Iranian Influence on Moslem Literature, Part I

by Konstantin Aleksandrovich Inostrantzev

CHAPTER VI

The list of the translators from Persian into Arabic as given in the
Fihrist, (244, 25-245, 6) 75

The different categories of these translators

Omar ibn al Farrukhan of Tabaristan (Fihrist 273, 14-18) and his Kitab al Mahasin 79

Other authors of books of analogous titles in the first centuries of Islam,—the relation of these books to the books of "Virtues and Vices" (cf. Baihaqi, pseudo-Jahiz) and the connection of these books with the Parsi religious idea of the licit and the illicit,—Al Mahasin wal Masavi, and the Shayast la Shayast. 83

TRANSLATORS FROM PAHLAVI.

In the Fihrist (244, 25-245, 6) are stated a number of names of the principal translators from the Persian into the Arabic language. Assuredly this list is far from complete. The author names only a few calling attention to only particular translators. The passage in question in the Fihrist has been more than once utilised. The entire section has not been exhaustively examined. We believe that from it we can infer the general character of the contents of those translations which were prepared from Persian into Arabic and can gather some further indices regarding this list of names.

To examine the list of translators in order. First of all as may be expected is mentioned Ibn al Muqaffa about whom the Fihrist speaks in detail at another place. Then follow the family of Naubakht; Musa and Yusuf, the sons of Khalid; Abul Hasan Ali ibn Zyad at Tamimi—of his principal translations is mentioned "the Tables of Shahriyar;" Hasan ibn Sahal mentioned at the head of astronomers; Balazuri; Jabala ibn Salem, secretary of Hisham; Ishak ibn Yazid, translator of the Persian history entitled Khuday Nameh; Muhammad ibn al Jahm al Barmaki; Hisham ibn al Kasim; Musa ibn Isa al Kisravi; Zaduya ibn Shahuya al Isfahani; Muhammad ibn Behram al Isfahani; Behram ibn Mardanshah, Mobed mobedan of the City of Sabur in Fars; Umar ibn al Farrukhan of whom special mention is made by the author of the Fihrist.

An examination of the aforesaid names of translators in order would, it seems to us, afford material for the solution of the problem regarding the different varieties of Persian literary tradition in the first centuries of Islam. Ibn al Muqaffa stands in the first place belonging to him by right. He was a genuine encyclopaedic translator familiar with the Arab society with all its influence of spiritual Sasanian life of Persia finding expression in its literature. He translated scientific, epico-historical, and ethico-didactic books. Hence we can understand that in the Fihrist has been assigned to him a special notice as noted by us above.

The family of Naubakht, mentioned next, represents a group of scholars mentioned separately in the Fihrist.[1] The head of the Naubakhts, was an astronomer to the Khalif Mansur and his son Abu Sahl succeeded to his father's occupation. The grandsons of Naubakht wrote books on astronomy as well as jurisprudence. Persian literary tradition is earliest recognised in the astronomical works of the grandsons of Naubakht. The author of the Fihrist places this Hasan ibn Sahl, as already indicated by Flugel, at the head of astronomers. And the same scientific character no doubt was attached to the activities of Musa and Yusuf,[2] the sons of Khalid mentioned there as well as at Tamimi, the author of the astronomical tables Zichash Shahriyar. In this manner these translators mentioned after Ibn al Mukaffa constituted in a manner a peculiar group of scholars who prepared translations from Pahlavi into Arabic.

[Footnote 1: 176, 20-177, 9; 177, 9-19; 274, 7-13; 275, 25-6. See Ibn al
Kifti 165, 1-5 and 409, 3-14.]

[Footnote 2: See Ibn al Kifti, 1711, 10-11.]

Balazuri and Jabala ibn Salem have already been mentioned above. The first translated into verse a Book of the Counsels of Ardeshir and the second the Book of Rustam and Isfandiyar as well as the romance of Behram Chobin. In this way the themes handled by these writers may be called epico-historical and ethico-didactic. Purely historical questions interested the seven succeeding translators from Ishaq ibn Yazid to Mobed Behram. These persons are sufficiently known in their special departments of literature. They were the translators into the Arabic language of the Khuday Nameh.[1] Accordingly we may group them in a class by themselves.

[Footnote 1: Compare the essay of Rosen mentioned above On the question of the Arabic translations of the Khuday Nameh, 173-176, and 182-186.]

