Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Influenced
Early life
Not much is known about al-Jāḥiẓ's early
life, but his family was very poor. Born in
Basra early in 160/February 776, he
asserted in a book he wrote that he was a
member of the Arabian tribe Banu
Kinanah.[1][2] His nephew also reported
that al-Jāḥiẓ's grandfather was a black
cameleer.[3]
Career
Death
Al-Jāḥiẓ returned to Basra with
hemiplegia after spending more than fifty
years in Baghdad. He died in Basra in the
Arabic month of Muharram in AH
255/December 868-January 869 CE.[12]
His exact cause of death is not clear, but
a popular assumption is that al-Jāḥiẓ died
in his private library after one of many
large piles of books fell on him, killing him
instantly. [13]
See also
Shu'ubiyya
Ajam
List of Arab scientists and scholars
References
1. Al-Jahiz messages, Alwarraq edition,
page 188; Yāqūt, Irshād al-arīb ilá ma`rifat
al-adīb, ed. Iḥsān `Abbās, 7 vols (Beirut:
Dār al-Gharb al-Islāmī, 1993), 5:2102.
2. Chuo Kikuu cha Dar es Salaam. Chuo
cha Uchunguzi wa Lugha ya Kiswahili
(1974). Kiswahili . East African Swahili
Committee. p. 16.; Yāqūt, Irshād al-arīb
ilá ma`rifat al-adīb, ed. Iḥsān `Abbās, 7
vols (Beirut: Dār al-Gharb al-Islāmī, 1993),
5:2102.
3. https://books.google.com/books?
id=owqY-90imMIC&pg=PA152
4. Shawqi Daif, Introduction to Ibn
Mada's Refutation of the Grammarians,
pg. 48. Cairo, 1947.
5. Kennedy 2006, p. 252.
6. F. E., Peters (1968). Aristotle and the
Arabs: The Aristotelian Tradition in Islam.
New York University Press. p. 133.
7. Mattock, J. N. (1971). "Review:
Aristotle and the Arabs: The Aristotelian
Tradition in Islam by F. E. Peters".
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and
African Studies, University of London. 34
(1): 147–148.
doi:10.1017/s0041977x00141722 .
JSTOR 614638 . "...there is much more in
al-Jāḥiẓ, enough to indicate that he used
a version of Aristotle (or an epitome), but
still not very much. If al-Baghdadi thought
that the Kitab al-hayawan was a
plagiarism of the Aristotelian work he was
either a fool or unacquainted with
Aristotle."
8. Zirkle C (1941). "Natural Selection
before the "Origin of Species" ".
Proceedings of the American
Philosophical Society. 84 (1): 71–123.
9. G. J. H. Van Gelder, Beyond the Line:
Classical Arabic Literary Critics on the
Coherence and Unity of the Poem, pg. 2.
Volume 8 of Studies in Arabic literature:
Supplements to the Journal of Arabic
Literature. Leiden: Brill Publishers, 1982.
ISBN 9789004068544
10. G.J. van Gelder, "Brevity in Classical
Arabic Literary Theory." Taken from
Proceedings of the Ninth Congress of the
Union Européenne Des Arabisants Et
Islamisants: Amsterdam, 1 to 7
September 1978, pg. 81. Ed. Rudolph
Peters. Volume 4 of Publications of the
Netherlands Institute of Archaeology and
Arabic Studies in Cairo. Leiden: Brill
Archive, 1981. ISBN 9789004063808
11. "Medieval Sourcebook: Abû Ûthmân
al-Jâhith: From The Essays, c. 860 CE" .
Retrieved 2 October 2014.
12. al-Ṣūlī, Muḥammad ibn Yaḥyá (1998).
Kniga listov. Sankt-Peterburg: T͡Sentr
"Peterburgskoe vostokovedenie". p. 392.
13. Pellat, C. (1990). "Al-Jahiz". In
Ashtiany, Julia; Johnstone, T.M.; Latham,
J.D.; Serjeat, R.B.; Rex Smith, G. Abbasid
Belles Lettres . Cambridge, UK:
Cambridge University Press. p. 81.
Retrieved 10 January 2017. "A late
tradition clams that Jahiz...was
smothered to death under an avalanche
of books."
Sources
Kennedy, Hugh (2006). When Baghdad
Ruled the Muslim World: The Rise and
Fall of Islam's Greatest Dynasty .
Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press.
ISBN 978-0-306814808.
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