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The Brethren of Purity (اخوان الصفا; also translated as Brethren of Sincerity) were an obscure and mysterious organization of neo-Platonic Arabic philosophers in Basra, Iraq - which was the seat of the Abbasid Caliphate - sometime during the 10th century CE.
They are remembered primarily because of a work they produced- the Encyclopedia of the Brethren of Purity, a giant encyclopedia expounding in an epistolary style their esoteric teachings and learning; it would greatly influence later encyclopedias. They are generally considered a secret society because of their closed & private meetings every 12 days, and their general reclusiveness; a good deal of Western scholarship has been on the subject of just pinning down who were the Brethren, or even what century they were active in.
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Meetings
The Brethren regularly met on a fixed schedule. The meetings apparently took place on three evenings of each month: once near the beginning, in which speeches were given, another towards the middle, apparently concerning astronomy and astrology, and the third sometime between the end of the month and the 25th of that month; during the third one, they recited hymns with philosophical content . During their meetings and possibly also during the three feasts they held, on the dates of the sun's entry into the Zodiac signs "Ram, Cancer, and Balance"), besides the usual lectures and discussions, they would engage in some manner of liturgy reminiscent of the Harranians
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Name
The Arabic "Ikhwan al-Safa" (short for, among many transcriptions, "Ikhwan al-Safa wa Khullan al-Wafa wa Ahl al-adl wa abna al-Hamd") can be translated as either the "Brethren of Purity" or the "Brethren of Sincerity"; various scholars such as Ian Netton prefer "of Purity" because of the group's ascetic impulses towards purity and salvation.
A suggestion made by Goldziher, and later written on by Philip K. Hitti in his History of Arabs, proposes that:
The story concerns a ring-dove and its companions who have become entangled in the net of a seeking birds. Together, they left themselves and the ensnaring net to a nearby rat, who is gracious enough to gnaw the birds free of the net; impressed by the rat's altruistic deed, a crow becomes the rat's friend. Soon a tortoise and gazelle also join the company of animals. After some time, the gazelle is trapped by another net; with the aid of the others and the good rat, the gazelle is soon freed, but the tortoise fails to leave swiftly enough and is himself captured by the hunter. In the final turn of events, the gazelle repays the tortoise by serving as a decoy and distracting the hunter while the rat and the others free the tortoise. After this, the animals are designated as the "Ikwhan al-Safa". This story is mentioned as an exemplum when the Brethren speak of mutual aid in one rasa'il, a crucial part of their system of ethics that has been summarized thus:
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Ranks
Hierarchy was a major theme in their Encyclopedia, and unsurprisingly, the Brethren loosely divided themselves up into four ranks by age; the age guidelines would not have been firm, as for example, such an exemplar of the fourth rank as Jesus would have been too young if the age guidelines were absolute and fixed. Compare the similar division of the Encyclopedia into four sections and the Jabirite symbolism of 4. The ranks were:
The "Craftsmen"- a craftsman had to be at least 15 years of age; their honorific was the "pious and compassionate" (al-abrār wa 'l-ruhamā).
The "Political Leaders"- a political leader had to be at least 30 years of age; their honorific was the "good and excellent" (al-akhyār wa 'l-fudalā)
The "Kings"- a king had to be at least 40 years of age; their honorific was the "excellent and noble" (al-fudalā' al-kirām)
The "Prophets and Philosophers"- the most aspired-to, the final and highest rank of the Brethren; to become a Prophet or Philosopher a man had to be at least 50 years old; their honorific compared them to historical luminaries such as Jesus, Socrates, or Muhammed who were also classified as Kings; this rank was the "angelic rank" (al-martabat al-malakiyya).
