Europe and the Arabs

[Alvaro da Luna]

Why is it that the Spanish had a rennaissance after the Arabs left Iberia? Surely, the 500 year Arab occupation of Spain contributed to European technology and culture. So, why is it that the occupation of Arab lands by Europeans left the Arabs shattered and in economic turmoil?

 

[amadeus]

If you look at the Arab states as a whole and Iberia today, I don't think you can say that Arabs were responsible for the surge in technological and cultural advances. My guess would be that of the opposite, that Arab states actually held Spain back.

 

[EzInKy]

Originally posted by Alvaro da Luna
Why is it that the Spanish had a rennaissance after the Arabs left Iberia? Surely, the 500 year Arab occupation of Spain contributed to European technology and culture.

Because the Arabs at the time valued preserving and advancing culture and knowledge while the West was suffering under fuedilistic theocratical governments.

So, why is it that the occupation of Arab lands by Europeans left the Arabs shattered and in economic turmoil?

Because the Europeans at this time value preserving and advancing culture and knowledge while the Arabs are suffering under fuedilistic theocratical governments.

 

[Maj]

How?

 

[Johann MacLeod]

and that spanish inqusition was certinaly a freind of science...

 

[Capulet]

Originally posted by rmsharpe
If you look at the Arab states as a whole and Iberia today, I don't think you can say that Arabs were responsible for the surge in technological and cultural advances. My guess would be that of the opposite, that Arab states actually held Spain back.

Yeah, while the rest of the European kingdoms were arguing over whether women were human or not

 

[Cilpot]

Originally posted by EzInKy
Because the Arabs at the time valued preserving and advancing culture and knowledge while the West was suffering under fuedilistic theocratical governments.

Because the Europeans at this time value preserving and advancing culture and knowledge while the Arabs are suffering under fuedilistic theocratical governments.

Thats what I call hitting the nail on the head

 

[Free Enterprise]

The Byzantine scholars were a major source of the surge in Western culture. The West had recovered from the fall of Rome.

The Arab knowledge was fused with the European knowledge (yes the Europeans did have some very helpful knowledge at that time). The Europeans did some important things in the Middle Ages with regards to technology and philosophy. The Slavic lands and Greek lands were quite advanced. The new Western nations were just getting established also.

Ezinky,

Do you not think the Arab empire was based largely on the Islamic religion and its laws? Byzantium seemed to be doing quite well under its government. It was partly the Mongol invasions that broke down Arab culture. There were numerous causes of the rises and falls of each civilization.

 

[Baleog]

The Arabs didn't treat Spain as a colony, they actually ruled Spain. As in there was Arab princes of Spain (AFAIK). It wasn't just a case of a token presence living there to make sure the locals got on with making cheap produce for back home.
Also the Arabs were kicked out of Spain so that Arab institutions would have left with them. The Europeans gave independence to the modern day Arab nations(?) leaving behind some kind of structure to suit their (our) needs.

When the Arabs came to power Europe was still in the (relative) dark ages. The Arabs actually saved some European knowledge that might have been otherwise lost.

 

[Achinz]

Think of mathematics, art, science, literature when you think about the Islamic influence in Spain.

Civilizations rise and fall. What can be said of the Arabs can also be said of the Greeks who although their golden age has long gone has left an idelible mark on the current world.

There are cycles though eg China which after a real trough in the last couple of centuries seems ready for a resurgence.

 

[Pangur Bán]

Originally posted by EzInKy
Because the Arabs at the time valued preserving and advancing culture and knowledge while the West was suffering under fuedilistic theocratical governments.

Because the Europeans at this time value preserving and advancing culture and knowledge while the Arabs are suffering under fuedilistic theocratical governments.

The West valued preserving knowledge too in the "medieval" period, which is why there is just as much ancient Latin literature in existence as ancient Greek. But to talk of "preserving" is to misunderstand these societies...the Latin West was the successor to the western Roman Empire, just like Byzantium was to the East...except the Byzantines valued Greek literature more. Both of these "medieval" civilizations saw a continuity with the Roman past, which Renaissance and later western writers distorted by creating an artificial distinction between "ancient" and "medieval". The Arabs preserved almost nothing of the classical canon that was not otherwise preserved. If we want to thank anyone for preserving our ancient literary heritage, then it is the churches of the Latin West and the Byzantine bookmen...not the Arabs, who got many of their Greek texts via Syriac translations anyway. Crediting the Arabs for this is one of the biggest lies in modern popular history!