The next author mentioned at this place in the Fihrist as a translator stands by himself,—Umar ibn al Farrukhan. He is altogether unknown as a translator of historical works. Hence he was not included in the group of persons mentioned before. On the other hand, had he been set down in this passage of the Fihrist as a translator of scientific works he would have been assigned a place not at the close of the list but in the middle of the translators of this class of books, that is, after Ibn Muqaffa and in the midst of the descendants of Naubakht and other persons mentioned above. Therefore we think that Umar ibn Farrukhan was a translator of another species of work or, may be, works. In support of our assumption we must call attention to that place in the Fihrist where are enumerated the books of this author and to which an-Nadhin himself refers in the analysis of the number of translators from Persian into Arabic.

Besides this place in the Fihrist, Umar ibn Farrukhan of Tabaristan has been mentioned in two other places. Once briefly,[1] (268, 25-26) as the annotator of the astronomical book of Dorotheya Sidonia and in another place (277, 14-18) in a few lines[2] specially devoted to him. Here he is mentioned as the annotator of Ptolemy as translated by Batrik Yahuya ibn al Batrik and as the author of two books, one of astronomical contents and the other entitled Kitab al Mahasin, that is the book of good qualities and manners.[3] This latter book demands a few lines from us.

[Footnote 1: Ibn al Qifti 184, 9—10.]

[Footnote 2: Ibn al Kifti 241, 20-242, 12. (This has been pointed out in the Fihrist Vol. II, 110-111, and in ZDMG XXV, 1871, 413—415.) Further mention of him in the same book 98, 9 and 184, 10.]

[Footnote 3: An account of the literary activity of this author was given in the work of H. Suter, Die Mathematiker und Astronomen der Araber und ihre Werke, Abhandiungen Zur Geschichte der mathematischer Wissenschaften Supplement zum, 45 Jahrgang der Zeitschrift fur Mathematik und Physik, Leipzig, 1900, 7-8. Haji Khalfa cites only the astrological books of Omar Ibn Farrukhan I, 198 and V, 35, 386. See also Justi Namenbuch 95, Nos. 15 and 19.]

Umar ibn Farrukhan is mentioned in the section of books on astronomy, mathematics, physics, mechanics, and music. In this group are mentioned a number of writers who composed works on these sciences, beginning with Euclid and ending with the contemporary authors of an-Nadhin. In the midst of them, an-Nadhin has also mentioned the grandsons of Naubakht. Not one of them wrote any Kitab al Mahasin which appears, therefore, to be the independent work of Umar ibn Farrukhan. This book, further, could not have been of a scientific astronomical, or mathematical nature as is obvious from its subject-matter which related to good manners and conduct. This book has been mentioned in this group only because here are enumerated the works of Umar ibn Farrukhan. And good manners and conduct constituted, as we saw above, a favourite theme of Parsi literature: wherefor the book heads the list. Similar to it are the contents not only of Andarzes and Pand Namehs but of a series of tracts on religious subjects. Hence we think that it was mainly owing to this book that Umar ibn Farrukhan was included among the number of principal translators from Persian into Arabic and came to be enumerated among the translators to whom is ascribed a certain amount of speciality. For he was the solitary representative of his category of translators of ethicodidactic books intimately connected with the problems of the Paris religion. Possibly Umar ibn Farrukhan was the first to introduce this species of literature into Arabic, and we must add, employed for his material as well as ideas Parsi tracts. Originally from Tabaristan, he, in the words of Ibn al Qifti, was introduced to Abu Maashar al Balkhi, stood well with Jaffer the Barmecide, and subsequently with Fazl ibn Sahl, the Wazir who recommended him to his sovereign al-Mamum. And for this Khalif Mamun he prepared a number of translations. The sympathy of these persons for the Persian literary tradition could not have been confined to the translation of scientific works, but must have extended to the preservation of Persian ethico-didactic tradition in literature.

Books with the title of Kitab al Mahasin are to be met with in the Fihrist, if not often, several times. A book with this title (77, 21) has been ascribed to the celebrated Ibn Qutaiba. It was composed doubtless after the book of Umar ibn Farrukhan, for Qutaiba flourished at the close of the reign of Mamun and his literary activities could be referred to the ninth century. Qutaiba undoubtedly interested himself in Persian literary materials. Hence it can be concluded that his Kitab al Mahasin was not foreign to the materials and in form could be the first imitation of Farrukhan. Further it is interesting to note that books with this title were attributed especially to Shia authors such as Abu Nadar Muhamed ibn Masud al Ayashi who wrote Kitab al Mahasin al Akhlak or a book of good morals (195, 10) and Abu Abdullah Muhammad ibn Khallid al Barki who wrote Kitab al Mahasin (2213-4, also 7-9). And the interest of Shia authors in Persian tradition was unquestionable. A book with the same title of Kitab al Mahasin is ascribed to a certain Ibn al Harun, (148, 17) an author who has been assigned in the Fihrist a place among the writers on Adab and as responsible for a book called Kitab al Adab. Now the discussion of Adab as we said above is intimately connected with Persian tradition. And this tradition probably survived in the books which had for their theme "the good qualities of Adab."[1] We believe that all these books were devoted to Persian literary tradition, in close relation to which stands the book on "good qualities and manners" mentioned in the Fihrist as translated from the Persian language into Arabic by the man from Tabaristan, Umar ibn al Farrukhan.

