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Great lord of
Soul and Wisdom, in thy name which to transcend no flight of thought may
claim
A Sample of Distinguished Scholar’s
Biography
Ali
Akbar Dehkhoda
In this data
bank, it has been endeavored to present information about biography, education,
occupations, responsibilities, skills, innovations, compilations and … of
national and religious scholars of Iran. Biography of Ail Akbar Dehkhoda is an
organized sample, which has been prepared in accordance with the framework of
“Distinguished Scholars” data bank:
Birth, Childhood And Family:
Ali Akbar Dehkhoda was born in Tehran at about the year 1297
After Hejrat (by the Lunar Calendar) .His father, called Khanbaba Khan, was one
of the small landowners of Ghazvin city who had emigrated to Tehran before Ali
Akbar’s birth. Ali Akbar was only ten years old when his father passed away. He
continued his schooling under the guardianship of his mother from that time on.
[Moeen(1)].
Education
And Professional Training: After his father’s death,
one of the great scholars of the time named Sheikh Gholam Hossein Broojerdi,
was assigned to educate Dehkhoda. He had a chamber (class) in Haj Sheikh Hadi
School (located on Sheikh Hadi street in Tehran). He was a single man who
taught Arabic and theology. When The School of Political Science was founded in
Tehran some years later, Dehkhoda began studying there. He soon started to
learn the French language too.
When Mr.Moaven
el doleh Ghaffari was assigned to go to the Balkans as an ambassador, Dehkhoda
accompanied him to that region .He stayed in that area for two years - mostly
living in the Austrian capital of Vienna, trying to perfect his French language
skills and learn the sciences of the time. [Moeen (1)] .
Occupations
And Activities: Dehkhoda’s return to Iran was concurrent with the breaking out
of the Iranian Constitutional Revolution. Dehkhoda began publishing a newspaper
called “ Soor Esrafil” [The horn of the angel Seraphim who is to signal the
resurrection day by blowing this horn] together with two other people in 1325
(Lunar year). After closing down of the newly born Parliament (Majlis) in
the reign of Mohamad Ail Shah (king), Dehkhoda was exiled to Europe along with
a number of other freedom fighters. He then went to the city of Iverdon in
Sweden and published three issues of his newspaper, Soor Esrafeel .The third
issue was published on the fifteenth day of the month of Safar in the year 1327
AH (Lunar year) which was March 8th, 1909.
After that,
Dehkhoda went to Istanbul and with the cooperation of a number of Iranians
residing in Turkey; he published another newspaper in Farsi called Soroosh [a
messenger-angel, Gabriel, who is invisible but whose voice is heard] which
fifteen issues of this newspaper had been published. After the conquest of
Tehran by the revolutionary army (Mojahedeen) and the overthrow of Mohammad Ali
Shah Ghajar, Dehkhoda was elected to the National Legislative Assembly by
both the people of Tehran and of Kerman.Upon the insistence of the
revolutionary movement leaders, he left the territory of the Ottoman Empire and
returned to Iran. During the First World War, Dehkhoda went into seclusion for
various reasons and took refuge in one of the villages of Chahar Mahal
Bakhtiari (in the south-central parts of Iran); and when the war was over, he
returned to Tehran. He, however, retired himself from political activities and
began working on scientific, literary and cultural questions.
Dehkhoda was
the general secretary of the secretariat of the Education Ministry for a while;
and he also held some other administrative positions like that of the chief of
the supervisory office of the Ministry of Justice, the Dean of the School of
Political Science, and later the chief of the Higher Learning School of
Political Science School, in Tehran. All through this time and until the end of
his life, Dehkhoda kept himself busy studying, carrying out research, compiling
and writing. [Moeen (1)]
Colleagues
and Co-workers: Dehkhoda got acquainted with Seyed Hassan Taghizadeh at the
beginning of the year 1325 (Lunar year). At that time Mirza Ghasem Khan Tabrizi
who was working for the government of the King Mozaffar el din (Shah) in a
department called
“ Amin
Hazrat”(headed by a man bearing the same title), had already joined the
constitutional revolutionary movement, and was making preparations to publish a
newspaper with his own finances. He presented a sample of the writings of young
Dehkhoda to Taghizadeh to study and let him know whether they could utilize his
services; and Taghizadeh, while declaring his completely favorable view, urged
both Mirza Ghasem Khan and Mirza Djahangir Khan Shirazi to employ Dehkhoda to
work for the newspaper they were planning to publish. Thus the newspaper
mentioned earlier, Soor Esrafeel, came into circulation with Mr. Djahangir Khan
as its founder, Mirza Ghasem Khan and Mirza Djahangir Khan as joint editors,
and Mr. Dehkhoda as its secretary.
