by
Damien F. Mackey
In the history of Islam, the history of philosophy and science, we encounter
a handful of polymaths of the Golden Age (c. 800-1300 AD), who, I believe,
are simply based upon a greatly embellished and legend-enhanced Ahikar.
“Ahikar the son of my brother Anael, was appointed chancellor of the
exchequer for the kingdom and given the main ordering of affairs”.
Tobit 1:21
Ahikar’s contemporary the heroine Judith, whom Ahikar (as Achior) met shortly after she and her maid had carried the head of “Holofernes” in a basket back to “Bethulia”, has likewise been projected into a supposed AD time, c. 900 AD, as Gudit (or Judith):
Judith the Simeonite and Judith the Semienite
(6) Judith the Simeonite and Judith the Semienite | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
How does this happen?
And, what a story Ahikar (or Ahiqar) has to tell.
He (as Achior) had been left for dead by “Holofernes” for having dared to suggest that an Israel with the aid of the Lord would be irresistible. So “Holofernes” had him tied up within close proximity of Judith’s town of “Bethulia” (Shechem), there to die with the people whom he had just verbally defended. Achior was taken in by the Bethulians, whose leader at the time was the Simeonite Uzziah, the great Isaiah.
Then, after Judith with her maid had returned triumphantly from the Assyrian camp, she asked to see Achior (Judith 14:6-7):
So they summoned Achior from the house of Uzziah. When he came and saw the head of Holofernes in the hand of one of the men in the assembly of the people, he fell down on his face in a faint. When they raised him up he threw himself at Judith’s feet and did obeisance to her and said, ‘Blessed are you in every tent of Judah! In every nation those who hear your name will be alarmed. Now tell me what you have done during these days’.
This famous Israelite pair, Judith and Ahikar, who appear in the Catholic Bible for the era of c. 700 (conventional dating), have been recklessly projected into a c. 900 AD, and later, time – a shocking time warp of more than a millennium and a half!
How does this happen? (See also latter part of this article)
Seleucids/Ptolemies divinised ancient heroes
The Ptolemies re-presented some famous characters of Egyptian history as ‘saints’.
Ancient notables of Egyptian history, such as Imhotep and Amenhotep son of Hapu, became, in the hands of the later Ptolemies, thaumaturgists and quasi-divine. Thus Dietrich Wildung wrote of this pair as ‘becoming gods’ (Imhotep und Amenhotep. Gottwerdung im alten Ägypten, Münchner Ägyptologische Studien, 36, 1977).
The Seleucids did the same with - to give one example - the legendary King Solomon, who became, in their hands, the great temple building Sumerian notable, Gudea:
Prince of Lagash
(6) Prince of Lagash | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
The Seleucids greatly embellished the talents of these, admittedly already striking, ancient celebrities.
And I suspect that the same must have been done with Ahikar (Achior), already a great person in his own right, to whom has artificially been added encyclopaedic wisdom and magical skills as one might read of in a fantastic Arabian nights legend.
Hence we now find, as I have often quoted:
“The story of Ahikar is one of the most phenomenal in the ancient world in that it has become part of many different literatures and has been preserved in several
different languages: Syriac, Arabic, Armenian, Greek, Slavonic, and Old Turkish.
The most ancient recension is the Aramaic, found amongst the famous 5th-cent.
BC papyri that were discovered … on Elephantine Island in the Nile. The story
worked its way into the Arabian nights and the Koran; it influenced Aesop,
the Church Fathers as well as Greek philosophers, and the OT itself”.
Of particular interest for this study is the influence of Ahikar upon the Koran (Qur'an).
Indeed, the sage Koranic character, Luqman (Lokman), is thought by some to have been taken from Ahikar himself:
Ahiqar and Aesop. Part Two: Ahiqar, Aesop and Lokman
(13) Ahiqar and Aesop. Part Two: Ahiqar, Aesop and Lokman | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
1. The real Ahikar
(a) Kingdom of Assyria
The young Ahikar (Achior) had a stellar career in the kingdom of Assyro-Babylonia, somewhat akin to that of the prophet Daniel.
According to his uncle, Tobit (1:22): “… when Sennacherib was emperor of Assyria, Ahikar had been wine steward, treasurer, and accountant, and had been in charge of the official seal”.
When the Assyrians first successfully invaded Jerusalem, Ahikar, the Rabshakeh, was King Sennacherib’s mouthpiece, he being eloquent and, apparently, multi-lingual.
