According To Fuat Sezgin The Factors Behind The Scientific Achievements Of Muslims

Yıl 2019, Cilt: 2019 Sayı: 39, 35 - 57, 23.12.2019

Cenan Kuvancı

https://doi.org/10.28949/bilimname.578171

Öz

According to Fuat Sezgin, behind the scientific breakthroughs of Muslims, there are love of truth, surprising openness to other cultures, let alone concealing resources, the habit of quoting precisely with utmost diligence, ethic of a fair critique, the experiment being seen as an auxiliary tool used systematically in scientific studies, the effort to create new scientific terminologies and expand the available ones, adhering to the principle of equilibrium between theory and practice, the long years of astronomical observations made with the help of observatories established in the Islamic world, a clear understanding of the existence of a law of progress in the field of sciences and as it is an unknown relationship form between teacher and student is born in the Islamic world. All of these were seen as characteristic features of scholarship in the Islamic civilization environment. All these factors have played a role together on the rapid, broad and deep development of the sciences around Islamic civilization, and these factors remained effective not only for a short period of time but for hundreds of years.
In accordance with these principles, Muslim scholars absorbed the knowledge they received from other cultural circles in a time that could be called short. They did not stay with it, a century later, in the middle of the 9th century BC, in all spheres of science, they had reached the stage of creativity beyond the stage of importing and assimilating from foreign cultural worlds, especially from the Greeks.
In this process, Muslim scholars, together with their colleagues from other religions such as Christianity and Judaism, under the same state, have made significant progress in the field of sciences, leaving their predecessors behind. Muslims and non-Muslims working under their rule, although under different historical, geographical and economic conditions, appeared on the stage of history in the 7th century and soon proved that they were the true students of the Greeks. Most of the Greek works that survived were translated into Arabic in a very short time. Neither political nor religious obstacle was encountered in the process of adoption and assimilation of the sciences inherited from Greeks and other civilizations. For example, Muslims who accepted the view of Greeks that the world was round, at the beginning of the 8th century without any religious resistance, unhesitatingly gave Aristotle the title “the first teacher” of the world of thought.
In the light of this information it should not be surprised the fact that the Islamic world is in a creative activity in the sciences. Because Muslim scholars have reached a higher level of knowledge and understanding in all of the branches of science that existed from the ancients. Besides, they established new interdisciplinary departments, redefined science, made new classifications in different disciplines, developed new scientific terminologies, and laid the foundations of many new disciplines such as sociology, philosophy of history, mathematical geography. In this context, we see that Muslim scholars always pay regard the principle of balance between theory and practice, which is necessary for systematic and practical studies on their own. As a consequence, the intense use of logic in Islamic intellectual tradition did not lead to a secular rationalism that rebelled against God and religion, and the widespread use of experimentation did not lead to narrow-angle empiricism, which saw the senses as the sole source of all knowledge. Traditional Islamic epistemology has taken all the necessary measures against such philosophical deviations, all the paths to knowledge have been properly assessed and each has been assigned a legitimate place and function within the general structure of this epistemology. Islam is the religion of unity (tawheed) and balance (i`tidal); and it has always supported the idea that there is integrity and hierarchy of knowledge and that there are different ways of knowing. For example, for the development of sciences, Muslim scholars have benefited from every easily accessible way of knowledge, such as systematic-logical thinking, mathematical analysis, observation-experiment, and rational interpretations of religious texts. According to the Qur'an, all intellectual abilities such as the five senses, memory, imagination, heart and mind should be used legitimately in accordance with their creation and function. The legitimate use of each ability requires recognition of activity areas suitable for it and its limits. Human beings are equipped with the ability to learn everything they need to know. As long as Muslims remain loyal to the true spirit of tawheed, which implies the integrity of knowledge and adherence to the hierarchy of knowledge, have been protected from the unfortunate and intellectually dangerous situation where one way of knowing is accepted in spite of another, or that the superiority of certain ways of knowing is supported by denial of the validity of others as in modern Europe. In short, Muslim scholars have not put forward one method as a scientific method, ignoring other methods. On the contrary, in accordance with the nature of the subject, they have used different ways and methods that make it understandable. Moreover, the question of methodology has not been conceptually dealt with separately from the ultimate goal of human understanding, that is, the spiritual future of man. All of these have played a role in the scientific initiatives of Muslim scientists. But with the realized laxity, this process began to lose its speed in the 15th century after a steady rise and it was entered the unproductive period with the transition from the 16th to the 17th century.
According to Fuat Sezgin, the reason why Muslims lose their creativity is that they stop abiding by the working principles we listed. Instead of trying to develop their creativity, rather, they were content to take things blindly from others. It is necessary to be fed from other cultures, but it should be done in a conscious way without abandon oneself to the inferiority complex and by knowing the nature of the receiving.  In this context, the task of determining the path falls on the intellectuals of the society, not ordinary individuals. What others have to do is to walk on this road.

