WHO IS FUAT SEZGİN?

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28 Feb 2024

Prof. Dr. Fuat Sezgin was born on October 24, 1924 in Bitlis. After graduating from secondary school and high school in Erzurum, he came to Istanbul in 1943 to study mathematics and become an engineer, according to his first plan. Upon the advice of a relative, Sezgin attended a seminar given by German orientalist Helmut Ritter, one of the most well-known experts in his field, at the Istanbul University Institute of Oriental Studies, and radically changed his initial plan. Under the fascinating influence of what Ritter said, Fuat Sezgin went to the Institute the next day to register for classes. Neither the passing of the last day for registration nor Ritter's warnings that the field was very difficult could dissuade Sezgin from his firm decision.

When university education in Turkey was suspended due to the German army advancing into Bulgaria in 1943, Ritter advised his students to take advantage of this long break and learn Arabic. At that time, Fuat Sezgin decided to compare Cerîr al-Taberî's commentary with books containing the Turkish translation and studied Arabic for 17 hours every day for six months in order to understand the commentary written in a difficult language. At the end of six months, he was reading the Arabic version of Tabari's commentary as if he were reading a newspaper. When Helmut Ritter put Ebû Hamid el-Ghazalî's book İhyâu Ulûmi'd-Dîn in front of Fuat Sezgin to read, he was very pleased that his student could easily achieve this. He suggested that Fuat Sezgin, who had a great talent in learning languages, should start learning five languages at the same time and learn a new language every year. Sezgin continued this high work tempo until his old age.

After completing his thesis on the evolution of the science of Bedi' in 1947, he prepared a second thesis, with the consultancy of Helmut Ritter, on the philological commentary of Ebû Ubeyde Me'mar ibn el-Musenna in his Mecâzu'l-Kur'an. Fuat Sezgin, doctoral thesis. He realized that some parts of Muhammad al-Bukhari's hadith book, for which he continued his research, were taken from Mecâzu'l-Qur'an. Al-Bukhari's use of written sources proved that the previous thesis of scholars and hadith scholars that their journals were based solely on oral tradition was wrong. Fuat Sezgin published his introductory thesis titled Research on Bukhari's Sources in 1956.

Sezgin had to continue his studies outside Turkey after his name was included in the list prepared by the government brought to power by the military coup in Turkey in 1960, in which 147 academics were banned from universities. Desperate, he left his homeland and continued his research and teaching activities at the University of Frankfurt. In 1965, he wrote his second doctoral thesis on Jabir ibn Hayyan at Frankfurt University Institut für Geschichte der Naturwissenschaften and a year later he became a professor.

In the same year, he married Ursula Sezgin, who was also an orientalist. Their daughter, Hilal, was born in 1970. He published the first volume of the History of Arab-Islamic Science (Geschichte des Arabischen Schrifttums), the most comprehensive work written in its field from the beginning of human history to the present, in 1967. He passed away while writing the 18th volume of the work consisting of 17 volumes. Some of the subjects included in the various volumes of this comprehensive work (GAS) are as follows: Quran sciences, hadith sciences, history, fiqh, theology, mysticism, poetry, medicine, pharmacology, zoology, veterinary medicine, alchemy, chemistry, botany, agriculture, mathematics, astronomy, astrology, meteorology and related fields, grammar, mathematical geography, cartography in Islam, history of Islamic philosophy.

A committee consisting of more than 10 academics selected from different countries who were interested in developing Carl Brockelmann's work Geschichte der Arabischen Literatur, appreciated GAS and decided to leave the development of Brockelmann's work to Sezgin and dissolved it in 1967. In the same year, when Fuat Sezgin sent a copy of the first volume to his teacher Ritter in Istanbul to learn his expert evaluation, the experienced orientalist stated that "no one has done such a work before and no one will be able to do it again". He congratulated.

Fuat Sezgin, who was deemed worthy of the King Faisal Islamic Sciences Award in 1978, took advantage of this support when this award was presented to him and founded the Institut für Geschichte der Arabisch-Islamischen Wissenschaften, affiliated with Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, in 1982.

