Hidayah Blog

Assalamu-Alaykum (Peace be Upon you)

In this section of the blog, we aim to highlight the contribution that Islam has made to humanity in all fields, whether that be in the past or in the present.

And so, just as Boeing have unveiled their latest Dreamliner and Airbus plan to make the biggest commercial aircraft ever, we take a look at the humble beginnings of man and his desire to soar in the air like birds.

We find that Ibn Firnas of Islamic Spain invented, constructed and tested a flying machine in the 800’s AD. Furthermore, Roger Bacon, the famous English scientist, learned of flying machines from Arabic references to Ibn Firnas’ machine. And Philip Hitti, in his famous book, History of the Arabs writes that, “Ibn Firnas was the first man in history to make a scientific attempt at flying.”

And Allah knows best.

Ma’as-salaam

This entry was posted on Monday, July 23rd, 2007 at 2:31 pm and is filed under Did You Know?. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.