[Footnote 1: For instance, Mahasin al Adab of Ispahani, see
Brockelmann, Geschichte der Arabischen Litterature I. 351.]

Co-related with these books on "good qualities" stand, in our opinion, the books on "good morals and their opposite," or "goodness and wickedness," Kutub al Mahasin wal Azdad, or Kutub al Mahasin wal Masawi. Although in the Fihrist we do not come across books with this title, we have a book so named from the beginning of the tenth century whose author was Ibrahim ibn Muhammad al Baihaki.[1] Under the title of Kitab al Mahasin wal Azdad we likewise possess a work ascribed to Jahiz.[2] Both these books evidently go to a common origin.[3] It is quite possible that antithesis was originally not excluded from these Kutub al-Mahasin, from which were developed a special species of educative treatises,—those on "good qualities and their opposites." Continuing our comparison with the Parsi literature, we notice that a similar kind of antithesis is most commonly employed there.

[Footnote 1: Ibrahim ibn Muhammad al Baihaki, Kitab al-Mahasin val masavi, herausgegeben von Dr. F. Schwally, Geissen 1902.]

[Footnote 2: Le livre des beautes et des antithesis attribue a Abu
Othman Amr ibn Bahr al-Djakiz, texte arabe publie par G. Van Vloten
Leyde; 1898.]

[Footnote 3: See the review by Barbier de Meynard of the edition of Mahasin wal Azdad in the Revue Citique, 1900, 276.]

In the Parsi ecclesiastical literature of an ethical nature we find definitely settled what is "proper" and, on the other hand, what is "improper."[1] It is well known that books under this title,—"the proper and the improper" or "the licit and the illicit"—are to be found among the Pahlavi tracts the time of whose composition can be fixed somewhere between the seventh and the ninth centuries A.D.[2] Comparing the Pahlavi tracts with reference to these questions with Arabic books on good and bad qualities and manners, we have to bear in mind the general features, general outline, as well as the conditions of civilisation of the period when these books were written, in other words, the circumstances of their intimate relation generally of a cultural nature, particularly of a literary form obtaining between the Arab and Persian nations, and between Islam and Parsism. Not only in detail, but also in their nature these books must be differentiated in proportion as were different the clergy who wrote these ethical tracts from didactic works of a strong legendary element belonging to the pen of secular people. These literary monuments must be differentiated quite as much as their authors and with reference to them we may institute the same parallel which we suggested above between the Parsi clergy and the Iranophile party of the Shuubiya.

[Footnote 1: Shayed-na-shayed.]

[Footnote 2: Shayast la-shayast West Pahlavi Texts, Part I, 1880.
Sacred Books of the East, Vol. V. 237-407.]

Furthermore, associated with these literary features was also that class of Arabic books, so well known and the period of which interests us, the books on Questions and Answers.[1]

[Footnote 1: Kitab al Masael wa Jawabat.]

And this is precisely the form in which some of the better known of the Parsi books have been cast, for instance, the Minog-i-Khrad[1] and the Dadistan[2] The second of these books decidedly belongs to the ninth century. Its contents no doubt, were strongly divergent from others owing to its dependence on altered conditions.

[Footnote 1: Sacred Books of the East, Vol. XXIV, 1-15.]

[Footnote 2: Sacred Books of the East XVIII, 1-277.]

We have already indicated the importance of the citations in early Arabic anthologies incorporated from Persian historical works.[1] This nature of quotations are to be found also in books on "good and bad morals and conduct." Further we find embedded in Arabic works a considerable amount of matter of great importance, a circumstance of vital moment for the investigation of the survival of Persian literary tradition. A number of passages similar to those found in these books are undoubtedly embodied in various Arabic anthologies. We give below from the two works al Mahasin wal Masavi and al Mahasin wal Azdad extracts bearing on Persian subjects.[2]

[Footnote 1: See Noeldeke "National Epos" 13.]

[Footnote 2: See Part II.]

The list of Persian subjects comprised in these Arabic books afford us a sufficient idea of the wealth and variety of the material on these points to be recovered from Arabic discourses on manners and morals.