Kegemilangan Islam dalam ilmu dan teknologi sangat berkembang saat Kekhalifan Abbasiyah dan Umayyah (Spanyol) memimpin dunia. Warisan ilmu pengetahuan yang mereka tumbuh kembangkan adalah kilat cahaya yang menerangi eropa untuk bangkit dari era dark age menuju zaman renaissance. Eropa di awal milenium kedua sangat jauh tertinggal dari Islam. Mereka terkungkung pada mistisme dan kekakuan dogma gereja yang menentang habis-habisan ilmu pengetahuan. Namun perlahan, mundurnya kerajaan islam akibat terpecah belah menjadi kerajaan kecil serta penyakit wahn yang sedari awal sudah diingatkan oleh Nabi Muhammad, menjadi awal kebangkitan barat beserta perangkat ilmu pengetahuannya. Perlu dipahami bahwa kemajuan tersebut berimbas pada majunya perdaban barat saat ini.
Berbicara mengenai ilmu pengetahuan tidak akan pernah terlepas dari ‘Baitul hikmah’ atau House of wisdom. House of Wisdom adalah tempat di mana para ilmuwan berkumpul dan membahas ragam ilmu mulai dari logika, metafisika, teologi, aljabar, geometri, trigonometri, fisika, kedokteran hingga bedah.
Dalam buku ‘Great Discoveries of Muslim’, penulis menjabarkan apa-apa saja prestasi muslim berkaitan dengan ilmu pengetahuan yang masih bisa kita rasakan saat ini. Dari sekian banyak kebermanfaatan tersebut, berikut ini adalah segelintir rinciannya. Gue tulis dalam versi bahasa inggris (langsung di salin ulang dari buku yang sama)
- Book of optics from Ibnu Al Haytam (Alhazen) was actually a critique of Ptolemy’s book Almagest. He was the first to introduce experimental evidence as a requirement for accepting a theory since physics before him was more like philosophy, without experiment.
- Napoleon Bonaparte French Military bands were equipped with Ottoman war musical instruments such as zil (cymbal) and the kettledrums.
- Ziryab or blackbird has become a fashion trend setter; disseminate ethic, sound system (music), and three course menu.
- Baghdad with ‘House of Wisdom’ was the world’s richest city and center for intellectual development. In muslim countries a thousand years ago, the school was the mosque. One of the first lessons in writing was to learn how to write ninety-nine most beautiful names of God and simple verses from the Quran. After this, the Quran was studied thoroughly and arithmetic was added. By the 10th century, teaching was moving away from mosque and into the teacher’s house. This means that gradually schools developed, in Persia first.
- On 1066, Seljuk built the Nizamiyah school, named after its founder, Vizier Nizam al-mulk of Baghdad invade England. This was the first proper school that had a separate teaching building.
- By the 15th century, the ottomans had revolutionized schools by setting up learning complexes in towns like Bursa and Edirne in Turkey. Their school system was called, Kulliye, and constituted a campus-like education.
- This university (al-qarawiyin in Fez, Morocco) was built in 841 CE by Fatima Al Fihri. At the Al Qarawiyin mosque students didn’t pay fee and were given monetary allowances for food and accommodation. The teaching was in study group, known as The certificates known as ijaza.
- Terms ‘chair’ as professional position like the chair of board or a committee was evolved from professor who was seated on ‘chair’ or ‘kursi’ around the students
- A great refinement of muslim mathematicians of the indian system was the wider definition and application of the zero. Muslim gave it a mathematical property such as that zero multiplied by a number equals zero. Arabic numbers came into Europe by 3 sources : Gerbert (Pope Sylvester 1) in the late of 10th century, who studied in cordoba. Robert of Chester in the 12th century, who translated the 2nd book of Al khawarizmi. And Fibonacci in the 13th century, who inherited and delivered them to the mass population of Europe. Fibonacci learn of them when he was sent by his father to the city of Bougie, Algeria. He learnt mathematics from a teacher called sidi omar.
