Michael Hamilton Morgan

He is an author and a former U.S. diplomat. His 2007 book, Lost History: the Enduring Legacy of Muslim Scientists, Thinkers and Artists has now touched more than 300 million people worldwide. He is also the founder and president of the New Foundation for Peace, a non-profit organization created to teach leadership skills worldwide.

His previous books were Collision with History; the Search for John F. Kennedy’s PT 109, a book and television documentary released by National Geographic and MSNBC in 2002. In 2001, he co-authored Graveyards of the Pacific, also published by National Geographic. On these books he collaborated with the undersea explorer and Titanic discoverer, Robert D. Ballard. Morgan’s 1991 international thriller, The Twilight War (Dutton/Signet), was set in Eastern Europe, Central America and Washington.

From Lost History: the Enduring Legacy of Muslim Scientists, Thinkers and Artists:

The honor of chivalry: Saladin

Morgan states that this period of trouble (a short time before the emergence of Saladin) would lead to the appearance of a Muslim religious leader who, although not endowed with the same intellect of Hârûn ar-Rashîd or al-Ma’mûn in Baghdad, or al-Hâkim Bi Amr Allâh in Cairo, or ‘Abd-ar-Rahmân III in Cordoba, would embody a different kind of honor of Islamic chivalry which would dazzle the Europeans and put them to many critical situations.

But in an attempt to find the reason lying behind his noble manners, they claimed that he was so simply because there was European blood running in his veins. I mean Saladin. Like Hârûn ar-Rashîd, the stories pertaining to him were of a romantic and mythical nature. But his highness and human judgment in the controversial matters were true and imitable.[1]

The scientific genius: Al-Khwarizmi

Till the 16th century, i.e. 700 years after the death of al-Khwarizmi, all his writings were still received with great respect and high esteem by the Europeans, considering them among the truisms; and this seems clear from the remark they often give in the footnotes of their writings “As stated by al-Khwarizmi.” That is, all their calculations and computations were based on their belief in the knowledge of this Persian scientist; and all al-Khwarizmi’s translated books became the foundation of the university books of mathematics and astronomy in Europe and Islamic world.[2]

The medical excellence: Az-Zahrâwi

This Andalusian master and surgeon, as says Morgan, is also the chief of Muslims in obstetrics, dentistry and medical products. Those things and more are included in his al-Khulâsah al-Wâfiyah which he put in 30 volumes; and because of its complexity and loftiness, it would take from the European translators about 300 years to understand it and then be able to translate it into Latin and other European languages.[3]

[1] Michael Hamilton Morgan, Lost History: the Enduring Legacy of Muslim Scientists, Thinkers and Artists, (Arabic translation), 268.

[2] Ibid. 91.

[3] Ibid. 199.