Part 1
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AVICENA’S OFFERING _to the_ PRINCE
«E l’anima umana la qual è colla nobiltà della potenzia ultima, cioè ragione, participa della divina natura a guisa di sempiterna Intelligenza; perocchè l’anima è tanto in quella sovrana potenzia nobilitata, e dinudata da materia, che la divina luce, come in Angiolo, raggia in quella; e però è l’uomo divino animale da’ Filosofi chiamato.»[1]
(=Dante=, _Convito_, III, 2.)
STAMPERIA DI NICOLA PADERNO _S. Salvatore Corte Regia, 10_ VERONA, ITALIA
A COMPENDIUM ON THE SOUL,
BY _Abû-'Aly al-Husayn Ibn 'Abdallah Ibn Sînâ:_
TRANSLATED, FROM THE ARABIC ORIGINAL, BY EDWARD ABBOTT van DYCK,
WITH Grateful Acknowledgement of the Substantial Help OBTAINED From Dr. S. Landauer’s Concise German Translation, AND FROM James Middleton MacDonald’s Literal English Translation;
AND PRINTED AT _VERONA, ITALY, in THE YEAR 1906_, For the Use of Pupils and Students of Government Schools IN _Cairo, Egypt_.
PREFACE
Several sources out of which to draw information and seek guidance as to Ibn Sînâ’s biography and writings, and his systems of medicine and philosophy, are nowadays easily accessible to nearly every one. Among such sources the following are the best for Egyptian students:
1. Ibn Abi Uçaybi´ah’s “Tabaqât-ul-Atib-ba,” and Wuestenfeld’s “Arabische Aertzte.”
2. Ibn Khallikân’s “Wafâyât-ul-A´ayân.”
3. Brockelmann’s “Arabische Literatur.”
4. F. Mehren’s Series of Essays on Ibn Sînâ in the Periodical “Muséon” from the year 1882 and on.
5. Clément Huart’s Arabic Literature, either in the French Original or in the English Translation.
6. Carra de Vaux’s “Les Grands Philosophes: Avicenna,” Paris, Felix Alcan, 1900, pp. vii et 302.
7. T. de Boer’s “History of Philosophy in Islâm,” both in Dutch and in the English translation.
The “Offering to the Prince in the Form of a Compendium on the Soul,” of which the present Pamphlet is my attempt at an English Translation, is the least known throughout Egypt and Syria of all Ibn Sînâ’s many and able literary works: indeed I have failed, after repeated and prolonged enquiry, to come across so much as one, among my many Egyptian acquaintances, that had even heard of it.
Doctor Samuel Landauer of the University of Strassburg published both the Arabic text, and his own concise German translation, of this Research into the Faculties of the Soul, in volume 29 for the year 1875 of the Z.d.D.M.G., together with his critical notes and exhaustively erudite confrontations of the original Arabic with many Greek passages from Plato, Aristotle, Alexander Aphrodisias, and others, that Ibn Sînâ had access to, it would appear, second hand, i.e. through translations. Doctor Landauer made use also of a very rare Latin translation by Andreas Alpagus, printed at Venice in 1546; and of the Cassel second edition of Jehuda Hallévy’s religious Dialogue entitled Khusari, which is in rabbinical Hebrew, and on pages 385 to 400 of which the views of “philosophers” on the Soul are set forth, Doctor Landauer having discovered to his agreeable surprise that those 15 pages are simply a word for word excerpt from this Research by Ibn Sînâ. For the Arabic text itself, he had at his command only two manuscript copies, the one, preserved in the Library at Leyden, being very faulty; and the other, in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana at Milan, being far more accurate and correct.
This text was reprinted talis qualis, but with omission of every kind of note, in 1884 at Beirût, Syria, by Khalîl Sarkîs: this reprint is very hard to find.
James Middleton MacDonald, M.A., made a studiedly literal English translation or rather a construe of it in 1884, of which he got a small number printed in pamphlet form at Beirût, and by Khalîl Sarkîs also: this English Version too is very rare, and almost unknown.