In the year
1326, after the cannonade of the Iranian parliament (Majlis) by the absolutist
troops of Mohammad Ali Shah, and the downfall of the constitutional revolution,
a group of the freedom fighters including Mirza Djahangir Khan, Dehkhoda, Seyed
Djamal el Din Vaezz Esfahani, Malik ol Motokalemeen, Mirza Davood Khan
Aliabadi, and a few others took asylum in the backyard of the National
Legislative Assembly; and after a month, a group of them, including Mr.
Dehkhoda were exiled from Iran. As it went above, Mr. Dehkhoda published Soor
Esrafeel once more, this time in Sweden and with the financial support of a man
called
“ Moazed
ol Saltaneh”, in the city of Iverdon. [Taghizadeh].
During his
exile period and while he lived in the city of Paris, Dehkhoda was in contact
with Allameh Mohammad Ghazvini. [Moeen)].
Among those
people who assisted Mr. Dehkhoda in his endeavor to write the great Dehkhoda
Lexicon were Hommaee, Bahmanyar, Moeen, and Gonabadi
Decease:Mr.
Dehkhoda passed away at seven forty-five PM on Monday, the seventh of Esfand
1334 AH (Solar year), that is, on February 25th, 1956. In his own
house located on Iranshahr Street (Jallar Bayar), in Tehran, and his body was
moved in a solemn funeral procession, to the city of Rey the next morning and
was buried in his own family mausoleum in “ Ibne Babevieh”[Moeen (1)].
Professors And
Instructors: The instructor of the Persian literature classes of Tehran School
of Political Science was Mr. Mohammad Hossein Forooghi, the founder of
“Tarbiat” newspaper, and the father of the famous Mr. Zoka el Molk Forooghi. As
the instructor of the class, Mr. Forooghi sometimes let the class be taught by
his outstanding student, Mr. Dehkhoda.
Since Mr.
Dehkhoda’s house was near that of the famous Islamic jurisprudent,
“Ayatollah Haj Sheik Hadi Nadjmabadi”, Mr. Dehkhoda also had the opportunity to
learn from him. At that time, Mr. Dehkhoda participated in the discussions,
which took place in Mr. Nadjmabadi’s classes like any other student despite his
very young age.
Among the many
great instructors that Mr. Dehkhoda had, he himself believed to have learned
most from the teachings of Sheikh Gholam Hossein Broojerdi. [Moeen (1)].
Compilation
And Their Contents:
Charand va
Parand ( Fiddle-faddle).
This was
the title of a column in Soor Esrafeel newspaper, in which Mr. Dehkhoda
presented his political views and his criticisms leveled at various events, in
a mocking style, under the pen name “Dakho”. [Moeen (1)].Amsal
va Hekam . (Proverbs and Wise
Sayings)
After the
end of the First World War and his return to Tehran from Chahr Mahal va
Bakhftiari, in 1918, Mr. Dehkhoda began a far and wide study of the proverbs
used by common people, the people in the street, as well as all the ones he
could find in the precious treasures of Persian poetry and prose collections.
He then began to make his own collection by classifying the material he had
gathered and finding the roots of every item and its current variations. This
led to the compilation of the four-volume “Amsal va Hekam” which was
published in Tehran during the years 1929-1932. [Moeen (1)]. A selection of
these (proverbs and wise sayings) were published along with some notes written
by Mr. Dehkhoda about the Preface of the four-volume text, in the form of a new
book (entitled”Bargozideh Amsal va Hekam” (Excerpts from Proverbs and Wise
Sayings) in February 1980, with Dr. Seyed Mohammad Dabirsiaghi as its editor.
Collection of
Articles.
A collection
of Dehkhoda’s sociological and political articles which had been published
under the title ‘Charand va Parand’ in the newspaper Soor Esrafeel, along with
32 editorials of this same newspaper (published in Tehran) written by him, and
three issues of Soor Esrafeel published in Iverdon, Sweden, 14 issues of three
newspapers: “Soroosh”, published in Istanbul, Iran newspaper (with Mr.
