Talk:Muhammad ibn Zakarīya Rāzi

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is within the scope of the following WikiProjects:
Former featured article Muhammad ibn Zakarīya Rāzi is a former featured article. Please see the links under Article milestones below for its original nomination page (for older articles, check the nomination archive) and why it was removed.
Main Page trophy This article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on June 12, 2004.

Contents

[edit] On the initial article

Quick note for the author of this page (and others) - great work, but it's not the done thing on the wikipedia to place one's name in an article text. This is because an article might get edited and/or expanded by anybody after you have worked on it, meaning it really would be "by" you any more. If you want people to know what you're responsible for, I'd suggest making a user account - then you can put a list of your pages on your user page if you like. Anyway, keep up the good work. --Camembert

I'm not sure about the copyright status of some material in this article, especially the quotes should be better acknowledged ([1]). I'm also not sure about the copyright status of the picture. -- till we *) 19:33, Aug 9, 2003 (UTC)

[edit] Resectioning

To all:

  • I have tried to reformat the article according to the Wikipedia standards, chiefly by adding one "=" to the level of all sections.
  • However, I used "*" instead of "====" for the sub-sub-sections (commentaries on individual books), because the document's structure seemed clearer that way. On my browser "====" looks just like "===". (Of course that may be a fluke of my browser/fonts combination.) The drawback is that editing an individual book commentary is not possible. Perhaps the old format was better after all...
  • The commentary on Razi's medical work is quite extensive, perhaps even too detailed for an encyclopedia article. On the other hand, the commentary on his chemical work, which was perhaps even more important, is too skimpy. Perhaps someone with more knowledge of chemistry would be willing to provide the details of his discovery of sulphuric acid and alcohol? (Based on half-remembered sources, I guess that the former was by distillation of vitriol; but that is little more than a guess.)
  • Ditto for the =Biography= section (currently one small paragraph...)
  • The Arabic /Persian title of Al-Hawi in the list of medical books looks strange. Could it be vandalism?
  • The full list of book titles could perhaps be moved to a separate article, "list of al-Razi's books". That would avoid the huge gaps between sections and make the text flow more naturally.

I am doen for today. All the best,
Jorge Stolfi 23:35, 16 May 2004 (UTC)

[edit] More fixes

Some fixes:

  • Changed "Iranian" to "Persian". As far as I know, "Iran" is a modern name. (Cf. Julius Caesar — usually said to be "Roman" not "Italian").
Iranian is an old name, although the country was usually called "Persia" in English before 1935. john k 23:27, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)
  • Restored the sentence about alcohol. From the sources I have seen, Al-Razi is indeed credited with the discovery of alcohol (meaning ethanol - as opposed to alcoholic beverages, which of course were pre-historical). Or, at least, he was the first who described its preparation (which presumably is what counts). Is that claim contested? BTW, as far as I know "alcohol" derives from Arabic for "spirit".
  • Merged the footnotes into the text (footnote 3 apparently was not anchored anywhere).

Jorge Stolfi 22:38, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Alcohol discovery

It would probably be best to state exactly what Al-Razi was credited doing first. It wouldn't have been discovering alcohol or even the preparation of alcohol, since ancient distillers must have done that, too. Was he the first to identify ethanol as the intoxicating component of alcoholic beverages, or the first to describe how to prepare pure ethanol? It's probably necessary to specify ethanol, since alcohol is ambiguous in English. (By the way, Merriam-Webster Online says the word is derived from Arabic al-kuhul, "the powdered antimony". Seems like there's an etymological link missing, or at least an interesting story.) In any case, on en:wikipedia, it shouldn't have the connotation in English that he first did something that has obviously been done for millenia. I'd supply a better phrasing myself, but I don't know exactly what Al-Razi did. -- Jeff Q 23:54, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

What "ancient distillers" are those? I have never heard of distilled beverages in ancient Greece or Rome, or anywhere else before the era of the Islamic alchemists. (They had wine and beer, of course.) Jorge Stolfi 03:13, 13 Jun 2004 (UTC)