When King Hezekiah’s envoys implored him to speak in Aramaïc rather than Hebrew, before the walls of Jerusalem, the Rabshakeh (“field commander”) refused to comply (Isaiah 36:11-21):
Then Eliakim, Shebna and Joah said to the field commander, ‘Please speak to your servants in Aramaic, since we understand it. Don’t speak to us in Hebrew in the hearing of the people on the wall’.
But the commander replied, ‘Was it only to your master and you that my master sent me to say these things, and not to the people sitting on the wall—who, like you, will have to eat their own excrement and drink their own urine?’
Then the commander stood and called out in Hebrew, ‘Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria! This is what the king says: Do not let Hezekiah deceive you. He cannot deliver you! Do not let Hezekiah persuade you to trust in the LORD when he says, ‘The LORD will surely deliver us; this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.’
‘Do not listen to Hezekiah. This is what the king of Assyria says: Make peace with me and come out to me. Then each of you will eat fruit from your own vine and fig tree and drink water from your own cistern, until I come and take you to a land like your own—a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards.
‘Do not let Hezekiah mislead you when he says, ‘The LORD will deliver us’. Have the gods of any nations ever delivered their lands from the hand of the king of Assyria? Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? Have they rescued Samaria from my hand? Who of all the gods of these countries have been able to save their lands from me? How then can the LORD deliver Jerusalem from my hand?’
But the people remained silent and said nothing in reply, because the king had commanded, “Do not answer him”.
There is nothing to suggest from any of this, so far, that Ahikar was anything more than a competent military commander and loyal servant of the Great King of Assyria.
But, in the Book of Tobit, we learn that Ahikar was the mentor of Nadin (or Nadab) - and his “uncle” (presumably through marriage) - who was Sennacherib’s oldest son, Ashur-nadin-shumi, and who was to become the ill-fated “Holofernes” of the Judith drama.
We also learn that Ahikar was kind, he having looked after Tobit during his blindness, before being commissioned to govern the land of Elam (Elymaïs) (Tobit 2:10):
I went to physicians to be healed, but the more they treated me with ointments the more my vision was obscured by the white films, until I became completely blind. For four years I remained unable to see. All my kindred were sorry for me, and Ahikar took care of me for two years before he went to Elymais.
Ahikar and Nadin were present at the wedding of Tobias (Tobiah) and Sarah after the elderly Tobit had been miraculously cured of his blindness by the angel Raphael.
These were no ordinary times (Tobit 11:17-18):
That day there was joy for all the Jews who lived in Nineveh.
Ahiqar and his nephew Nadin were also on hand to rejoice with Tobit. Tobiah’s wedding feast was celebrated with joy for seven days, and many gifts were given to him.
Ahikar will also intervene with king Esarhaddon, enabling for Tobit to return home after his desperate flight from the now-deceased Sennacherib (Tobit 1:21-22):
But not forty days passed before two of Sennacherib’s sons killed him, and they fled to the mountains of Ararat, and his son Esar-haddon reigned after him. He appointed Ahikar, the son of my brother Hanael over all the accounts of his kingdom, and he had authority over the entire administration. Ahikar interceded for me, and I returned to Nineveh. Now Ahikar was chief cupbearer, keeper of the signet, and in charge of administration of the accounts under King Sennacherib of Assyria; so Esar-haddon reappointed him. He was my nephew and so a close relative.
From the Judith drama we learn that Ahikar, or Achior, was now leader of a foreign contingent in the Assyrian army, wrongly called “Ammonite”, but should read Elamite.
This mistake is one of the main reasons why the Book of Judith has not been accepted into the Jewish canon (Deuteronomy 23:3): “No Ammonite or Moabite or any of their descendants may enter the assembly of the LORD, not even in the tenth generation”.
For, as we read in Judith 14:10: “When Achior saw all that the God of Israel had done, he believed firmly in God. So he was circumcised and joined the house of Israel, remaining so to this day”.
Presumably Achior was, like most of his tribe in those days, neglectful of Yahwism.
As Tobit recounts it (1:4-6):
When I lived as a young man in my own country, in the land of Israel, the entire tribe of my ancestor Naphtali broke away from the house of David, my ancestor, and from Jerusalem, the city that had been singled out of all Israel’s tribes that all Israel might offer sacrifice there. It was the place where the Temple, God’s dwelling, had been built and consecrated for all generations to come. All my kindred, as well as the house of Naphtali, my ancestor, used to offer sacrifice on every hilltop in Galilee to the calf that Jeroboam, king of Israel, had made in Dan.