“Nasser ol Islam” as its editor), published in Tehran, and Aftab (The Sun), the
semi-governmental newspaper of the Nasser ol Molk administration ,
published in Tehran, along with some articles written in another newspaper
called “Shora”( The Council)
published in Tehran , were published together ,in book form, under the title
“Collection of Articles” [Moeen (1)].
Another
collection of articles including the ones entitled Charand va Parand, as well
as other articles entitled “A Collection of Dakho’s Proverbs”, My Delirious
Talks”, and “The Miscellaneous
Notes” were also published together in book form under the title “Dehkhoda’s
Articles” by Dr Seyed Mohammad Dabirsiaghi in February 1980.
[Dabirsiaghi].
In addition to
what went above, Mr. Saeed Nafeesi also collected all of Dehkhoda’s articles
published in the newspaper “ Soor Esrafeel” and had them published in book form
under the title “The Masterpieces of the Contemporary Persian Prose” in 1951.
[Moeen (1)].
Dehkhoda’s
Collection of Poetry.
Mr.
Dehkhoda was very skillful in writing both in poetry and in prose; and he went
deeply into the study of many of the Old Iranian poets’ works. So he occasionally wrote pieces of poetry some of which are quite famous even today. One of such
pieces is the one written in the commemoration of
Mirza Djahangir Khan Shirazi. The poem goes as follows:
Original verse:
Translation
of Verse:
O
you beautiful bird of the dawn! When this dark and mourning night,
Is
gone for ever and has left all its savagery and malice behind,
And
when the fascinating and reviving glamour, of the fragrant morning light,
Has
arisen all who were buried in deep asleep, and make them
stand upright,
When
the sun, as the beloved of all the blue skies and the heavens,
Has
revealed her long golden tresses, to shine so gorgeously bright,
And
Almighty God’s perfection has reappeared with all His glorious might,
And
all the villains and the assassin’s claws, have been fastened perfectly tight,
Remember,
you, all the snuffed out candles, the candles of freedom and right!
O
you fellow intimate of Joseph, his fellow – in – chain and fellow-in fright!
When
your dream was interpreted correctly, and your certain liberty came to light,
Your
heart was filled with joy and your lips blossomed with laughter and delight,
With
the jealousy of foes, and the joy of close friends reaching their ultimate
height,
And
when you fly toward your kin and folk, who have been waiting day and night,
As
free as you can be, as free as the light breeze. Freer than moonlight,
Then
remember those who spent many nights with you, ready to struggle and ready to
fight,
With
the craving to see the loved ones, and the longing to see the day break the
night,
Counted
the stars and the heavens with you until daybreak,
You
remember! When this garden gains its freshness once more, and becomes truly
alight,
O
you poor and grief-stricken nightingale, afflicted with a dreadful blight,
When
our world is filled with hyacinth flowers, Damascus roses and fragrant herbs,
And
has thus become like a Chinese gallery, filled with pictures colorful and
bright,
And
the blooming roses, their petals covered with dews, create such a glorious
sight,
Making
you dazzled, bewitched, infatuated and covered with delight,
Then
remember the precocious raised bud, in severe anguish and filled with spite,
None
of its burning desires soothed, and in such a terrible plight,
Chilled
to the marrow, frozen dead from the winter frost, remember!
O
you, the companion of the great Moses, wandering in the Teeh , Sina desert,
When
these few short years have passed and gone by for ever,
And
when the handsome host of the banquet of wisdom and insight,
Has
made his promises conspicuous and brought his great iterations to light,
And
when the golden rays of solar orb have purred all over from this source of
light,
And
in the morning, the fragrance of ambergris and Aloes wood saturate all in
sight,
Remember
him, who, because of his ignoramus tribe’s poor vision and short sight,
While
sighing longingly for the promised land which was already in sight,
Unjustly
lost his life in that dreadful deserted night, you remember!
And
when the world is rejuvenated and is once again filled with light,
O
you the
child of
this newly-established
golden age , a child so
bright,
When
God’s face, joyous of the renewed loyalty of His servants, all alight,
The
Mighty Lord begins His Holy Kingdom on the Earth once
more,
And
the palaces built for the
oppressors on Earth, and all their trite,
Are
buried under mud with the oppressors and their
ways without a fight
Remember
the one who, enslaved by the assassin and his dagger’ s bite,
Held
guilty of the crime of fighting for freedom and for the peoples’ rights,
Was
martyred and thus sacrificed his life for the cause, you remember!