* * * * *
My present English rendering of this Essay by Avicena on the Powers of the Soul has been made directly and finally from the Arabic Original as given in the Landauer Text, with constant consultation however of both the Landauer German translation and the MacDonald English construe: it has been made not for European scholars and Arabists but solely for pupil students in Egypt, which circumstance called in a great measure for the use of two or more nearly synonymous words where the Arabic original often has but one only. Indeed I am not ashamed to say further that in some places I have failed to follow the drift and understand the purport of Ibn Sînâ’s argument; so that in such passages I am only too conscious of how far my rendering may perhaps have wandered from the right and true sense. But the author himself declares that psychology is one of the deepest and darkest of studies; and he relates of himself in his autobiography that he had read one of Aristotle’s writings forty times over, until he had got it by heart, and yet had failed to see the point. And he goes on to tell of how it was that he one day stumbled across and then read over al-Fârâbî’s “Maqâçid Aristotle,” whereupon mental light dawned upon him as to the purport of that writing.
Those for whom I have made it now know why this my English version is often timid and wavering, nay sometimes even wordy and hazy.
* * * * *
The end of the next year’s session will in all likelihood bring with it the cessation of my connection with the Khedivial School of Law. More than this: I am getting well on in life, so that this translation will most likely be the last serious work that I shall ever perform in the service of Young Egypt. Such reflections awaken in my inmost soul all sorts of feelings and thoughts about the shortness and fleetingness of this earthly life, the happiness of childhood and youth, the darkness of the grave, and the utter despair that will surely engulf the soul at the last hours, unless--mark my words--unless the strong arm of our Heavenly Father lay hold upon this soul that is now within me, and take it off and up, to be joined unto the millions of souls of all, all those who have gone before, whither too shall follow so many, many other millions; in a word, unless GOD have mercy upon me, even as He has had mercy upon my forefathers and mothers since many generations. This hope in His mercy and grace is my ever-strengthening prop and stay, the older and feebler I get. Nor will any of those for whom I write these lines ever find a stronger or a better. And the time will very soon come when each and every one of them, however long may be his life here below, will surely need it, to save him from sinking into the black nothingness of doubt, indifference, and despair.
EDWARD ABBOTT van DYCK.
VERONA, _August, 1906_.
Wer fertig ist, dem ist nichts recht zu machen: Ein werdender wird immer dankbar sein.[2]
[Lustige Person, in Goethe’s Faust]
FOOTNOTES:
[1] _Note added by transcriber_: From the translation of Dante's _Il Convito_ (The Banquet) by Elizabeth Sayer Price (in Project Gutenberg: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12867):
And the Human Soul possessing the nobility of the highest power, which is Reason, participates in the Divine Nature, after the manner of an eternal Intelligence: for the Soul is ennobled and denuded of matter by that Sovereign Power in proportion as the Divine Light of Truth shines into it, as into an Angel; and Man is therefore called by the Philosophers the Divine Animal.
[2] _Note added by the transcriber_: From the translation of Goethe's _Faust_ by Bayard Taylor (in Project Gutenberg: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/14591):
A mind once formed, is never suited after; One yet in growth will ever grateful be.
[Funny Person, in Goethe’s Faust]
INTRODUCTION
In the Name of GOD, the Merciful, the Compassionate: May GOD bless our Lord Muhammad and his Kinsfolk, and give them peace. O my God facilitate [this undertaking]; and make [it] end in good, O Thou Bounteous Being!