German physicist Eilhard Wiedemann, who wanted to introduce Islamic scientific instruments to people as models from books, started making models of Islamic scientific instruments in 1900, and until 1928, he managed to make models of five instruments in approximately 30 years of his life. Prof. Dr. Our teacher Fuat Sezgin asked, "Can I manage to make 30 instruments?", "Can I fill a room even if it is not a museum?" He expanded his work, which he started with this idea, to more than 800 instruments in the Museum of the History of Islamic Science, which he founded in Frankfurt. More than eight hundred examples of scientific instruments, tools and equipment made by scientists who grew up in the Islamic cultural environment, based on written sources, are exhibited in the museum. In the same building, there is the History of Sciences Library, which he founded with 45,000 volumes of books that he purchased from all over the world with great care and hardship throughout his life. This library, which has the distinction of being the only original copy of some of its books in its field, is a specialized collection library that is unique in the world in terms of the History of Islamic Sciences.

Prof. Dr. With the extraordinary efforts and work of Fuat Sezgin, a second museum was opened in 2008, containing approximately 700 works, almost all of which were donated through the efforts of our esteemed teacher, and were gifted to our entire nation in the building in Gülhane Park in Istanbul.

These museums comprehensively present the inventions and discoveries that Muslim scientists have gifted to humanity for centuries, and the evolution of the history of science in different disciplines, and represent an innovation in the world in their field. The works exhibited in a systematic order in the fields of astronomy, geography, navigation, time measurement, geometry, optics, medicine, chemistry, mineralogy, physics, architecture, technique and warfare techniques show the great discoveries and magnificent inventions of Islamic Sciences, and how these discoveries and inventions were transferred to Europe in different ways. It clearly presents to its visitors, with a delightful visuality, that it was accepted and assimilated there. Thus, it proves that the history of sciences is a whole, in accordance with the truth, free from feelings and prejudices, and with complete objectivity. Introducing the instruments in these museums, Prof. Dr. There is a catalog work titled "Science and Technology in Islam" written by Fuat Sezgin, consisting of 5 volumes and a total of 1,121 pages. Such a holistic and comprehensive work has been written for the first time as a museum catalogue, and has been published in four languages: Turkish, English, German and French.

In 2010, in order to support the activities of the Istanbul Islamic Science and Technology Museum, Prof. Dr. Fuat Sezgin Islamic Science History Research Foundation was established by Prof. Fatih Sultan Mehmet Foundation University. Dr. Fuat Sezgin Institute for the History of Islamic Science started education in 2013. Prof. Dr. Fuat Sezgin Islamic Science History Research Foundation provides a scholarship of 1,000 TL per month to undergraduate students in the Department of History of Science and 1,400 TL per month to students studying for a master's degree at the institute. The income from the sales of Fuat Sezgin's books published by the foundation is allocated to student scholarships.

A member of various international academies, Prof. Dr. Fuat Sezgin has been deemed worthy of many important awards and decorations. Some of these are honorary memberships of Cairo Arabic Language Academy, Damascus Arabic Language Academy, Morocco Rabat Royal Academy, Baghdad Arabic Language Academy, Turkish Academy of Sciences. Prof. by Erzurum Atatürk University, Isparta Süleyman Demirel University, Kayseri Erciyes University and Istanbul University. Dr. Fuat Sezgin was awarded an honorary doctorate. He is also the recipient of the Frankfurt am Main Goethe Plaque, the German First Degree Federal Service Medal, the German Distinguished Service Medal, the Iran Islamic Sciences Book Award, the Hesse Culture Award and the Turkish Presidential Culture and Arts Grand Prize.

Prof. Dr. Istanbul Museum of Islamic Science and Technology History, founded under the leadership of Fuat Sezgin, was deemed worthy of the 2016 Special Award of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism as an institution due to its superior quality works and original works.

He passed away on June 30, 2018.