But I alone used to go often to Jerusalem for the festivals, as was prescribed for all Israel by longstanding decree.
A dying Tobit will praise Ahikar to his son Tobias for Ahikar’s “almsgiving”, contrasting his nephew with the treacherous Nadin/Nadab (Tobit 14:10-11):
‘See, my son, what Nadab did to Ahikar, who had reared him. Was he not, while still alive, brought down into the earth? For God repaid him to his face for this shameful treatment. Ahikar came out into the light, but Nadab went into the eternal darkness because he tried to kill Ahikar. Because he gave alms, he escaped the fatal trap that Nadab had set for him, but Nadab fell into it himself and was destroyed. So now, my children, see what almsgiving accomplishes and what injustice does—it brings death!’
Ahikar/Achior also appears as “Arioch” in a gloss in the Book of Judith (1:6): “… King Arioch of Elam”. The glossator had obviously failed to realise that this was Tobit’s “Ahikar [who] … went to Elymaïs [Elam]”.
Now, before we proceed to consider the fantastically embellished Arabian nights version of Ahikar, we need to add yet an extra dimension to the real person.
This will have huge ramifications for the Golden Age of Islam – my focus there being on the intellectual aspect of that so-called Golden Age.
(b) Kingdom of Chaldea (Babylonia)
The lives of the Tobiads (Tobit, Tobias, Ahikar) passed through the tumultuous reign of Sennacherib and on into the far more benign (for the Tobiads) reign of Esarhaddon.
Now, Esarhaddon, called a “son” of Sennacherib in Tobit 1:21, was not Sennacherib’s actual biological son, nor was he an Assyrian. Esarhaddon was a Chaldean, whose reign marks the beginning of the Chaldean dynasty.
Esarhaddon was none other than Nebuchednezzar ‘the Great’:
Esarhaddon a tolerable fit for King Nebuchednezzar
(12) Esarhaddon a tolerable fit for King Nebuchednezzar | Damien Mackey - Academia.edu
That makes it quite possible that Ahikar (Arioch) was the “Arioch” of Daniel 2:24-25, a high official of King Nebuchadnezzar.
But far more importantly for this study is my identification of a sage official of Nebuchednezzar due to my folding, in my university thesis (2007), of Nebuchednezzar so-called I (c. 1100 BC, conventional dating) with II (c. 600 BC, conventional dating).
The famous official, Esagil-kinni-ubba, will become vital for explaining the intellectual Golden Age of Islam.
This is what I wrote about Esagil-kinni-ubba (of various spellings) in my thesis:
A Revised History of the Era of King Hezekiah of Judah
and its Background
AMAIC_Final_Thesis_2009.pdf
I believed that I may have found - over and above some very compelling Babylonian-Elamite parallels - a connection between a ‘Middle’ kingdom vizier of great wisdom and a similarly celebrated ‘Neo’ kingdom sage.
I wrote about this as follows, then wrongly suspecting that Nebuchednezzar so-called I was the same ruler as my composite king Sargon II-Sennacherib (Volume One, pp. 185-187):
A Legendary Vizier (Ummânu)
Perhaps a further indication of a need for merging the C12th BC king of Babylon, Nebuchednezzar I, with the C8th BC king of Assyria, Sargon II/ Sennacherib, is that one finds during the reign of ‘each’ a vizier of such fame that he was to be remembered for centuries to come. It is now reasonable to assume that this is one and the same vizier.
I refer, in the case of Nebuchednezzar I, to the following celebrated vizier: … “The name Esagil-kini-ubba, ummânu or “royal secretary” during the reign of Nebuchednezzar I, was preserved in Babylonian memory for almost one thousand years – as late as the year 147 of the Seleucid Era (= 165 B.C.) …”.
Even better known is Ahikar (var. Akhiqar), of Sennacherib’s reign, regarding whose immense popularity we read: ….
The story of Ahikar is one of the most phenomenal in the ancient world in that it has become part of many different literatures and has been preserved in several different languages: Syriac, Arabic, Armenian, Greek, Slavonic, and Old Turkish. The most ancient recension is the Aramaic, found amongst the famous 5th-cent. BC papyri that were discovered … on Elephantine Island in the Nile. The story worked its way into the Arabian nights and the Koran; it influenced Aesop, the Church Fathers as well as Greek philosophers, and the OT itself.