It seems that Geber already knew about alcohol (at least as a flammable gas that escaped from bottles of boiling wine). So presumably Al-Razi was the first to condense the product? Jorge Stolfi 06:15, 13 Jun 2004 (UTC)
Ah, I am hoist by my own petard! "Distillers" was probably the wrong word. I was responding to your statement that Al-Razi "was the first who described [alcohol's] preparation". My thought was that, unless people before the 10th century C.E. found their ethanol-based beverages lying around in puddles, many people must have been preparing it for millenia. ☺ But distallation is a more specific means of ethanol preparation. Is this what Al-Razi discovered and/or invented? If so, that would eliminate the ambiguity. (BTW, I replaced your bullet above with an indent colon, because bullets screw up talk page formatting in this wonderful new style the Wiki Powers That Be have forced upon us. Please pardon the edit.) -- Jeff Q 17:35, 13 Jun 2004 (UTC)

---

Also, it would be interesting to know if al-Razi had any idea of the antiseptic qualities of alcohol. If so, and if we can find a reliable source, we should make not of it both in this article and the article on Joseph Lister. --dws 4/25/2005

[edit] Alcohol etymology

((moved to Talk:alcohol Jorge Stolfi 03:33, 15 Jun 2004 (UTC)))

[edit] Sulfuric acid

There is something fishy about the sulfuric acid story. This article claims that Al-Razi discovered H2SO4, and then Geber used it to discover HCl, HNO3, and aqua regia. However, according to the dates in Wikipedia, Geber died about 50 years before Al-Razi was born. What is the real story?
Jorge Stolfi 06:14, 13 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Seems to me that that part of the article is incorrectly stating that Razi's work "paved the way for Geber". Geber's article also indicates that Geber's discoveries "paved the way for Razi"!! Obviously Razi could not have paved the way for Geber (unless the author of the article meant Pseudo-Geber) so it seems that the "Razi paved the way for Geber" part must be removed. --K1 10:25, 14 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Yes, I just added that part in the Geber article, after reading a document on the net about the discovery of alcohol that seems authoritative and has detailed quotes of observations by Geber and other Arab alchemists. I will take out that line about Geber, but now I am unsure about whether he indeed was the frist to prepare ethanol, or whether credit should go to someone else, possibly just after Geber's . (The one above does not even mention Al-Razi, but perhaps it was due to nationalistic prejudice.)

The H2SO4 problem is even more urgent, since Geber is supposed to have used the stuff to make other acids. However, perhaps Geber did not use H2SO4, but distilled a mixture of salt and viriol, which I suppose would have generated HCl directly. Ditto for HNO3. Then perhaps Al-Razi distilled vitriol alone and got H2SO4.

Pseudo-Geber does not seem relevant, he was too late. Surely the distillation of spirits was already well known by then, even in Europe. (BTW, it seems that by the 16th century the distillation of ethanol was a very popular research topic of European alchemists. I wonder why... 8-)

Jorge Stolfi 14:21, 14 Jun 2004 (UTC)

[edit] 2 questions

  1. "Razi always used a natural approach when treating ill patients"
    What exactly does this mean? Can you elaborate perhaps?
  2. Why exactly did Abu contradict that a Muslim priest (or mullah?) got so angry as to have his head smashed in? That is quite a severe punishment, and inspires curiosity as to the nature of the offense. [[User:Sam Spade|Sam Spade Arb Com election]] 18:02, 20 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] al-Hawi anecdote

The Wikipedia article says:

A Muslim priest, whom Razi had apparently contradicted somewhere in its pages, ordered that Razi be beaten over the head with the [al-Hawi] manuscript until one of them broke. Razi's head broke first, and the result was permanent blindness for Razi.

The NIH website says:

The most sought after of all the compositions by al-Razi (Rhazes to Europeans) was his Comprehensive Book on Medicine (Kitab al-Hawi fi al-tibb). It was not a formal medical encyclopedia, but rather was assembled posthumously from Razi's working files of readings and personal observations. [My emphasis.]

Razi's "manuscript" was not assembled until after his death. Yet a "Muslim priest" orders that he be beaten over the head with it? What is wrong with this picture?? It's also suspicious that the Muslim priest is not named, thereby making the story all the more difficult to verify.

Do we have a reference for the head beating story?

--Susurrus 05:48, 29 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Or what about this?

His medical career was cut short by his major work, the Kitab al-Hawi fi al-tibb, or "The Comprehensive Book on Medicine", commonly referred to as "al-Hawi". [Followed by the head-beating story.]
Razi suffered failing eyesight for several years, and though he eventually lost all vision he continued to provide medical consultations and often even lectured.

The first person to spot the contadiction wins a teddy bear.