Abu-´Aly, Ibn Sînâ, the chief elder, learnèd and erudite leader, the precise and accurate researcher, Truth’s plea against mankind, the physician of physicians, the philosopher of Islâm, may the Most High GOD have mercy upon him, saith:--
The best of beginnings is that which is adorned with praise to the Giver of strength for praising Him; and for invoking blessing and peace upon our Lord Muhammad, His prophet and servant, and upon his good and pure offspring after him. And after this beginning, he saith further:--
Had not custom given leave to the small and low to reach up to the great and high, it would be most difficult for them ever to tread those paths in going over which they need to lay hold of their upholding arm[3] and seek the help of their superior strength; to attain to a position in their service, and join themselves to their social circle; to pride themselves on having become connected with them, and openly declare their reliance upon them. Nay, the very bond which joins the common man to the man of élite would be severed, and the reliance of the flock upon its shepherd would cease; the frail would no longer become powerful through the strength of the mighty, nor the low-born rise through the protection and countenance of the high-born; the foolish would not be able to correct his folly and ignorance by intercourse with the prudent and wise; nor the wise draw nigh to the ignorant and foolish.
And whereas I find that custom has trod along this highroad, and prescribed this usage, I avail myself of such a precedent and excuse to warrant my reaching up and aspiring to the Prince, GOD give him long life, with an offering [an acceptable present]; and I have given prevalence to the thought that my choice ought to fall upon an object which will at once be most acceptable to him, and best calculated to attain my aim of ingratiating myself into his favor; and this, after coming to the certain conclusion that the chief virtues are two, namely 1. Love of wisdom as to the Articles of Faith, (i.e., Love of Philosophy in theoretical principles); and 2. Choice of the most honest of deeds as to intention (i.e., the preference of pure purposes in practical life).
And in this connection I find the Prince, God prolong his days, to have given to his intrinsically worthy character so much of the polish and lustre imparted by wisdom that he far outstrips his rivals among the princes, and overtops all such as are of his kind. And hence I clearly perceive that of all presents the one he will appreciate most is such as conduces to the most precious of the virtues, to wit wisdom. I had, however, so far profitted from a careful perusal of the books of the learnèd as to find their researches into the spiritual faculties among the most abstruse and refractory against the mind’s grasping what they mean, and the most bewildering, obscure and misleading as to their results. And yet I have seen it reported about a number of wise men (philosophers) and pious[4] saints that they agree in this dictum (motto), viz: “Whoso Knoweth himself, Knoweth his Lord”; and I have also heard the Chief of the Philosophers say, in agreement with their saying: “Whoso faileth to Know himself, is still more likely (apt) to fail of Knowing his Creator”; and “How shall he, who is trusted as a reliable authority in a science, be deemed to have any views at all, when he is ignorant of himself?” I see further the Book of the Most High GOD pointing to the measure of truth of this, where He says, when mentioning the distance separating the Erring from His mercy: Surah 59, al-Hashr, v. 19: “they forgot God, and He made them forget themselves”; is not His making the forgetting of self to depend upon forgetting Him done so as to awaken the attention to His closely binding the remembrance of Him with the remembrance of self, and the knowledge of Him with the knowledge of self, scilicet of one’s own soul? Furthermore, I have read in the books of the ancients that the hard task of going deeply into the knowledge of self had been enjoined upon them by an oracle that had descended upon them at one of the temples of the gods, which says: “Know thyself, O man, so shalt thou know thy Lord.” I have also read that this saying was engraved in the façade of the temple of Aesculapius, who is known among them as one of the prophets, and whose most famous miracle is that he was wont to heal the sick by mere loud supplication; and so did all priests who performed sacerdotal functions in his temple. From him have philosophers got the science of medicine.
Thus I have thought fit to make for the Prince[5] a book on the soul, in the form of a compendium; and I ask the Most High God to prolong his life, to keep intact from the evil eye his frail and mortal body, to refresh through him wisdom after its fading, to revive it after its languishing, to renew its might through his might, and to give it length of days through length of days to him, in order that by his prestige the advantages accruing from the prestige of its kin shall become all-embracing, and that the number of the seekers after its fullness shall abound. Nor shall I achieve this my ambition save through God: He is my all-sufficient stay, and best helper. I have arranged the Book in sections, ten in all:--
1. To Establish the Existence of the Faculties of the Soul, the detailed analysis and explanation of which I have undertaken.