According to the first chapter of [the Book of Tobit]: “Ahikar had been chief cupbearer, keeper of the signet, administrator and treasurer under Sennacherib” and he was kept in office after Sennacherib’s death. At some point in time Ahikar seems to have been promoted to Ummânu, or Vizier, second in power in the mighty kingdom of Assyria, “Chancellor of the Exchequer for the kingdom and given the main ordering of affairs” (1:21, 22). Ahikar was Chief Cupbearer, or Rabshakeh … during Sennacherib’s Third Campaign when Jerusalem was besieged (2 Kings 18:17; Isaiah 36:2). His title (Assyrian rab-šakê) means, literally, ‘the great man’. It was a military title, marking its bearer amongst the greatest of all the officers. Tobit tells us that Ahikar (also given in the Vulgate version of [the Book of Tobit] as Achior) was the son of his brother Anael (1:21).
Ahikar was therefore Tobit’s nephew, of the tribe of Naphtali, taken into captivity by ‘Shalmaneser’.
This Ahikar/Achior was - as I shall be arguing in VOLUME TWO (cf. pp. 8, 46-47) - the same as the important Achior of [the Book of Judith].
Kraeling, whilst incorrectly I believe suggesting that: ….
“There does not appear to be any demonstrable connection between this Achior [of the Book of Judith] and the Ahikar of the [legendary] Aramaic Story”, confirms however that the name Achior can be the same as Ahikar ….
….
I had suggested above that Adad-apla-iddina, ruler of Babylon at the time of Tiglathpileser I, may have been the same person as Merodach-baladan I/II.
I may now be able to strengthen this link to some degree through the agency of the vizier just discussed. For, according to Brinkman: …. “… Esagil-kini-ubba served as ummânu … under Adad-aplaiddina…”.
[End of quote]
One further matter of importance regarding “The real Ahikar” is that his Assyrian name was Aba-enlil-dari “whom the Aramaeans call Ahu-uqar [Ahiqar]”:
http://www.melammu-project.eu/database/gen_html/a0000639.html
This name will also become important in the context of the Islamic Golden Age.
2. The fantasy Ahikar
We read of the “Ahiqar story”, “of great popularity”, at:
http://www.melammu-project.eu/database/gen_html/a0000639.html
The story of Ahiqar is set into the court of seventh century Assyrian kings Sennacherib and Esarhaddon. The hero has the Akkadian name Ahī-(w)aqar “My brother is dear”, but it is not clear if the story has any historical foundation. The latest entry in a Seleucid list of Seven Sages says: “In the days of Esarhaddon the sage was Aba-enlil-dari, whom the Aramaeans call Ahu-uqar” which at least indicates that the story of Ahiqar was well known in the Seleucid Babylonia.
The oldest form of the story of Ahiqar itself is available in the Old Aramaic fragments from the end of the fifth century BCE and were discovered in the ruins of Elephantine in Egypt. The story of Ahiqar was incorporated into Greek legendary life of Aeseop - the adventures and maxims of the Assyrian sage were transferred to his Greek counterpart.
The Syriac Ahiqar book is of non-Christian character and belongs to the oldest period of Syriac literature, to the first two centuries CE. Later versions in Armanian, Arabic, and Old Church Slavonic are all closely related to the Syriac version. From the Armenian the story of Ahiqar was translated into Kipchak-Turkish and into another Turkic language, while the Romanian translation is related to the Church Slavonic text. A selection of the precepts of Ahiqar, but not his story, was included in an Arabic Christian anthology which was later translated into Ethiopic. There is another Ethiopic version which is shorter and also clearly translated into Arabic. There are references to Ahiqar in Tobit and also other quotations from his maxims in various other books of the Bible, especially in the book of Sirach. Also a set of the Middle Persian (Pahlavi) didactic books which were associated with the name Ādurbād, a historical person of the fourth century CE Zoroastrianism, reveal strong affinities with the Akkadian-Aramaic story of Ahiqar. The Admonitions of Ādurbād contains many parallels to the Ahiqar maxims in several languages. Given the great popularity of the Ahiqar story in the first centuries of the Christian era and the long symbiosis of Iranian and Aramaic civilisation, there is certainly nothing wrong with the assumption that Persian authors of the Sasanian period may have been familiar with it.