We NEED a reference for this head-beating story. I have performed a quick Google search for a reference. The whole first page of references to that story are all different versions of this Wikipedia article—never a good sign. I have already quoted the dubious material in full above. I therefore see fit to delete it from the article in the absence of any voiced dissent.

--Susurrus 23:25, 30 Nov 2004 (UTC)

A citing of the head beating story appears in "A Prelude to Medical History" by Felix Marti-Ibañez on p. 112. The book was published in back 1961. This obviously predates the Wikipedia article a bit, but unfortunately the book doesn't give a source for the story. Hope this helps in some way.

[edit] Three categories of diseases?

He further classified diseases into three categories: those that are curable, those that can be cured, and those that are incurable.

What is the difference between the first two categories, please?? I think this passage needs reworking...

--Susurrus 05:47, 29 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Start of Editing Article-25 August 2005, finished 11 Sep. 2005

I am new to Wikimedia but I was searching for Al-Razi (for my study on Hermetism/Alchemy) and was very impressed with the immense research of this scholar. Not all of us have the perfect Oxford English level of the English language and I therefore volunteer to do some editing over the coming months. I first checked with the Sandbox to familiarize myself with some basic editing modes and that took some time. I am a student of English and reasonably familiar with alchemical works of the past, because of my recent study of Alchemy. So I hope I can be of some help. I will do my utmost not to change in any way the content or meaning of the article, but will only change structure of sentences and replace verbs with synonyms wherever applicable or needed. CHITRANI 25 August 21.45 (GMT +1)

SEP.07/05 I have edited p.1-8 and added information obtained from: 1. the Alchemy website: Alchemy in Islamic Times by Prof. Hamed Abdel-reheem Ead, Prof. of Chemistry at the Faculty of Science - University of Cairo
2. Brian Copenhaver: Hermetica Cambridge University Press -ISBN 0 521 42543 3 (1992).
3.G.R.S. Mead: Thrice-Greatest Hermes.3 Vol.York Beach (Maine), (1992).
4.Peter Marshall,"Alchemy,the Philosopher's Stone',-[London]: Macmillan, ISBN 90 4390 145 8, (2001). Last sentences on pages spill over and that will be corrected in the future.
CHITRANI- 07 SEP/2005- 18.51 (GMT +1)

FINISHED 11 September 2005. CHITRANI 14:38, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Hermeticism

I removed this section since it did not seem to have any connection to Al-Razi. On the contrary, his style seems completely contrary to the hermetic tradition of mysticism and obscure symbolism. If there is a connection, it should be better expressed and supported by actual evidence from Al-Razi's writings (not just by someone else's unsupported statements). All the best, Jorge Stolfi 04:51, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Hermeticism
Alchemy's source can be traced to the Hermetica, writings attributed to Hermes Trismegistus, Hermes Thrice-Great who is identified with the Egyptian god Thoth, inventor of alchemy and god of Wisdom. It was in ancient Egypt that the Hermetica emerged and reached the state now visible in various treatises of Arabian alchemists and philosophers. Hermeticism encompasses the Art of alchemy (both 'technical' and 'philosophical' alchemy) as well as astrology and talismanic magic. As in so may other respects, Moslems and other non-Europeans of late antiquity and the early middle ages outdid their Western contemporaries in preserving and extending the Hermetic tradition. Alchemical works began to enter Islamic lands from Alexandria as early as the 7th century, even prior to Jabir al-Hayan (known as Geberu). Many Arabian alchemists emerged since and most of them were physicians, just as al-Razi. Their alchemistical experiments lead to the discovery of many medicinal and chemical inventions which laid the foundation for future developments in both sciences.

[edit] Picture

If the artist is unknown, then it's more likely than not a copyvio.... --Jacqui M Schedler 01:09, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Arabic

While likely the Arabic of his name is that of common usage, those that can not read the Arabic script might naturally assume it is his full name given right before it. His full name would be: "ابو بكر محمد بن زكريا الرازى", I believe. To avoid ambiguity the opening could be changed to: "Abū Bakr Muhammad Ibn Zakarīya al-Rāzi; also Abū Bakr Al-Rāzi (ابو بکر الرازی), ...", since I don't believe writing out his full family name is necessary, as he was most likely never referred to by it anyway. Khiradtalk 06:13, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Article name

