Shaykh Hasan al-Attar (; 1766–1835) was a

Sunni Sunni Islam is the largest branch of Islam and the largest religious denomination in the world. It holds that Muhammad did not appoint any successor and that his closest companion Abu Bakr () rightfully succeeded him as the caliph of the Mu ...

Shafi'i The Shafi'i school or Shafi'i Madhhab () or Shafi'i is one of the four major schools of fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence), belonging to the Ahl al-Hadith tradition within Sunni Islam. It was founded by the Muslim scholar, jurist, and traditionis ...

scholar, Grand Imam of al-Azhar from 1830 to 1835. A "polymathic figure", he wrote on

grammar In linguistics, grammar is the set of rules for how a natural language is structured, as demonstrated by its speakers or writers. Grammar rules may concern the use of clauses, phrases, and words. The term may also refer to the study of such rul ...

science Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. Modern science is typically divided into twoor threemajor branches: the natural sciences, which stu ...

logic Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the study of deductively valid inferences or logical truths. It examines how conclusions follow from premises based on the structure o ...

medicine Medicine is the science and Praxis (process), practice of caring for patients, managing the Medical diagnosis, diagnosis, prognosis, Preventive medicine, prevention, therapy, treatment, Palliative care, palliation of their injury or disease, ...

and

history History is the systematic study of the past, focusing primarily on the Human history, human past. As an academic discipline, it analyses and interprets evidence to construct narratives about what happened and explain why it happened. Some t ...

. Hassan al-Attar was appointed Sheikh of al-Azhar in 1830 and became one of the earliest reformist clerics in Ottoman Egypt. He was a forerunner of Egypt's national revival, and his legacy was a generation of

Egyptian ''Egyptian'' describes something of, from, or related to Egypt. Egyptian or Egyptians may refer to: Nations and ethnic groups * Egyptians, a national group in North Africa ** Egyptian culture, a complex and stable culture with thousands of year ...

modernists like his disciple Rifa al-Tahtawi. He advocated the introduction of sciences such as

and modern

astronomy Astronomy is a natural science that studies celestial objects and the phenomena that occur in the cosmos. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and their overall evolution. Objects of interest includ ...

, and wrote the first modern history of

Mohammed Muhammad (8 June 632 CE) was an Arab religious and political leader and the founder of Islam. According to Islam, he was a prophet who was divinely inspired to preach and confirm the monotheistic teachings of Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, ...

's tribe, the Quraish. He was to suffer greatly for his modernizing beliefs. His first contact with foreign (non-Muslim) knowledge came during the French occupation of Egypt (1798–1801). Fearing for his safety after the French withdrawal, he left Cairo for

Istanbul Istanbul is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, constituting the country's economic, cultural, and historical heart. With Demographics of Istanbul, a population over , it is home to 18% of the Demographics ...

. There he studied and read voraciously, from 1802 through 1806, when he continued his studies in Alexandretta (today

İskenderun İskenderun (), historically known as Alexandretta (, ) and Scanderoon, is a municipality and Districts of Turkey, district of Hatay Province, Turkey. Its area is 247 km2, and its population is 251,682 (2022). It is on the Mediterranean coas ...

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and

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, returning to Egypt in 1815. He was the first director of the new medical college, defending the necessity of corpse

dissection Dissection (from Latin ' "to cut to pieces"; also called anatomization) is the dismembering of the body of a deceased animal or plant to study its anatomical structure. Autopsy is used in pathology and forensic medicine to determine the cause of ...

, which he had observed in the Cairo veterinary college, against the non-experimental, theoretical teachings of eleventh-century

Avicenna Ibn Sina ( – 22 June 1037), commonly known in the West as Avicenna ( ), was a preeminent philosopher and physician of the Muslim world, flourishing during the Islamic Golden Age, serving in the courts of various Iranian peoples, Iranian ...

, discarded centuries ago in Christian Europe. While he was a successful lecturer at

al-Azhar University The Al-Azhar University ( ; , , ) is a public university in Cairo, Egypt. Associated with Al-Azhar Al-Sharif in Islamic Cairo, it is Egypt's oldest degree-granting university and is known as one of the most prestigious universities for Islamic ...

, his time there was marked by continual conflict with un-Westernized (?)

ulema In Islam, the ''ulama'' ( ; also spelled ''ulema''; ; singular ; feminine singular , plural ) are scholars of Islamic doctrine and law. They are considered the guardians, transmitters, and interpreters of religious knowledge in Islam. "Ulama ...

s, leading him at times to conduct classes in his home. The tensions only became worse with his appointment as rector. He died within four years.

Creed

According to Peter Gran, professor of history at

Temple University Temple University (Temple or TU) is a public university, public Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related research university in Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. It was founded in 1884 by the Baptist ministe ...

, his first phase, as an

Ash'ari Ash'arism (; ) is a school of theology in Sunni Islam named after Abu al-Hasan al-Ash'ari, a Shāfiʿī jurist, reformer (''mujaddid''), and scholastic theologian, in the 9th–10th century. It established an orthodox guideline, based on ...

, ended early in his stay in

Turkey Turkey, officially the Republic of Türkiye, is a country mainly located in Anatolia in West Asia, with a relatively small part called East Thrace in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia (country), Georgia, Armen ...

. Thereafter, his study of

and other rational science drew him toward a Maturidite position. During the 1830's, he wrote on

ijtihad ''Ijtihad'' ( ; ' , ) is an Islamic legal term referring to independent reasoning by an expert in Islamic law, or the thorough exertion of a jurist's mental faculty in finding a solution to a legal question. It is contrasted with '' taqlid'' ( ...

from a Maturidite outlook.

References

External links

Rediscovering Al-'Attar
* Dunne, Bruce William. ''Sexuality and the 'Civilizing Process' in Modern Egypt'. ProQuest, UMI Dissertations Publishing, 1996. Asharis Maturidis Shafi'is Grand Imams of al-Azhar Egyptian Sunni Muslims Egyptian people of Moroccan descent Mujaddid Muslim reformers Muslim writers 1766 births 1835 deaths {{Islam-bio-stub

Creed

References

Further reading

External links