[End of quote]
From a sober military governor and administrator of the highest level for the kingdoms of Assyria and Babylonia, a wise and kindly man who practised almsgiving, Ahikar will be transformed through later legend into a sage of enyclopaedic knowledge - an ancient Leonardo da Vinci, so to speak - especially as we trace him below through his ‘Islamic’ guises.
Ahikar transformed
Here is the fantastic Story of Ahikar: https://sacred-texts.com/bib/fbe/fbe259.htm
Ahikar, Grand Vizier of Assyria, has 60 wives but is fated to have no son. Therefore he adopts his nephew. He crams him full of wisdom and knowledge more than of bread and water.
THE story of Haiqâr [Ahiqar] the Wise, Vizier of Sennacherib the King, and of Nadan, sister's son to Haiqâr the Sage.
2 There was a Vizier in the days of King Sennacherib, son of Sarhadum [Esarhaddon?], King of Assyria and Nineveh, a wise man named Haiqâr, and he was Vizier of the king Sennacherib.
3 He had a fine, fortune and much goods, and he was skilful, wise, a philosopher, in knowledge, in opinion and in government, and he had married sixty women, and had built a castle for each of them.
4 But with it all he had no child by any. of these women, who might be his heir.
5 And he was very sad on account of this, and one day he assembled the astrologers and the learned men and the wizards and explained to them his condition and the matter of his barrenness.
6 And they said to him, 'Go, sacrifice to the gods and beseech them that perchance they may provide thee with a boy.'
7 And he did as they told him and offered sacrifices to the idols, and besought them and implored them with request, and entreaty.
8 And they answered him not one word. And he went away sorrowful and dejected, departing with a pain at his heart.
9 And he returned, and implored the Most High God, and believed, beseeching Him with a burning in his heart, saying, 'O Most High God, O Creator of the Heavens and of the earth, O Creator of all created things!
10 I beseech Thee to give me a boy, that I may be consoled by him that he may be present at my heath, that he may close my eyes, and that he may bury me.'
11 Then there came to him a voice saying, 'Inasmuch as thou hast relied first of all on graven images, and hast offered sacrifices to them, for this reason thou shalt remain childless thy life long.
12 But take Nadan thy sister's son, and make him thy child and teach him thy learning and thy good breeding, and at thy death he shall bury thee.'
13 Thereupon he took Nadan his sister's son, who was a little suckling. And he handed him over to eight wet-nurses, that they might suckle him and bring him up.
14 And they brought him up with good food and gentle training and silken clothing, and purple and crimson. And he was seated upon couches of silk.
15 And when Nadan grew big and walked, shooting up like a tall cedar, he taught him good manners and writing and science and philosophy.
16 And after many days King Sennacherib looked at Haiqâr and saw that he had grown very old, and moreover he said to him.
17 'O my honoured friend, the skilful, the trusty, the wise, the governor, my secretary, my vizier, my Chancellor and director; verily thou art grown very old and weighted with years; and thy departure from this world must be near.
18 Tell me who shall have a place in my service after thee.' And Haiqâr said to him, 'O my lord, may thy head live for ever! There is Nadan my sister's son, I have made him my child.
19 And I have brought him up and taught him my wisdom and my knowledge.'
20 And the king said to him, 'O Haiqâr! bring him to my presence, that I may see him, and if I find him suitable, put him in thy place; and thou shalt go thy way, to take a rest and to live the remainder of thy life in sweet repose.'
21 Then Haiqâr went and presented Nadan his sister's son. And he did homage and wished him power and honour.
22 And he looked at him and admired him and rejoiced in him
and said to Haiqâr: 'Is this thy son, O Haiqâr? I pray that God may preserve him. And as thou hast served me and my father Sarhadum so may this boy of thine serve me and fulfil my undertakings, my needs, and my business, so that I may honour him and make him powerful for thy sake.'
23 And Haiqâr did obeisance to the king and said to him, 'May thy head live, O my lord the king, for ever! I seek from thee that thou mayst be patient with my boy Nadan and forgive his mistakes that he may serve thee as it is fitting.'
24 Then the king swore to him that he would make him the greatest of his favourites, and the most powerful of his friends, and that he should be with him in all honour and respect. And he kissed his hands and bade him farewell.
25 And he took Nadan. his sister's son with him and seated him in a parlour and set about teaching him night and day till he had crammed him with wisdom and knowledge more than with bread and water.
[End of quote]
There follows a list of maxims, some of which are straight out of Tobit 4.
We read more about the Story of Ahikar from professor Susan Niditch at:
https://www.thetorah.com/article/joseph-interprets-pharaohs-dreams-an-israelite-type-922-folktale
….
In brief, the story tells about an Assyrian [sic] wise man named Ahiqar, who served at the courts of Sennacherib and his son Esarhaddon. As Ahiqar has no son, he adopts his nephew Nadan and treats him as his own son, and asks Esarhaddon to accept Nadan as his counselor upon Ahiqar’s retirement.
Nadan, however, deals treacherously with his uncle, accusing him of disloyalty to the king.
Esarhaddon orders an officer by the name of Nabu-šuma-iškun to find Ahiqar and execute him, but as Ahiqar had once saved Nabu-šuma-iškun’s life in the past, he asks for reciprocity in return.
Nabu-šuma-iškun agrees, kills one of his own slaves to fake Ahiqar’s death, and hides Ahiqar in a makeshift prison, where he lives as a castaway or outcast. ….
News of the great wise man Ahiqar’s “death” reaches the ears of the Pharaoh of Egypt, who sees an opportunity to hurt his Assyrian rival. The Pharaoh challenges Esarhaddon with a riddle-like trial or wager: Egypt would like to build a castle in the air. If Esarhaddon can send him someone who knows how to do this, Egypt will pay three years of taxes to Assyria, but if Assyria cannot send Egypt someone with this knowhow, Assyria must pay three years’ taxes to Egypt.
The story continues in a classic Type 922 fashion: Esarhaddon is furious with Nadan, since he cannot solve the riddle, and bemoans his rash decision to have Ahiqar executed. Nabu-šuma-iškun hears this, and, in a manner reminiscent of the cupbearer in the Joseph story, tells the king that he can produce Ahiqar, who will certainly know the answer. Ahiqar appears before Esarhaddon, and the king sends him to Egypt.
After a long session of answering riddles, Pharaoh tells Ahiqar to build the castle in the air. Ahiqar sends two boys up on eagles, who call down to the Egyptians that they should hand them some bricks and they will start building. Pharaoh says it is impossible to get bricks to people all the way up in the sky, to which Ahiqar replies that if he can’t even get the bricks to his builders, how are they supposed to build the castle. The story ends with Pharaoh paying the tribute to Assyria, Esarhaddon reinstating Ahiqar as advisor, and Nadan dying a cruel death. ….
In the history of Islam, the history of philosophy and science,
we encounter a handful of polymaths of the Golden Age (c. 800-1300 AD),
who, I believe, are simply based upon a greatly embellished
and legend-enhanced Ahikar.
As we read previously, Ahikar has been transformed by legend and embellishment from being a sober military governor and administrator of the highest level for the kingdoms of Assyria and Babylonia, a wise and kindly man who practised almsgiving, into a sage of enyclopaedic knowledge - an ancient Leonardo da Vinci, so to speak - and a wonder worker.
Islamic Golden Age polymaths
In the history of Islam, the history of philosophy and science, we encounter a handful of polymaths of the Golden Age (c. 800-1300 AD), who, I believe, are simply based upon a greatly embellished and legend-enhanced Ahikar.
In the same sort of fashion has Ahikar’s c. 700 BC contemporary, the Simeonite Judith, been chronologically projected forward so as to become a supposed Ethiopian queen of c. 900 AD, Gudit (or Judith).
The handful of presumed Islamic scholars of the Golden Age to whom I refer are the polymathic Al-Kindi (c. 800); Al-Razi (c. 850); Al-Farabi (c. 900); Avicenna (c. 1000); Averroes (c. 1150); and Ibn Khaldun c. 1300).
In these famous names is largely encompassed Islamic philosophy, science, astronomy, cosmology, history, demography, medicine and music for the Golden Age.
Now, I find in four of these six names elements of Ahikar’s Assyro-Babylonian names: Esagil-kinni-ubba and Aba-enlil-dari. Thus:
AL-KINDI – ESAGIL-KINNI;
AL-FARABI – ENLIL-DAR-AB(I);
AVICENNA – UBB-KINNI(A);
AVERROES – ABA-(D)AR(I)
This becomes a huge extension of the already over-stretched Ahikar of legend and pseudo-history, including his influence upon the Koran.
If I am correct in identifying Ahikar with at least four of these famed six intellectuals of the so-called Islamic Golden Age, then this will have enormous ramifications for the history of philosophy and science, and, indeed, for the authenticity of Islam.