Fuat Sezgin`e Göre Müslümanların Bilimsel Başarılarının Arkasındaki Etkenler

Öz

Fuat Sezgin`e göre, Müslümanların bilimsel atılımlarının arkasında, hakikat sevgisi, başka kültürlere yönelik şaşırtıcı bir açıklık, kaynakları gizlemek şöyle dursun, aşırı bir titizlikle tam olarak alıntılama alışkanlığı, adil bir eleştiri ahlâkı, deneyin bilimsel çalışmalarda sistematik olarak kullanılan bir yardımcı araç olarak görülmesi, yeni bilimsel terminolojiler yaratma ve olanı genişletme çabası, kuram ile uygulama arasında denge prensibine riayet ve İslâm dünyasında kurulan rasathaneler yardımıyla yapılan, uzun yıllar süren astronomik gözlemler, bilimler alanında bir ilerleme kanunun olduğuna ilişkin açık bir anlayış ve bu şekliyle daha önce bilinmeyen bir hoca-talebe ilişkisinin İslâm dünyasında doğmuş olması bulunur. Tüm bunlar İslâm medeniyet çevresinde bilginliğin karakteristik özellikleri olarak görülüyordu.
Müslüman bilginler bu prensiplere uygun olarak, diğer kültür çevrelerinden aldıkları ilimleri çok kısa denilebilecek bir sürede özümsediler. Onlar bununla da kalmadılar, bir yüzyıl sonra yani milâdî 9. Yüzyılın ortalarında bilimlerin her alanında, yabancı kültür dünyalarından, özellikle Yunanlılardan alma ve özümseme safhasının ötesinde yaratıcılık merhalesine ulaşmışlardı. Bu süreç devamlı bir yükselişten sonra 15. Yüzyılda hızını kaybetmeye başladı ve 16. yüzyıldan 17. Yüzyıla geçişle birlikte duraklama çağına girildi.
Fuat Sezgin`e göre, Müslümanların yaratıcılıklarını kaybetmelerinin nedeni, sıraladığımız çalışma prensiplerine uymayı bırakmalarıdır. Onlar yaratıcılıklarını geliştirmeye çalışmak yerine, çokluk başkalarından körü körüne bir şeyler almakla yetindiler. Başka kültürlerden beslenmek gereklidir, fakat bu, aşağılık duygusuna kapılmadan, almanın mahiyetini bilerek ve bilinçli bir şekilde yapılmalıdır. Bu bağlamda, yol tayin etme vazifesi sıradan fertlere değil toplumun fikir adamlarına düşmektedir. Diğerlerinin yapması gereken bu yolda yürümektir.

Anahtar Kelimeler

Din felsefesi, Fuat Sezgin, adil tenkit, İslâm medeniyet çevresi, bilimsel yaratıcılık, zihinsel yaratıcılık

Kaynakça

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