'' (''Treatise on astronomy'').
* ''Mukhtaṣar fī al‐hayʾa'' (''Epitome on astronomy'').
* ''Kashf al‐ḥaqāʾiq fī taḥrīr al‐daqāʾiq'', where he accepts the view that the
celestial bodies do not change and maintains that stars have volition and it is the source of their motion.
; Mathematics
* Several works on ''Iṣlāḥ'' (''Correction'') of
Euclid
Euclid (; grc-gre, Εὐκλείδης; BC) was an ancient Greek mathematician active as a geometer and logician. Considered the "father of geometry", he is chiefly known for the '' Elements'' treatise, which established the foundations of ...
, one of which is an attempt to prove the
parallel postulate
In geometry, the parallel postulate, also called Euclid's fifth postulate because it is the fifth postulate in Euclid's ''Elements'', is a distinctive axiom in Euclidean geometry. It states that, in two-dimensional geometry:
''If a line segmen ...
, which was commented upon and criticized by
Shams al-Dīn al-Samarqandī
(c. 1250 – c. 1310) was a 13th-century astronomer and mathematician from Samarkand.
Life and works
Nothing is known of al-Samarqandi's life except that he composed his most important works in the last two decades of the 7th and early decades ...
.
; Philosophy
* ' (''Guide on Philosophy''): a book dealing with the complete cycle of Hikmat, i.e.,
logic
Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the science of deductively valid inferences or of logical truths. It is a formal science investigating how conclusions follow from premise ...
,
natural philosophy
Natural philosophy or philosophy of nature (from Latin ''philosophia naturalis'') is the philosophical study of physics, that is, nature and the physical universe. It was dominant before the development of modern science.
From the ancient wo ...
, and
metaphysics
Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the fundamental nature of reality, the first principles of being, identity and change, space and time, causality, necessity, and possibility. It includes questions about the nature of conscio ...
.
* ' (Commentary on
Porphyry's ''Isagoge''), a treatise on
logic
Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the science of deductively valid inferences or of logical truths. It is a formal science investigating how conclusions follow from premise ...
. Latin Translation by
Thomas Obicini; ''Īsāghūkhī, Isagoge. Id est, breve Introductorium Arabicum in Scientiam Logices: cum versione latina: ac theses Sanctae Fidei. R. P. F. Thomae Novariensis'' (1625).
Notes
References
*
PDF version
* Brockelmann, C.
al- Abharī , At̲h̲īr al-Dīn Mufaḍḍal b. ʿUmar" Encyclopaedia of Islam. Edited by: P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel and W.P. Heinrichs. Brill, 2008. Brill Online.
Further reading
*
External links
Isagoge of al-Ahbārī with Latin translation and a theological treatise by Thomas Obicini (Gallica, Bibliothèque nationale de France).
{{DEFAULTSORT:Abhari
1200 births
1265 deaths
13th-century Iranian mathematicians
13th-century astronomers
People from Abhar
13th-century Iranian philosophers