Tasawwuratu l-matnwa š-šarh ila hada l-maqam

This attitude toward Greek logic is epitomized in a famous debate reported to have taken place in Baghdad in 932 between the grammarian Abu Sa'id al-Sirafi and Abu BishrMatta, a Syriac Christian who translated some of Aristotle's works into Arabic and is purported to have been one of al-Farabi'steachers. The extant account of the debate is heavily biased towards al-Sirafi, who attacks logical formalism and denies the ability of logic to act as a measure of reasoning over and above the innate capacities of the intellect itself. Hisprincipal claims are that philosophical logic is nothing but Greek grammar warmed over, that it is inextricably tied to the idiom of the Greek language and that it has nothing to offer speakers of another language such as Arabic. Year of publishing: 1829.

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