Dimitri Gutas

Profiles Grecian influences on tenth-century Arab society

The Graeco-Arabic Translation Movement in Baghdad and Early ʻAbbāsid Society (2nd-4th/8th-10th Centuries)

Greek Thought, Arabic Culture

Sous le pouvoir à peine conquis des Abbassides, Bagdad, entre le VIIIè et le Xè siècle, est le lieu d'un formidable éveil de la pensée philosophique et scientifique. Cet essor de la vie intellectuelle s'accompagne d'un vaste mouvement de traduction des textes grecs anciens. Que traduit-on ? Toutes les disciplines scientifiques -- de l'astrologie, de la médecine, de l'astronomie, des mathématiques... et même des manuels d'art militaire -, puis de la philosophie, notamment Aristote. Tout un corpus se constitue -- de traductions, fidèles ou paraphrastiques, en commentaires, de compilations en œuvres propres --, qui deviendra la base de la pensée arabe classique et une source capitale de notre accès à l'Antiquité grecque. L'originalité de Dimitri Gutas est d'analyser les facteurs sociopolitiques et surtout idéologiques qui ont permis ce grand mouvement culturel il corrige l'idée selon laquelle ces traductions auraient été faites en vertu d'une sorte de goût altruiste pour la culture. Il montre qu'elles émanent en réalité de la demande de l'État et plus généralement de la société, puisque leurs commanditaires sont les califes et aussi des marchands, des propriétaires terriens, des Arabes et des non-Arabes, des musulmans et des non-musulmans... Enfin, Dimitri Gutas décrit l'influence de cette grande entreprise de traduction sur cet autre renouveau intellectuel qu'on a appelé le " premier humanisme byzantin ". Salué, lors de sa parution en langue anglaise en 1998, par une critique unanime, ce livre est un classique des études sur les rapports entre l'Antiquité grecque et le monde arabe.

le mouvement de traduction gréco-arabe à Bagdad et la société abbasside primitive (IIe-IVe/VIIIe-Xe siècles)

Pensée grecque, culture arabe

Professor Gutas deals here with the lives, sayings, thought, and doctrines of Greek philosophers drawn from sources preserved in medieval Arabic translations and for the most part not extant in the original. The Arabic texts, some of which are edited here for the first time, are translated throughout and richly annotated with the purpose of making the material accessible to classical scholars and historians of ancient and medieval philosophy. Also discussed are the modalities of transmission from Greek into Arabic, the diffusion of the translated material within the Arabic tradition, the nature of the Arabic sources containing the material, and methodological questions relating to Graeco-Arabic textual criticism. The philosophers treated include the Presocratics and minor schools such as Cynicism, Plato, Aristotle and the early Peripatos, and thinkers of late antiquity. A final article presents texts on the malady of love drawn from both the medical and philosophical (problemata physica) traditions.

Greek Philosophers in the Arabic Tradition

Through close study of Avicenna's statements and major works, Dimitri Gutas traces Avicenna's own sense of his place in the Aristotelian tradition and the history of philosophy in Islam, and provides an introduction to reading his philosophical works by delineating the approach most consistent with Avicenna's intention and purpose in philosophy. The second edition of this foundational work, which has quickened fruitful research into the philosopher in the last quarter century, is completely revised and updated, and adds a new final chapter summarizing Avicenna's philosophical project. It is also enlarged with the addition of a new appendix which offers a critical inventory of Avicenna's authentic works, updating the work of Mahdavi (1954) with additional information on all manuscripts and important editions and translations. Its usefulness enhanced, the book provides primary orientation to Avicenna's philosophy and works and constitutes an indispensable research tool for their study.

Introduction to Reading Avicenna's Philosophical Works

Avicenna and the Aristotelian Tradition

From the middle of the eighth century to the tenth century, almost all non-literary and non-historical secular Greek books, including such diverse topics as astrology, alchemy, physics, botany and medicine, that were not available throughout the eastern Byzantine Empire and the Near East, were translated into Arabic. Greek Thought, Arabic Culture explores the major social, political and ideological factors that occasioned the unprecedented translation movement from Greek into Arabic in Baghdad, the newly founded capital of the Arab dynasty of the 'Abbasids', during the first two centuries of their rule. Dimitri Gutas draws upon the preceding historical and philological scholarship in Greco-Arabic studies and the study of medieval translations of secular Greek works into Arabic and analyses the social and historical reasons for this phenomenon. Dimitri Gutas provides a stimulating, erudite and well-documented survey of this key movement in the transmission of ancient Greek culture to the Middle Ages.

The Graeco-Arabic Translation Movement in Baghdad and Early 'Abbasaid Society (2nd-4th/5th-10th c.)

"From antiquity to the 16th century, translation united culturally the peoples in the historical West (from Bactria to the shores of the Atlantic) and fueled the production and circulation of knowledge. The Hellenic scientific and philosophical curriculum was translated from and into, to mention the most prevalent languages, Greek, Syriac, Middle Persian, Arabic, Hebrew, and Latin. To fill a lack in existing scholarship, this volume collects the documents that present the insider evidence provided in contemporary accounts of the motivations and purposes of translation given in the personal statements by the agents in this process, the translators, scholars, and historians of each society. Presented in the original languages with an English translation and introductory essays, these documents offer material for the study of the historical contextualization of the translations, the social history of science and philosophy in their interplay with traditional beliefs, and the cultural policies and ideological underpinnings of these societies"--

Documents from Antiquity to the 16th Century in the Historical West (Bactria to the Atlantic)

Why Translate Science?

Gerhard Endress

materials for a dictionary of the medieval translations from Greek into Arabic

A Greek and Arabic lexicon

William Fortenbaugh

Robert Sharples

Pamela Huby

A two-volume collection of the fragments and testimonia relating to Theophratus (c. 270-288/5 B.C.), presenting the texts, critical apparatus and English translation.

Theophrastus of Eresus. Sources for His Life, Writings, Thought and Influence (2 vols)

Simultaneous critical editions based on all available evidence, with an introduction, English translations, and commentaries of the Greek text and a medieval Arabic translation of Theophrastus’s On First Principles (“metaphysics”), together with a methodological excursus on Graeco-Arabic editorial technique and normative glossary.

Greek Text and Medieval Arabic Translation, edited and translated with introduction, commentaries and glossaries, as well as the medieval Latin translation, and with an Excursus on Graeco-Arabic Editorial Technique

Theophrastus On First Principles (known as his Metaphysics)

Aristoteles

Leonardo Tarán

Annotation This 'editio maior' of Aristotle's 'Poetics', based on all the primary sources, is a major contribution to scholarship. The introductory chapters provide insights about the transmission of the text to the present day and especially the significance of the Syro-Arabic tradition.

Editio Maior of the Greek Text with Historical Introductions and Philological Commentaries

Aristotle Poetics

This important new editio maior of Aristotle's Poetics is based on all the primary sources and is accompanied by a details critical apparatus. The introductory chapters provide important new insights about the transmission of the text to the present day and especially the significance of the Syro-Arabic tradition.

From the eighth to the tenth century A.D., Greek scientific and philosophical works were translated wholesale into Arabic. "A Greek and Arabic Lexicon" is the first systematic attempt to present in an analytical, rationalized way our knowledge of the vocabulary of these translations. It is an indispensable reference tool for the study and understanding of Arabic scientific and philosophical language and literature, and for the knowledge of the vocabulary of Classical and Middle Greek and the reception and reading of classical Greek works in late antiquity and pre-Photian Byzantine literature.

Dimitri Gutas

Books

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