Surely this page is not named in accordance with Wikipedia rules. Shouldn't it be at Al-Razi, or some such? john k 21:20, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I suppose so. However, since full names are often used in order to disambiguate homonyms, it is not a hard and fast rule, is it? As long as there is a redirect...
Jorge Stolfi 22:38, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)
Are there any other people named Al-Razi? If not, he should go there. Just as we have articles at Avicenna and Averroes rather than Abu Ali al-Husain ibn Abdallah ibn Sina and Abu Al-Walid Muhammad Ibn Ahmad Ibn Rushd. john k 23:27, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Is there any objection to a move to Al-Razi? john k 05:49, 13 Jun 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Article name 2

Why Al-Razi? The name must be Razi. --131.227.231.149 00:26, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

  • Well, we have several options:
"Abu Bakr Muhammad Zakariyah al-Razi" (full Arabic name)
"Zakariyah al-Razi" (common Arabic name)
"Al-Razi" (Arabic name as might be used in English)
"Rhazes" or "Rasis" Latinized names (there may be more), widely used in historical European documents, still used by some
"Razi" (above proposal)
Personally I would be against "Razi" since I don't think it has been widely used in the West (but I may be wrong). Moreover, since it means "of Rayy", it is even less appropriate linguistically than "al-Razi" ("the one from Rayy"). Methinks that in this case "Zakariyah al-Razi" may be the best option, and consistent with the treatment of other historical figures that are known mostly by their surname, e.g. Newton (Isaac Newton).
A year ago someone decided that Jabir should be renamed Geber, so for consistency we should rename Al-Razi as "Rhazes" or "Rasis". But that is problematic because there are various options, and it seems like going backwards.
All the best, Jorge Stolfi 20:35, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
The point is that he is a Persian, and he is not called by the name of "Al-Razi" in Iran, in the West he may have been called Al-Razi by some but I believe Razi is the correct and the name that should be used. -- - K a s h Talk | email 15:06, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Disambiguation?

"Al-Razi" is a fairly generic name, and simply dedicating the whole page to Abu Bakr Muhammad Zakariyah al-Razi is akin to exclusively giving the article "Smith" to Adam Smith. There is another, equally important person with the name Al-Razi: Abu Hatim Al-Razi, a somewhat fundamentalist theologian, who actively engaged in dialogues with Rhazes (the al-Razi of this article.)

Also, Rayy was and is an intellectually fertile region of Iran, thus, its possible that there are more al-Razis, or that more may be produced.

As long as there is only one other "Al-Razi", it can be accomodated by a "for ... see" note at the top of this article (I don't like such notes, but I seem to be a minority of one... 8-() If there are more, they may go to "Al-Razi (disambiguation)". I don't think that "Al-Razi" should be a disambiguation page, because Rhazes is obviously far more important than all the other Al-Razis put together. But it may be indelicate to say so, and other people may even think otherwise.
All the best, Jorge Stolfi 20:35, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] move

The MOS for Arabic is to use solar letters, which means that it should be written as it is pronounced, which is Ar-Razi. Cuñado - Talk 03:48, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Oppose, as noted on the MOS page. Al-Razi is far more common, and the MOS isn't finished yet. —Ruud 07:02, 10 September 2006 (UTC)
If you can show a significant amount of references as al-Razi, then that would be the primary transliteration and it should remain. Otherwise ar-Razi is the standard. The MOS on this subject is clear, and the current voting is to solidify the standard which has been around a long time. Cuñado - Talk 05:09, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
FYI- Googling Al-Razi gets around 143,000 hits, while Ar-Razi get around 52,200 hits. --khello 21:46, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Comment: It's true that Ar-Razi is the correct Arabic pronunciation, but this person is Persian and he was born in Iran, so I believe it's better to rename this article Razi (as pronounced in the Persian language), or the Latinised names Rhazes or Rasis (like Avicenna). —MK (talk) 06:14, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
Support. Per MOS. Although "Al-Razi" is more referenced, "Ar-Razi" is more correct methinks --khello 21:46, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Former FA

Former FA? Why not revert back to the FA class and make it a FA article? --Striver 08:39, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

This article is really informative, but reading through why it was stripped of its FA status I can see why- it is full of lists. What would other editors think of moving all the lists of books/publications by Al-Razi to another article, called something like List of Al-Razi works? or is that not accepted "wikipedia style"? We could move the summaries of all that work there, and just have a brief paragraph directing to the new article. Thoughts? --khello 01:43, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Freethinker

I had originally read about al-Razi on a website which mentioned his condemnation of Islam, his rejection of religious faith, his denouncement of people who were known as prophets, and his criticism of the Qur'an. I mean, he did write books called "The Prophet's Fraudulent Tricks" and "On the Refutation of Revealed Religions". Coming to this page, however, it seems that one would be rather hard-pressed to find any strong expression of this. For instance, the article mentions A'lam al-Nubuwwah, which is a book of response to a lost book of al-Razi's, which had made some controversial claims. The article also quotes him on his view of prophetically-revealed religions, which is not a favorable one. Here is a summary of al-Razi's views in his lost book, as it is expressed in the response:

(1)All men are by norted mixture of "absurd and inconsistent fables," which has ridiculously been judged inimitable, when, in fact, its language, style, and its much vaunted "eloquence" are far from being faultless. Custom, tradition, and intellectual laziness lead men to follow their religious leaders blindly. Religions have been the sole cause of the bloody wars that have ravaged mankind. Religions have also been resolutely hostile to philosophical speculation and to scientific research. The so-called holy scriptures are worthless and have done more harm than good, whereas the "writings of the ancients like Plato, Aristotle, Euclid, and Hippocrates have rendered much greater service to humanity."
(2) "The people who gather round the religious leaders are either feeble-minded, or they are women and adolescents. Religion stifles truth and fosters enmity. If a book in itself constitutes a demonstration that it is true revelation, the treatises of geometry, astronomy, medicine and logic can justify such a claim much better than the Qur'an [the transcendent literary beauty of which, denied by Razi, was thought by orthodox Muslims to prove the truth of Muhammad’s mission]."


Al-Razi was more a deist than an actual Muslim, probably comparable to calling some of the Founding Fathers Christians. However, the article seems to attribute some parts of his philosophy to the very religion he is opposed to, without warrant:

It is quite evident that most of his thoughts were derived from the Islam

Really, is it? Because it seems to echo a more independent, general monotheism to me. Obviously, we all bear a little bit of baggage from the realm of thought we were born into, but I don't believe it's fair to attribute his opinions so assuredly to Islamic thought, especially with the statement that "most" of his ideas came from "the Islam".

Hopefully, I'll be able to use a few of the sources, both online and print, to help add a more reasonable representation of al-Razi's stance on religion and prophecy. I'm rather lazy, so it might be ages until I get around to it.--C.Logan 19:38, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] State of the article.

I'm surprised to see this as a former featured article, because the article looks to be in a bad state. Almost no citations (footnotes), weasel and peacock terms throughout, a rambling style, a load of irrelevant or overly specific information scattered throughout, etc.

Couldn't the sections dealing with his writings be moved to a separate article, such as Works of Al-Razi, or something? The article is very quote-heavy, and although the article definitely presents a lot of information, it's hard to verify any of it without citations in-text. I believe the only actual citation was in the section I had a hand in editing some time ago, concerning Razi's harsh criticism of Islam. As I'm no great expert on Razi, it would be difficult for me to determine what is essential and what is extraneous.

We need to remember that this an encyclopedic biography, and we should try to keep it as concise and readable as possible. As it is, it fails in this qualification.--C.Logan 18:22, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] On religion section...full of b.s.?

Seriously when did al-Razi say any of that which the authors of the article claim him to say? What books he wrote mentioned them? As the article is written now, it sounds like: "well, bob said that steve said...." I think the original books were those quotes are written should be mentioned or the whole section should be deleted. 213.42.21.156 —Preceding signed but undated comment was added at 14:04, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

The books are already given in the first sentence of the section. Please read the section thoroughly before you make complaints.--C.Logan 18:56, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Beans cause blindness

The article references his blindness was caused by beans. I checked the wiki entry for the broad beans, and there are no health issues related to blindness listed. Should this be removed? Pgrote 17:04, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Don't you hate having to clean up after other editors' unsourced unlikely-sounding stuff? Anyway, you might also want to consider removing it as a copyvio. See this book. Dicklyon 22:35, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sad reflection on this article

Am I the only one who thinks this revision of this article is far superior to what is currently the revision served to our readers? BTW in case you haven't clicked it yet, that revision is from April 2003, that is to say 5 years ago. *deep sigh* -- 82.181.254.50 (talk) 20:10, 29 April 2008 (UTC)