2. Division and Classification of the Primary (Primitive) Faculties of the Soul, and Definition of the Soul at large (or as a whole).
3. That None of the Faculties of the Soul originates from the Combination (Blending) of the Four Elements, but on the contrary comes upon them from without.
4. Detailed Statement concerning the Vegetable Powers (faculties), and Mentioning the Need for Each One of them.
5. Detailed Statement concerning the Animal Faculties (powers), and Mentioning the Need for Each One of them.
6. Detailed Statement concerning the External (Apparent) Senses, and How they perceive, mentioning the Disagreement [of researchers] as to How Seeing is performed.
7. Detailed Statement concerning the Internal (Hidden) Senses, and the Body Moving Power.
8. Memoir on the Human Soul from the Stage of its Beginning to the Stage of its Perfection.
9. Establishing the Proofs necessary for affirming the Essentiality of the Speaking (Rational) Soul, by the logical method.
10. Establishing the Argument for the Existence of an Intellectual Essence, distinct from Bodies, standing to the Rational (speaking) Faculties in the stead of a Fountain, and in the stead of Light to Sight; and Showing that Rational (speaking) Souls remain united with It after the death of the body, secure and safe from corruption and change; and It is what is called Universal (generic) Intelligence.
FOOTNOTES:
[3] The figure of speech in the Arabic is «loopholes»; compare Surah 2:257, and 31:21, and Beydâwi’s Commentary.
[4] The «waly» performs miracles only, whereas the «naby» performs miracles, and also foretells future events.
[5] Who was this prince; and why did the author stand in such need of his countenance as to dedicate to him this booklet in the humble and lengthy terms of apology which run through the greater part of the Introduction? It is Doctor S. Landauer’s opinion that, with this Essay, Ibn Sînâ began his career as a writer. After he had completed the sixteenth year of his age, he was summoned to the bedside of the suffering Sâmânid prince, Nûh ibn Mançûr, who resided at Bukhâra (See Ibn Khallikân’s Biographies), and succeeded in curing him. Then, followed a long period during which Ibn Sînâ removed from the Court of one Ruler to that of another, and was successively engaged in the service of various Petty Dynasties in Khurasân. If then this Essay was his maiden production--as Doctor Landauer assumes--the author was still quite young, and stood in need of the patronage he so earnestly implores. Furthermore there is a manuscript in Leyden, marked Codex 958, and numbered 1968 in the Catalogue, which is a small treatise on the soul by Ibn Sînâ, closing as follows:
«I had produced a short essay on the exposition of the knowledge of the soul, and what is connected therewith, at the beginning of my career forty years ago, after the purely philosophical method of investigation. Whoso wishes to know that method, let him peruse it, for it is adapted to the seekers of research.»
The «40 years ago» fit exactly, if students one assumes that the literary production referred to is the one he dedicated to «the Prince.» Now, the first prince he came in contact with was Nûh ibn Mançûr (ruled from 366-387 H. = 976-997 A.D., the Eighth of the Sâmânid Dynasty). Ibn Khallikân relates that Ibn Sînâ, at the age of 16 years, had begun to have a great reputation as a physician. Moreover the Latin translation in Florence of this essay bears in express words the dedication to Nûh. Result:
Ibn Sînâ born in 370 H. = 980 A.D.
Earliest Age as Treating Physician 386 H. = 996
Death of Nûh in Month of Ragab 387 H. = 997 Jule
Death of Ibn Sînâ 428 H. = 1036
Between 386 and 428 lie the 40 years.
SECTION FIRST
=To Establish the Existence of the Spiritual Faculties, the Detailed Analysis of which I have undertaken.=
Whoso wishes to describe anything whatsoever before proceeding to establish first its [6]reality of existence, such a one is counted by the wise among those who deviate from the broad beaten track of perspicuous statement. It is incumbent upon us, therefore, to first set to work to establish the existence of the spiritual powers, before starting to define each one of them singly, and enlarge upon it.
