The article analyzes the life and work of Al-Farabi within the context of Eurasian Geography and contemporary realities. The legacy of Al-Farabi is a source of inspiration, knowledge, and solutions to many present problems, since his writings bring together the wisdom of the East and the progressive approach of the West. The multi-faceted nature and relevance of tractates of the Second Teacher can be used as a practical tool for the development of the people of Kazakhstan and improvement of the spiritual component of a personality and a community.
Introduction
According to the Cultural Policy Concept of the Republic of Kazakhstan, the strategic dominant of the new cultural policy resides in the idea of the Nation’s spiritual modernization and renewal of national consciousness named ‘Rukhani Zhangyru’ (Spiritual Revival), proclaimed by the First President of the Republic of Kazakhstan and designed to consolidate the people of Kazakhstan with its rich cultural legacy and creative resources as well as inspire its citizens on achievement of the infusive goal of the Republic of Kazakhstan to enter the top 30 most developed countries of the globe.
Today, the development of culture and cultural potential pertains to the key strategic priorities of many nations and countries around the world. The most important success criteria include the level of cultural development; availability of the effective infrastructure of institutions and mechanisms that ensure preservation and enrichment of the national and global cultural heritage; and also creation, distribution, and consumption of high-quality cultural values, fruitful cultural exchange, and spiritual and creative self-realization of individual personalities.
“Space is the measure of all things, time is the measure of all events. When the horizons of space and time merge, national history begins. And this is not just a beautiful aphorism.
If you think about the history of the German, Italian, or Indian people, the question of the relationship between the territory and the great achievements of these peoples during a thousand-year history quite rightly arises. Of course, Ancient Rome and modern Italy are not the same, but the Italians are justly proud of their roots. The ancient Goths and modern Germans are also not the same people, but they are all part of Germany’s vast historical heritage. Ancient India, with its rich polyethnic culture and the modern Indian people are naturally considered as one unique civilization, continuing its development in an uninterrupted stream of history.
And this is the right approach, allowing you to understand your origins, and indeed the entire national history in all its depth and complexity” [1].
In the view of the authors of the collective monograph ‘Ideals of Al-Farabi and Socio-Humanitarian Development of Modern Kazakhstan’ under the editorship of Z.K.Shaukenova, today’s Kazakhstan has reached a new phase of its historical evolution when the most important purpose lies not only in overcoming financial and economical difficulties, crises, and globalization challenges with minimum losses and troubles, but also in implementing the new thoroughly thought strategy of the socio-cultural, spiritual, and ethical growth of our country. This strategy will be effective if we acknowledge that there is more to that than sociohumanitarian models of the East and the West, but, above all, there is our own experience reflected in philosophical transactions of outstanding thinkers of the Kazakh Steppe and objectively conceptualized in the un-
*Corresponding author email: rahimzhanova.82@mail.ru derlying documents of the Kazakhstani society and its program-embedded ideas. Those are annual Addresses to the people of Kazakhstan by the Head of the country and Nation’s Leader N.A. Nazarbayev, along with various documents, which regulate and guide state activities in the field of culture, science, education, healthcare, and interethnic and interconfessional relations.Together, they represent an entire spectrum of the conceptual world outlooks, ideological and political concepts, and official standards and regulations of the State that provide for the current socio-humanitarian development of the Kazakhstani society. The overarching document which takes a special place in the development of Kazakhstan is the historic paper of the epoch-scale meaning, the program article by Elbasy Nursultan Nazarbayev — ‘Seven Facets of the Great Steppe’, which continues the program of Rukhani Zhangyru (Spiritual Revival) [1; 1]. In his article, Elbasy announced six new large projects aimed at investigating the history of Kazakhstan and popularizing its cultural heritage. Any national culture is primarily formed by creative intellectuals. They act as custodians of the spiritual culture and its missionaries that bring the valuable legacy to upcoming generations.
Experimental
The methodological basis of the study is hermeneutic, anthropological, theoretical research methods. Additionally, methods of description, narration, observation, classification, comparison, induction, deduction were used in the study. An objective study was conducted applying philosophical research methods. Methods of comparative text analysis, structural analysis, systematization were used in the research.
Results and Discussions
Creative intellectuals always have an important role and significant place in the Kazakh society. Often, the destiny of the nation was greatly influenced by their decisions and actions. During hard times, common people vested confidence in the intellectual domain, considering the latter to be spiritual teachers and finding support and guidance in their deeds.
Scientific research of the national history and culture is an effective method to actualize and adapt them within the social consciousness. This is contributed by the discussion space designed to provide in-depth communications, debates, and reflection of the most important components of the national selfconsciousness. Since Kazakhstan begins to shape its national self-determination, studies of the most prominent legacy of Al-Farabi gain special significance. Such status is further raised both by the strong need to strengthen the historical self-consciousness of the nation and realization of the full-fledged partner-level inclusion of Kazakhstan into the global community.
Al-Farabi’s legacy allows building cultural linkages with peoples of the Near and Middle East, Central Asia, and Europe, since it serves somewhat as a symbolic bridge to unite various cultures, as a binding thread to cement cultural interaction and international relations between the East and the West. The name of Al- Farabi is well-known to the scientific circles in Syria and Iraq, in Egypt and Turkey, in France and Spain, in Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. Owing to the leading role of Kazakhstan in Farabi-studies, our country may become the flagship of the expanding process of popularizing ideas of the great thinker and fostering spiritual bonds within the Eurasian territory. Al-Farabi’s philosophy is a fusion of the Eastern and Western concepts [2; 23].
Profound research and actualization of his ideas will contribute to the comprehensive and robust interpretation of the dialogue between the East and the West.Kazakhstan is spread at the crossroad of eastern and western cultures, being the historical hub of their long interaction and cross-enrichment as a result of such cooperation. Turkic roots of the personal biography of the sage, which had given way to the tree of his philosophy on the ground of the Islamic culture, made his crown stronger; and Al-Farabi’s legacy has become a symbol of the ability of a philosophical mind to create and produce within the multiple-meaning space of thinking.
The Kazakh land used to be a home for numerous outstanding characters that became famous far beyond our country, incredibly contributed to the development of the global science, and played a key role in the history of both their own people and other nations.One of such men of genius was Abu Nasr Al-Farabi, a great philosopher of the medieval East, a person of encyclopedic knowledge, a founder of the Kazakh social and political philosophy, and a spiritual teacher of many thinkers.
The article by the Leader of the Nation ‘Seven Facets of the Great Steppe’ says “…When the horizons of space and time merge, national history begins... Kazakhstan, the ancestral homeland of the Turkic peoples, is the sacred “Kara Shanyrak”[3; 2].From here, from our steppes, the Turkic tribes and peoples who made a significant contribution to the historical processes in other countries and regions went to different parts of the world...
Our land, without exaggeration, has become the place from where many objects of material culture originate. Much of that, without which the life of modern society is simply unthinkable, was once invented in our area. In their development, inhabitants of the steppes introduced many technical innovations to the world and became the forefathers of inventions, which are still used in all parts of the world. The chronicles preserve a lot of well-known facts, which show how the ancestors of the Kazakhs repeatedly changed the course of political and economic history over vast areas of Eurasia.
Altai is of great importance to the history of the Kazakhs and other peoples of Eurasia. From time immemorial, these majestic mountains not only decorated the lands of Kazakhstan, but were also the cradle of the Turkic peoples. It was here, in the middle of the 1st millennium, where the Turkic world was born, and a new milestone was reached in the Great Steppe. History and geography formed a special model of continuity of the Turkic states, the great steppe empires. For centuries, they have successively replaced each other, leaving their significant mark in the economic, political and cultural landscape of medieval Kazakhstan.
Having mastered the space within wide geographical boundaries, the Turkic peoples managed to create a symbiosis of nomadic and settled civilizations that led to the flourishing of medieval cities, which became centres of art, science, and world trade. For example, medieval Otyrar gave humanity one of the greatest minds of the world civilization, Abu Nasr Al-Farabi, while Turkestan was a place where Khoja Ahmet Yassawi, one of the great spiritual leaders of the Turkic peoples, lived and worked.
A prominent scholar and philosopher, Abu Nasr Al-Farabi was born in the year of 870 in the city of Farab, located in the place where the river of Arys joins Syr Darya, which is now Otyrar district of South Kazakhstan region of modern Kazakhstan. In the 9th-10th centuries, the city of Otrar used to be a major political, cultural, and trade center, a junction point of caravan roads within the Great Silk Way, an artery that connected medieval Europe and Asia. Al-Farabi was an offspring of the privileged Turk strata as evidenced by the word ‘Tarhan’ in his full name: Abȗ-Nasr Muhammad Ibn-Muhammad Ibn-Tarhan Ibn-Uzlag Al- Farabi at-Turk [4; 81].
In Europe, translation of Al-Farabi’s texts into Latin and Hebrew started already in the XXII–XXIII centuries. In 1930–1932 in Paris, the first part of his Great Book of Music was published in French. Translation was made by French scholar Baron Rudolf Erlanje. The name of Al-Farabi has ingrained into the history of the global science and culture. Having immensely influenced the European Renaissance, his transactions served as the linking bridge to bring together cultures and philosophies of the West and the East.
In Kazakhstan, research of the artistic heritage by Abu Nasr Al-Farabi began in the 60-s of the last century. Those scientific studies were initiated by Akzhan Mashani (Mashanov).
Recalling those days, he wrote: “Does anyone prohibit us from studying the scientific legacy of Al- Farabi? Is it not a direct and honor commitment of the scholars of Kazakhstan, his homeland? It is our duty to our people and to the memory of one of its greatest sons. So I have set a goal for myself to give a start to studying Farabi’s legacy. It was in the year of 1956… In two years, we had two volumes of Al-Farabi’s texts and the same amount of information on his personality and life. In 1960, we (myself and Akhmetova N., the director of the Library of the Kazakh SSR Academy of Sciences of the Kazakh SSR) prepared a memorandum addressed to Satpayev K.I., the President of the Academy of Sciences of the Kazakh SSR, that it was high time to proceed with the scrupulous research of Al-Farabi’s works. He considered our memo very carefully and endorsed as agreed and approved for implementation” [5; 106].
According to the materials summarized in the article ‘Farabi-Studies in Kazakhstan Prior to the Era of Independence’ by Galiya Kurmangaliyeva, several years later, in 1967, a group dedicated to studying Al- Farabi’s legacy was formed in Kazakhstan, giving an impetus to the fundamental research of Al-Farabi’s texts. It was performed in the context of the world philosophy and comprehension of problems of the historical and philosophical process as a whole.Still, it was Akzhan Mashani who initiated development of Farabi- studies in Kazakhstan in terms of conceptualizing the history, culture, and self-consciousness of the nation.
As a result of his self-sacrificing efforts, modern interpretation of Al-Farabi’s legacy has discovered deep-laid roots of the Kazakh spiritual culture, its Turk-Islamic basis and worldview contents. The memory of the strong-minded patriotic researcher, as well as his contribution to the development of Farabi-studies have been monumentalized by the Kazakh National Technical University named after K.I. Satpayev, where Mashani used to work for many years. The Institute of Basic Education, a part of most long-standing technical talent factory of the country, has been named in his honor.
The center of the studies of Abu Nasr Al-Farabi’s legacy was hosted in the Academy of Sciences, while obligations of the head office who used to realize, and still does, fundamental studies in that field was the Institute of Philosophy and Science of the Academy of Sciences of the Kazakh SSR, nowadays calledthe Institute for Philosophy, Political Science and Religious Studies under the Committee of Science of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan. Initial research of the legacy of Al-Farabi and further expansion of the program of its studies progressed to a new phase within the framework of preparing to conduct a series of international events dedicated to the 1100th thinker’s anniversary under the auspices of UNESCO around the globe. The jubilee agenda included, inter alia, the international academic conference hosted at his historical birthplace, in the contemporary capital city of Kazakhstan — Alma-Ata.
Those activities were implemented in close cooperation with central organizations of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR as the Kazakh Academy of Sciences was one of its academic and administrative divisions. It bears mentioning that formation of the national Farabi-studies was greatly influenced by such outstanding Russian scholars as Academican B.G. Gafurov, Doctors of science S.N. Grigoryan and B.A. Rozenfeld, Candidate of philosophical studies A.V.Sagadeyev, and many others.
For all these years, Farabi-studies in Kazakhstan have been dealing with comprehensive research of the various facets of the sage’s encyclopedic legacy: ontology and gnoseology, logic and social philosophy, ethics and aesthetics,politics and natural sciences, music and math.
The outcomes of that all-encompassing and in-depth scientific and research activities have been fixed in extensive monographic papers and academic articles, as well as materials of international academic forums and republican conferences held in our country.
The national philosophy has been witnessing emergence of the Kazakhstani school of Farabi-studies along with the evolution of the historical and philosophical knowledge in connection therewith. And yet, its essence has remained unchanged — immense Al-Farabi’s legacy that absorbed ideas of Hellenistic, Arabic, Persian, and Turkic cultural traditions, having transformed them into the concept of communicative and spiritual linkages between the East and the West.
As any sophisticated project, studies of Al-Farabi’s legacy can be structured as certain levels and areas, which are interrelated and still have their own specific peculiarities. At the dawn of scientific efforts on the research of the encyclopedic activities of Al-Farabi, three major fields of exploring studies were outlined.The first one was aimed at searching tractates authored by the thinker and their translation into Kazakh and Russian. The second dealt with scientific and research activities as well as academic and administrative arrangements which provided for both studying the writings of Al-Farabi and their active introduction into the discourse of the philosophy of Kazakhstan. The third focused on the scientific and popularizing, educational, and propagandistic work intended to make Al-Farabi’s legacy available to the wide academic circles, young minds, and entire population of the country.
Many-sided texts of Al-Farabi made an incredible contribution into the evolution of the human civilization and philosophical thinking. Al-Farabi’s worldview has been recognized by modern researchers as a linking chain between the antique reality and Islamic medieval world on one side, and between the Western European and Islamic Middle Ages — on the other.
Arabic thinkers who produceda significant impact on the culture of the era of Renaissance in Europe, such as Al-Biruni, Ibn Sina, Ibn Rushd, Ibn Baja, Ibn Tufayil, and many others, considered themselves to be disciples of Al-Farabi.
Ibn Sina’s medical works were highly-valued in Europe throughout the Middle Ages. Ibn Sina said that he had understood The Metaphysics of Aristotle only through Al-Farabi’s comments. Ibn Rushd was known in Europe under the name of Averroes. Ibn-Rushd employed Al-Farabi’s idea on the superiority of philosophy over religion, as well as reason over revelation, thus founding the doctrine of the duality of truth. Ibn- Baja was also influenced by the philosophy of Al-Farabi. In his tract ‘On the Lifestyle of a Hermit’, he writes about the important role of knowledge in achieving ethical excellence. Ibn-Tufeyl in his Novel of Hayy, the Son of Yaqzan, develops Al-Farabi’s thought on the perfection of the philosophical way of knowing the truth.
Considering Al-Farabi’s weight in European philosophy, we should mention the Jewish philosopher and theologian Maimonides, whose work “Guide to the Lost” contains ideas of Al-Farabi. Through Maimonides, we can trace a thread throughout the history of philosophy, leading from Al-Farabi to Spinoza, Dana Scott, Roger Bacon. The English monk and philosopher, Roger Bacon, being fluent in Arabic, studied original scripts of Al-Farabi’s tractates. During the Renaissance, Europe regained treasures of the classical ancient Greek philosophy and the Second Teacher’s merit was invaluable to that extent.
Al-Farabi’s legacy facilitates establishing the dialogue and rapprochement of the eastern and western cultures. His tracts on the rational mind, ethics, science, music, and happiness have remained relevant after more than a thousand years after their creation. We do need them now to build the progressive and virtuous society.
In particular, the examining Farabi studies proved that Abu Nasr Al-Farabi, was a Kazakh from the city of Otrar, which used to be the largest center of the ancient history of Kazakhstan and ex-Soviet Central Asia. Long ago, the city was called Farab, and this is where the name of the great scholar comes from. Analyzing texts of the outstanding philosopher, encyclopedic scholar, mathematician and astronomer, Akzhan Mashanov concluded that the book ‘Music of the Spheres’ by German astronomer Johannes Kepler takes many facts and data from Al-Farabi’s tract ‘Kitab al-musiki al-kabir’ (‘The Great Book of Music’). In 1984, Akzhan Mashanov’s article in Arabic was published in Kuwait, in Al-Farabi Magazine, where he proved his point.Later, in their peer reviews of the article, many scientists acknowledged that ‘Mr. al-Mashani was right’. Since then, it has been widely accepted that Akzhan Zhaksybekovich Mashanov discovered the great scholar to the Kazakh people. Akzhan Mashanov was fond of his new name — al-Mashani, and his further books ‘Ai Arysy’ and ‘Geomechanics’ were published under that name. He was justly considered to be the first consultant in studying the scientific legacy of the prominent ancestor, and his endeavors helped in bringing Al-Farabi’s name and spirit to the native land. In the year of 1972 marked as the 1100th anniversary of the great thinker, Akzhan Mashanov initiated conducting an international conference with the participation of high-profile world scholars in Almaty. In 2001, during the jubilee’s festivities in honor of Al-Farabi in Kazakhstan, Akzhan Mashanov, after his death, was given the Al-Farabi’s award and respective award certificate No. 246 [6; 8].
Today, we are entitled and honored to say that due to the consistent and scrupulous work of several generations of national scholars, the name of Al-Farabi has become the cultural symbol of Kazakhstan, while Farabi- studies have established an integral part of the science of our country, being one of its prioritized areas. In this regard, current approach to understanding the role of culture pre-conditions forming a new sociocultural environment, whose guiding principles would be competitiveness, pragmatism, preservation of the national identity, worship to knowledge, open consciousness, and evolutionary path of the development of our state.
It stands to quote Yergobek Shyngys, the Vice-Rector in tutorial activities and social matters of the National Academy of Arts named after T. Zhurgenov: “It has been a long-known fact that the Kazakh culture is an important componentof the world culture. There may be various new views on the history of Kazakhstan. It can be considered through the prism — the way our country used to position itself in the past and as we position ourselves now [7; 96]. Based on that, Kazakhstan is undoubtedly a cradle of the great Turkic culture that has made an immense contribution into the development of the entire global community. The culture of Turks cannot be considered outside the Kazakh context. The Kazakh culture has neither invading, nor military tendencies; above all, it is a creating culture, which has a globally acknowledged status in the modern world. And this world would not be so multi-faceted and wide if not for its Turkic component”.
At present, issues of the self-organization of open system remain fundamental for the understanding of the surrounding world. In other words, problems considered by Al-Farabi happen to be embodied in our reality at the higher level.
The analysis suggested in the article by M. Aldabergenov contains a number of facts evidencing than in 2013 a gigantic pentagram of about 366 meters in diameter was found within the territory of Kazakhstan, namely in the town of Lisakovsk in Kostanai region. The nature of the discovery should be explained.
Al-Farabi pointed out that the structure of the Earth amazes with its divine proportions (the so-called Golden Section), being the perfect harmony of the Heaven and the Earth. According to Mashani, the divine angle (38о10I) is of the great importance and isclosely linked to the divine proportions. Their competent interpretation can help explaining many interesting phenomena of the nature. Yet, the science has neither uncovered the secrets of the divine angle, nor answers such questions as why amino acids that participate in all reactions of living organisms are L-isomers (though D-isomers exists in parallel); or how the Nature selects the proper isomer. We can only hope that physical scientists, mathematicians, chemical specialists, and biologists will find the answers thereto.
Nowadays, matters of evolution, both of living organisms and inanimate things, attract attention of scholars all around the world. We are striving to find the universal system, i.e. to unite knowledge, ideas, and methods of various sciences at a higher level to create the integrated picture of the universe. This was the approach of Al-Farabi who considered the matters of the world creation through the geometry. However, in the times of Al-Farabi (870–950), it was possible when, for instance, chemistry formed a part of physics.
One can question whether the Third Teacher of the world would come. Theoretically — yes; practically — there can hardly be a person equally capable of mastering separated achievements of modern sciences and ensuring their synergy. The science of Kazakhstan is lucky to have Al-Farabi as our fellow countryman, a son of the Kazakh land, as academic Mashanov kept proclaiming and proving to the world. We need to tool up ourselves with Al-Farabi’s concept and, being guided to one goal, suggest our own national vision of the problems to the world. Many consider the universe as the continuum mechanics, namely, the Eulerian model. Serious hopes are set on biological sciences as biology is announced as the queen of all sciences of the 21st century. All processes of evolution are more vivid at the example of a living organism, and there are sustainable results to that extent.
It is believed that Al-Farabi left several thousands of scripts and only a small portion thereof has been found and translated. It is gratifying to emphasize that there are people in our country who continue looking for Al-Farabi’s texts across the globe. These activities should be encouraged within a governmental program. At present, a serious search of historical data on our republic has been initiated, and this state initiative should allocate special funds at studying Al-Farabi’s life and transactions. By ennobling Al-Farabi, we will rise up our modern Kazakhstani science.
Considering Al-Farabi, it is important to mention of his teaching, his philosophy. We neglect Gegel for being the idealist; we simply forgot about Marxism and Leninism and never mention them; we didn’t accept Kant; we don’t know Whitehead. So what do we have then? We should promote Al-Farabi’s philosophy to the frontline. It is worth mentioning Al-Farabi’s writings ‘On the Mind and Science’ (Alma-Ata, 1975, ‘Nauka’ Publishing House, Kazakh SSR), which provides a clear concept of Al-Farabi’s philosophy. It also gives a definition of the word ‘Mind’, because it is our mind that forms the basis of the philosophical approach towards the existing reality. “Thinking substance; thinking in reality; and mind-grasping substances in reality” are Al-Farabi’s categories that connect dialectics of the equivalence of brainwork and existence. Philosophy is the thought of its epoch.
Al-Farabi recommended reviewing his tract “On the Classification of Sciences”, before dealing with the matters of science: “your approach to sciences will be based on the knowledge and train of thought, rather than on blindness and ignorance” (p.54 «On the Mind and Science»). Being a child of his time, he divides the science into the following sections: 1. Language 2. Logic 3. Math 4. Physics 5. Civil Science. In particular, it stands to mention logic. “Taking into consideration its goal, we obtain a better understanding of its value in everything that we wish to prove in ourselves, and that we wish to prove in others, and that others wish to prove in us[8; 106]. If we know those laws and intend to reach a certain purpose and prove it for ourselves, then, when searching for what we want to prove, we should not leave our minds at rest, nor should we remain in uncertainty, striving to reach the goal, no matter what the price is… We should know what path we are to take, where we are going to in the end, how we start our journey, and how to have our mind understand and learn things, one by one, so to ultimately achieve the final goal”, Al-Farabi said. The art of logic serves as a tool for verifying mind-grasping substances. “Contemporary natural and humanitarian sciences should not exist separately; but ought to be interrelated as the elements of the integrated human culture”, al- Mashani wrote.Is it reasonable to use such classification in modern realities? Only the field of Earth investigations enlists a number of new areas, such as geodynamics, geophysics, geochemistry, geomechanics, and others. Presently, there is a tendency to consolidating scientific sectors, universities, professions. We call those consolidative formations clusters and complexes. Today, we speak a lot of the integration of education, science, and industry. Perhaps, use of Al-Farabi’s classification of sciences as the basis of such consolidations would be the optimal solution.
We should not speak of Al-Farabi without mentioning al-Mashani as he was the one who introduced us to the teaching of Al-Farabi. That said, in his 16-volume writings, al-Mashani both brings Al-Farabi’s ideas to us and develops them on the basis of ‘magical numbers’. Numbers rule the world, and the key ruler of them, according to al-Mashani, is the number of iron (khadid) — 26.
Starting from ancient times, people have known about five types of regular polyhedrons considered to be divine or sacred. Based on those polyhedrons, topology, theory of groups, and duality principle, al- Mashani presents its own vision of the superior form of symmetry and harmony of the universe. He believed that ‘magical numbers’ have some special sense and relate to certain consistent patterns of the nature. The unique heritage left by the medieval thinker from Otrar, South Kazakhstan region, being taken through the axiological interpretation of our time, is assigned with a significant ethical role both for the spiritual transformation of the mankind and for the successful progress of Kazakhstan on its way to democracy and spiritually healthy society.
Conclusion
In the view of modernization of the social consciousness, a special accent should be paid to strengthening the national identity and propagating the new Kazakhstani patriotism. In this regard, activities within the framework of the existing projects in the field of culture will be continued, along with the initiated implementation of projects under the Rukhani Zhangyru Program — “The Sacred Geography of Kazakhstan”, “Culture of Modern Kazakhstan in the Global Context”, “Tugan Zher” and others.
Looking at the history of the mankind, Al-Farabi, a representative of the brilliant assembly of medieval scholars, made the most significant contribution into the development of science and culture, the key drivers of the technical and spiritual evolution of the world civilization.His name symbolizes the highest level of intellect and fundamental encyclopedic knowledge. He is an example of whole-hearted servicing to the ideals of humanism and justice. The new Development Strategy of the Republic of Kazakhstan states “… in the 21st century Kazakhstan should become a bridge for establishing a dialogue and cooperation between the East and the West”. This confirms the greatness of Al-Farabi’s teaching and demonstrates possibilities of using his tractates for resolving many problems of our time. According to Al-Farabi, “the light of the mind constitutes the fundamental basis of the entire universe. The light of the mind and soul is in our heart as the Sun is the source of all life and light, heavens and earth”.
Al-Farabi consistently followed his saying — “til-adis-oiorisi”(“language–method– thought/mind”). As a consequence of his erudition, powerful thinking, and noble character, Al-Farabi was able to distinguish between the false and the true. He insisted that the purpose of science resides in perceiving wonderful secrets of the generous and wise Nature. Through his texts he conveyed his thoughts that can be currently employed at the higher levels, and the scientific community of Kazakhstan should fit his concepts to the current issues.
In conclusion, it is to vote that the Great Steppe blessed the mankind with many great sons, including Abu Nasr Al-Farabi. As of now, the name of Al-Farabi is widely known in the whole world that recognizes and honors the famous Turkic scholar of encyclopedic knowledge as the Second Teacher, and we can see that the interest of the abroad academic circles to his legacy never stops growing.
References
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