4 Reasons on Why You Should Read The House of Wisdom

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  • It covers a lesser-known society and time period
The book covers the beginning of the Islamic Golden Age and the achievements of scholars during that time period. Many people in the Western world have not heard of the Golden Age of Islam and are not aware of the intellectual achievements that happened during this time. The Golden Age is a crucial part of human history, as it helped preserve thousands of years of knowledge during Europe's Dark Ages, thus allowing future European scholars to continue their studies. These European scholars would also then have more data and research on their hands because of the progress that occurred while they were suffering during the Dark Ages. 
  • Even though it is a history book, it is written in a novel style making it much more engaging
A lot of time history books can feel like textbooks, making them rather boring with the excessive number of dates and specifics they shove down your throat. This makes the reader far more involved in the book, as it feels like a casual book you can sit on the couch and read. Additionally, the novel aspect of the book makes the events fit together like one coherent story, making it easier to remember the order of events and specific individuals. However, there aren't specific dialogues and such like a real novel, but that is quite understandable as the topic at hand happened around a thousand years ago.
  • If you're into science, this book covers many scientific achievements of Islamic scholars
Islamic scholars made many discoveries in the fields of medicine, optics, mathematics, astronomy, and more. Many of their ideas influenced European scholars to formulate the modern science we have today. The author of this book details many of these innovations and discoveries, as well as how they came to be and how it connects to our modern understanding of that topic. Along with that, the author explains how more ancient societies influenced scholars who pioneered that subject. I personally learned that the Greeks were major influences on the Arabs and Persians, who studied their works with great care and added upon them. They even wrote arguments either supporting or criticizing the Greeks' views.
  •  The Islamic Golden Age was a crucial part of history
Like I have mentioned before, the importance of this time period often goes unsung. Without the preservation of knowledge that the scholars did, there would be a catastrophic loss of knowledge due to Europe's Dark Ages, and I feel like the book captures the significance of this quite well. Like I have stated before, many of the innovations made during this time period sped up scientific development in the aftermath of the Dark Ages. Overall, this time period is just as important as the Renaissance. 

Comments

  1. JanakiMarch 1, 2020 at 11:19 AM

    I found your blog post to be very interesting as non-Western contributions to science and mathematics are usually ignored compared to the achievements of western civilizations. It's nice that you chose to read a book about something that people don't usually read, or even know about it. I also liked how you have four reasons to the reader about why they should read your book and it was concise, yet informative. I would highly consider reading it in the future as it seems interesting and I'm also interested in the non-Western roots and discoveries in science and mathematics. Nice job!

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  2. NoahMarch 6, 2020 at 6:41 AM

    I enjoyed reading your listicle because writing about history books isn't easy even when they are more like novels. It was interesting to see that many things we know as objective truths today come from the Golden Age of Islam. You did a good job of explaining each particular topic in depth so the reader could understand even without reading the book. Well done!

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