And whereas the most peculiar characteristics of spiritual properties are two--one of them Setting in Motion (Impulsion), and the other Perception--it is incumbent upon us to show that to every moving body there is a [A]moving cause (ground, reason, motive, pretence). Then it will become evident to us therefrom that bodies moving in motions over and above the natural motions--an example of natural motions is the sinking of the heavy, and the rising of the light--have moving[B] causes, which we call souls or spiritual powers; and that we further show that any body, in so far as it shows signs (traces) that it is perceptive, such perception by it cannot be validly ascribed to its body, except because of powers (faculties) in it that are capable of perception.
We now start by saying that not a shadow of doubt or perplexity hampers the mind, as to things, that some of them share some one thing in common, and differ in an other; and that that which is shared in common is other than that in which they differ. The mind encounters all bodies whatsoever as having this in common, viz. that they are bodies; and afterwards it encounters them as differing in that they move (in different ways); otherwise there would be no such thing as rest of a body, and not even such a thing as motion of a body, except along a circle, seeing that of motion in a straight line it is established by its very form that it will not proceed save from stoppings and to stoppings (resting-places to resting-places). Hence it is evident that bodies are not to be clothed with the attribute of motion because they are bodies, but for reasons (causes) above and beyond their corporeity, from which causes their motions proceed, like the resulting of the footprint from the walker (or, just as the effect proceeds from the agent).
So much having become clear to us, we say that we find, among bodies generated from the Four Elements,[7] such as moves, not by constraint, in two kinds of motion between which there is more or less difference: The one kind inherent in its element by reason of the supremacy over it of the power of one of its constituents, and thus decreeing its motion towards the position in space naturally appointed for it, as for example a man’s moving by the nature of the preponderating[8] heavy element in his body downwards; nor will this kind of the motions of bodies be found to take place save in one direction and with a constant tendency; The second kind of motion going against the decree of its element, which decree is either rest in the natural position as soon as it reaches that position, as for example a man’s moving his body along its natural home which is the Earth’s surface; or else a moving away from the natural position when already separated from it, like a flying bird’s motion with its heavy body high up through the sky. It has thus been made manifest [to the reader] that the two motions have two accounting causes, and that they are quite different one from the other: the one is called Natural, and the second called Soul or Spiritual Faculty. Hence it is quite sound, as to motion, to affirm the existence of spiritual faculties.
Whereas, in respect of Perception, because that bodies exist with this in common, viz. that they are bodies, and with this in distinction, viz. that they are repeatedly perceptive, it is quite manifest by the first (preceding) process of discrimination that perception will not ever differ from bodies through difference of their substance, but by certain powers or faculties borne within those bodies. It therefore becomes quite clear by this sort of exposition that spiritual faculties have an existence: and this is what we wished to demonstrate.
FOOTNOTES:
[6] Reality of existence; or its whereabouts. Doctor S. Landauer thinks that the word ayniyyat in the text must be wrong, because nowhere throughout this section is the «Whereabout» of the mental powers so much as hinted at; whereas the burden of the whole chapter is to prove merely that such powers do exist, i.e., their inniyyat, which is a word used by Arab Logicians.
[A] A Why and Wherefore moving it. Note the difference between sabab and `illah. _Transcriber addition:_ sabab (سبب) and `illat (علّة): Sabab means the general conditions that are conducive to something occuring, whereas `illat is the reason in cause-and-effect. Traditionally, `illat is used in logic or medicine, whereas sabab would be more likely to be heard in common speech.
[B] Ditto.
[7] The four elements: earth, air, fire, water.
[8] Here Ibn Sînâ seems to have had a rather clear premonition of Newton’s Theory of Gravitation, seven hundred years before the falling of the famous apple.
SECTION SECOND
=Of the Division of the Spiritual Faculties and their Classification into Three Main Classes, and the Definition of the Soul in a General Way.=
SUB-SECTION A: