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The Legacy of Muslim Rule in India c5.s7: Education

The Legacy of Muslim Rule in India c5.s7

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English

Education

c5.s7.1

Belief in astrology and alchemy, magic and witchcraft, miracles and superstition was there both in the West and the East in the middle ages. Europe released itself from mental darkness sooner because of spread of education and early establishment of a number of universities. Oxford was set up in the twelfth century, Cambridge in 1209. Paris University came into being in the twelfth, Angers in the thirteenth and Orleans in 1231. In Italy, Salerno was founded in the tenth century, Arezzo in 1215, Padua 1222, Naples 1224, Siena 1246, Piacenza 1248, Rome 1303, and Pisa 1343. Such was the situation throughout Europe.⁷⁷ The emergence of universities in such large numbers, with still larger number of schools whose selected pupils went to the universities, led to a spurt in learning which may explain the birth and flowering of Renaissance in Italy and Reformation in Germany. Martin Luther, who created a revolution in religion, was a student at the University of Erfurt founded in 1343.

c5.s7.2

In the early years of Islam the Muslims concentrated mainly on translating and adopting Creek scholarship. Aristotle was their favourite philosopher. Scientific and mathematical knowledge they adopted from the Greeks and Hindus. This was the period when the Arabs imbibed as much knowledge from the West and the East as possible. In the West they learnt from Plato and Aristotle and in India Arab scholars sat at the feet of Buddhist monks and Brahman Pandits to learn philosophy, astronomy, mathematics, medicine, chemistry and other subjects. Caliph Mansurs (754-76) zeal for learning attracted many Hindu scholars to the Abbasid court. A deputation of Sindhi representatives in 771 C.E. presented many treatises to the Caliph and the *Brahma Siddhanta* of Brahmagupta and his *Khanda-Khadyaka*, works on the science of astronomy, were translated by Ibrahim al-Fazari into Arabic with the help of Indian scholars in Baghdad. The Barmak (originally Buddhist Pramukh) family of ministers who had been converted to Islam and served under the Khilafat of Harun-ur-Rashid (786-808 C.E.) sent Muslim scholars to India and welcomed Hindu scholars to Baghdad. Once when Caliph Harun-ur-Rashid suffered from a serious disease which baffled his physicians, he called for an Indian physician, Manka (Manikya), who cured him. Manka settled at Baghdad, was attached to the hospital of the Barmaks, and translated several books from Sanskrit into Persian and Arabic. Many Indian physicians like Ibn Dhan and Salih, reputed to be descendants of Dhanapti and Bhola respectively, were superintendents of hospitals at Baghdad. Indian medical works of Charak, Sushruta, the *Ashtangahrdaya*, the *Nidana*, the *Siddhayoga*, and other works on diseases of women, poisons and their antidotes, drugs, intoxicants, nervous diseases etc. were translated into Pahlavi and Arabic during the Abbasid Caliphate. Such works helped the Muslims in extending their knowledge about numerals and medicine.⁷⁸ Havell goes even as far as to say that it was India, not Greece, that taught Islam in the impressionable years of its youth, formed its philosophy and esoteric religious ideals, and inspired its most characteristic expression in literature, art and architecture.⁷⁹ Avicenna (Ibn Sina) was a Persian Muslim who lived in the early eleventh century and is known for his great canon of medicine. Averroes (Ibn Rushd), the jurist, physician and philosopher was a Spanish Muslim who lived in the twelfth Century. Al Khwarizmi (ninth century) developed the Hindu nine numbers and the zero (*hindisa*). Al Kindi (ninth century) wrote on physics, meteorology and optics. Al Hazen (Al Hatim C. 965-1039) wrote extensively on optics and the manner in which the human eye is able to perceive objects. Their best known geographers were Al Masudi, a globe-trotter who finished his works in 956 and the renowned Al Idrisi (1101-1154). Although there is little that is peculiarly Islamic in the contributions which Occidental and Oriental Muslims have made to European culture,⁸⁰ even this endeavour had ceased by the time Muslim rule was established in India. In the words of Easton, when the barbarous Turks entered into the Muslim heritage, after it had been in decay for centuries, did Islam destroy more than it created or preserved.⁸¹ For instance, Ibn Sina had died in Hamadan in 1037 and in 1150 the Caliph at Baghdad was committing to the flames a philosophical library, and among its contents the writings of Ibn Sina himself. In days such as these the Latins of the East were hardly likely to become scholars of the Muhammadans nor were they stimulated by the novelty of their surroundings to any original production.⁸²

c5.s7.3

Similar was the record of the Turks in India. No universities were established by Muslims in medieval India. They only destroyed the existing ones at Sarnath, Vaishali, Odantapuri, Nalanda, Vikramshila etc. to which thousands of scholars from all over India and Asia used to seek admission. Thus, with the coming of Muslims, India ceased to be a centre of higher Hindu and Buddhist learning for Asians. The Muslims did not set up even Muslim institutions of higher learning. Their *maktabs* and *madrasas* catered just for repetitive, conservative and orthodox schooling. There was little original thinking, little growth of knowledge as such. Education in Muslim India remained a private affair. Writers and scholars, teachers and artists generally remained under the direct employment of kings and nobles. There is little that can be called popular literature, folk-literature, epic etc. in contemporary Muslim writings. The life of the vast majority of common people was stereotyped and unrefined and represented a very low state of mental culture.⁸³

Cites (7)