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Identities
There have been a number of theories as to the authors of the Brethren. Among the Is'maili groups and missionaries who favored the Encyclopedia (as Paul Casanova shows in his 1898 work attempting to date the Brethren), authorship was sometimes ascribed to one or another Hidden Imam; this theory goes as far back as to Ibn "al-Qifti" or "El-Kufty"['s biographical compendium of philosophers and doctors (the "Chronicle of the Learned"; Ahkbār al-Hukamā or Tabakāt-el-Hukama)][pg 193 of Lane-Poole's Studies in a Mosque] [pg. 25 of An Introduction to Islamic Cosmological Doctrines: conceptions of nature and methods used for its study by the Ihwan Al-Safa, Al-Biruni, and Ibn Sina, by Prof. Seyyed Hossein Nasr; 1964, the Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 64-13430]), in which the first theory he recounts is "Some people say they have been written by one of the Hidden Imams". [ pg 1; "It can be easily understood too that the Ismā'ilis, among whom the Rasa'il enjoyed a quasi-canonical authority, ascribed to someone or other of their "Hidden Imams"." Here Stern is drawing upon Dr. H. Hamdānī's "The Rasail Ikhwan al-Safa in the Ismaili Literature", published in Der Islam in 1936. Compare also this quote from pg 7 of the "Ikhwan as-Safa and their Rasa'il: A Critical Review of a Century and a Half of Research" (by A. L. Tibawi,as published in volume 2 of The Islamic Quarterly in 1955; pgs.28-46): "It tends, however, to prove one thing, namely, that theRasa'il were popular with later Isma'ili missionaries who read, copied, and summarized them to suit their own purpose. But, as stated above, it has yet to be proved that Isma'ili bent of the tracts and of the genuine ar-Risāla al-Jāmi'a was itself a proof of early Isma'ili connexion. Indeed, the tracts speak in two voices on this Isma'ili bent." "The authorship of the Epistles of the Ikhwan-as-Safa", by Samuel Miklos Stern, published by Islamic Culture of Hyderabad in 1947.]
However, al-Qifti denigrates this account, and instead turns to a comment he discovered, written by Abū Hayyān at-Tuhīdī (or al-Tawhīdī or "Et-Tawhidy"[; d. 1023) in his Kitāb al-Imtā 'wal-Muanasa, in which Tauhidi discusses "Zaid b. Rifa'a" through the proxy of a conversation with the vizier Ib Sa'dān, circa 992][Lane-Poole gives the date as "373 A.H" (After Hegira) on page 193 of his Studies in a Mosque, which would be equivalent to 995.]CE; apparently Tawhīdī was close to this Zaid, praising his intellect, ability and deep knowledge - indeed, he had dedicated his Kitāb as-Sadiq was-Sadaqa to Zaid -- but he was disappointed that Zaid was not orthodox or consistent in his beliefs, and that he was, as Stern puts it:
For many years, this was the only solid evidence as to the authors' identities, but at-Tuhīdī's comments were second-hand evidence and so unsatisfactory. This situation lasted until al-Tawhīdī's Kitāb al-Imtā 'wal-Muanasa was published in 1942. [ pg. 3 "The authorship of the Epistles of the Ikhwan-as-Safa", by Samuel Miklos Stern, published by Islamic Culture of Hyderabad in 1947.] This publication substantially supported al-Qifti's work, although al-Qifti apparently toned down the description and prominence of al-Tawhīdī charges that the Brethren were Batiniyya an esoteric Ismaili sect and thus heretics, possibly so as to not tar his friend Zaid with the same brush.
Stern derives a further result from the published text of the Kitāb al-Imtā 'wal-Muanasa, pointing out that a story al-Tawhīdī ascribes to a personal meeting with an "Qādī Abu'l-Hasan 'Alī b. Hārūn az-Zanjāni, when the founder of the sect, told me this story..." appears in almost identical form in one of the epistles. [ pg. 4 "The authorship of the Epistles of the Ikhwan-as-Safa", by Samuel Miklos Stern, published by Islamic Culture of Hyderabad in 1947]
While neat, Stern's view of things has been challenged by Tibawi, who points out some assumptions and errors Stern has made such as the relationship between the story in al-Tawhīdī work and the Epistle; Tibawi points out that it is possible it was instead taken from a third, independent and prior source.[ pg 12-13 of "Ikhwan as-Safa and their Rasa'il:A Critical Review of a Century and a Half of Research", by A. L.Tibawi, as published in volume 2 of The Islamic Quarterly in 1955;pgs. 28-46]
al-Tawhīdī's testimony has also been described as thus:
The last contemporary source comes from the surviving portions of the Kitāb Siwan al-Hikma (c. 950) by Abu Sulaiman al-Mantiqi (al-Tawhīdī's teacher), which was a sort of compendium of biographies; al-Mantiqi is primarily interested in the Brethren's literary techniques of using parables and stories, and so he says only this little before proceeding to give some extracts of the Encyclopedia:
The second near-contemporary record is another comment by Shahzúry or (Shahrazūrī) as recorded in the Tawārikh al-Hukamā or alternatively, the Tawárykh al-Hokamá; specifically, it is from the Nuzhat al-arwah, which is contained in the Tawárykh, which states:
Amusingly, Aloys Sprenger mentions this in a footnote: "Since I wrote the first part of this notice I found one of the authors of these memoirs mentioned in the following terms: 'Zayd b. Rofa, one of the authors of the Ikhwan al safa, was extremely ignorant in tradition, and he was a liar without shame.'" *
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