 

[Pangur Bán]

Originally posted by rmsharpe
If you look at the Arab states as a whole and Iberia today, I don't think you can say that Arabs were responsible for the surge in technological and cultural advances. My guess would be that of the opposite, that Arab states actually held Spain back.

Possibly. Spain was an intellectual powerhouse in late antiquity, before the Berber-Arab conquest. Spain (meaning Iberia) had no rival in those days. Isidore of Seville and Orosius - to name a couple - were its product. Spain has never since produced so many great thinkers/writers in so short a time.

 

[EzInKy]

Originally posted by calgacus
The West valued preserving knowledge too in the "medieval" period, which is why there is just as much ancient Latin literature in existence as ancient Greek. But to talk of "preserving" is to misunderstand these societies...the Latin West was the successor to the western Roman Empire, just like Byzantium was to the East...except the Byzantines valued Greek literature more. Both of these "medieval" civilizations saw a continuity with the Roman past, which Renaissance and later western writers distorted by creating an artificial distinction between "ancient" and "medieval". The Arabs preserved almost nothing of the classical canon that was not otherwise preserved. If we want to thank anyone for preserving our ancient literary heritage, then it is the churches of the Latin West and the Byzantine bookmen...not the Arabs, who got many of their Greek texts via Syriac translations anyway. Crediting the Arabs for this is one of the biggest lies in modern popular history!

Being that my college essay days are long past, I gave a simple answer to a simple question. Though it is true a few monastaries did preserve some ancient writings the efforts were haphazard at best compared to the Andalusian libraries and universities and there were many Arab contributions to western knowledge, particularly in mathematics.

 

[andrewgprv]

Originally posted by rmsharpe
If you look at the Arab states as a whole and Iberia today, I don't think you can say that Arabs were responsible for the surge in technological and cultural advances. My guess would be that of the opposite, that Arab states actually held Spain back.

Please go read some history before making such comments.

 

[Pangur Bán]

Originally posted by andrewgprv
Please go read some history before making such comments.

Hey, you need to say more than that (possibly he does as well). You have no idea how much or little history he has read.

 

[EzInKy]

Originally posted by Free Enterprise


Ezinky,

Do you not think the Arab empire was based largely on the Islamic religion and its laws?

Yes, but not the extreme fundamentalist form that is practiced in many Arab countries today.

EDIT: Or possibly it was, but Christian theocracy was even more oppressive than Islamic theocracy at the time.

 

[Knight-Dragon]

Moderator Action: Moved to History.

 

[aaminion00]

Because to Arabs the European world was a place to rule and live, not a colony. To the Europeans, the arab countries were but colonies to expand their interest and resources.

And the Arabs holding Spain back is utter crap. Certain people should stick to politics, anybody can argue that. History actually requires knowledge and study, not just semi-thought out comments to suit your view of the modern world. Spain under the Arabs reached a level that at it's height easily surpassed the Byzantine Empire of the time. Constantinople was largely responsible for the rennaisance yes, but it's golden age came long before Cordoba reached hers. Europeans rulers asked for their heirs to be educated at the university of Cordoba. That Spain had some worthy intellectuals before the Arab conquest might be true, but then again much of Europe had a few names here and there. In the long run it didn't amount to much. Considering how science and intellectualism was in Muslim Spain, to say that the Arabs held Spain back would mean saying that without Arab interference Iberia would have been on the same level as Constantinople, something I think many of you would be far less eager to argue.

 

[aaminion00]

Originally posted by Free Enterprise
Do you not think the Arab empire was based largely on the Islamic religion and its laws? Byzantium seemed to be doing quite well under its government. It was partly the Mongol invasions that broke down Arab culture. There were numerous causes of the rises and falls of each civilization.

The difference is that despite the tremendous role religion played in the Muslim caliphates, it was still allowed to flourish, contrary to the European kingdoms where the church used religion to halt scientific progress.

 

[Pangur Bán]

Originally posted by aaminion00
The difference is that despite the tremendous role religion played in the Muslim caliphates, it was still allowed to flourish, contrary to the European kingdoms where the church .

Sorry aaminion, that is complete hokum. The Church never "used religion to halt scientific progress". In actual fact, religious groups like the Franciscans and Jesuits did more to help scientific progress than any other institutions until the advent of the Reformation Universities.

Anyway, the idea of progressive, linear history is an invention of the Enlightenment. Such a conception never occcured to the Arab, Byzantine or Latin thinkers of the middle ages.