Professor
Edward Brown, the celebrated orientalist, has published a translation of this
piece of poetry along with the fluent translation of a humorous piece of poetry
written by Dehkhoda in a book called
“
Journalism and the Poetry of Modern
Iran” and has written an Introduction to the humorous piece as well.
Some of
Dehkhoda’s poetry were published in the newspaper Soor Esrafeel and in two
magazines called “ Mohr” and “
Yakima”. His collection of poetry
was published in 1955 with Dr. Moeen as its editor. [Moeen (1)].
In addition,
all his published and his unpublished poetry were put together in book form by
Dr. Dabeersiaghi in February 1980.
[Dabeersiaghi].
The
Great Lexicon.
Dehkhoda’s Lexicon is the product of fourty-five years of persistent
endeavors affected by Mr. Dehkhoda and a group of his colleagues. [Moeen (1)]
The first steps toward preparing the Lexicon were taken during the First World
War when Dehkhoda had taken refuge in the Chahar Mahal VA Bakhtiary area
(1297AH Solar year, 1337 AH by the Lunar year, and 1918 AD). After he had
completed his work on “Amsal va Hekam” (as mentioned above), Dehkhoda continued
his studies on Farsi words and on the poetry and prose texts that he had
collected during the past several years, and worked on the meanings of the
material he had gathered up to then. He soon had in his possession some three
million file cards based on very credible texts written by masters of Persian
and Arabic poetry and prose, as well as printed texts and manuscripts of books
on history, geography, medicine, astrology, astronomy, mathematics, philosophy,
religion, jurisprudence, etc. These file cards formed the basis of what later
became Dehkhoda’s great lexicon. The following is the text of the introductory
note Dehkhoda wrote for his Lexicon.
“My
reason for bearing all this lengthy hardship was in no way related to a desire
for gaining fame or wealth; I was, rather, merely incited by the injustices
leveled at the peoples of the East by Western oppressors .To gain wealth, I had
all the gates wide open to me; and, as for fame, since I never believed in its
eternal nature, I developed no taste for it. I could clearly see that the East
had no choice but to get armed with the weapon of modern civilization Not that
I thought very well of this civilization, because the civilization that
administered the affairs of the world for thousands of years was not a secular
one …” [Moeen (1)]
Aboo
Reyhan Birooni . This is a biography
of Aboo Reihan Mohammad ibn Ahmad Kharazmi Birooni which was published in
Education Magazine filling five consequent issues of this magazine completely.
This magazine was published by the General Publications Department of the
Ministry of Education in 1945, and later, it was published as part of the
Dehkhoda Lexicon without any alterations. [Moeen (1)].
Words
of Advice, and Maxims
. Dehkhoda has also collected a large number of short but elegant
statements and philosophical and moral remarks, written in the Larosh foco
style, which have not as yet been published. [Moeen (1)]
Another
part of Dehkhoda’s works is related to the corrections he made on the
collections of poetry written by celebrated Iranian poets. Some of these have
been published, but some have not, as yet. Among these are: Marginal notes to
the Collection of Poetry of: Nasser Khosro, Seyed Hassan Ghazvini, Hafiz,
Manoochehri Farrokhi, Masood Saad, Soozani; Corrections made to the Collection
of Poetry of Ibn Yamin, and the corrections of Yousef and Zoleikha. In addition
to these, he translated two books in his youth, neither of which was ever
published. These are: The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire, and Montesquieu’s
The Spirit of Laws. Among other works by Dehkhoda, one may mention French-Farsi
Dictionary, Corrections made to Asadi’s Farsi Lexicon, Corrections Made to
‘Sahah al Fors (The second Farsi Lexicon). None of these have been published
either.
[Moeen
1)]
Some
other of his works are:
Some Memories of Dehkhoda in His Own Words
.This was a work which was published in 1979 with Dr. Dabirsiaghi as
its
editor,
Dehkhoda’s Political Letters which was published by Mr. Iraj Afshar in December
1979, and Political Articles which was compiled and published by
Dehkhoda’s colleagues and friends.
[Dabirsiaghi]
The
Critic’s Views on Dehkhoda’s Works:
The
publication of Amsal va Hekam was considered as a literary event in the
literary circles of Tehran in 1932.In the Literary Association of Iran whose
meetings were held in Afsar’s house, a special session was held in Dehkhoda’s
honor in which Professor Froozanfar gave a short talk on the personality of
Dehkhoda and the qualities of Amsal va Hekam, and greatly admired Dehkhoda.
Some
people, however, made much of the fact that the title of the book was
“Amsal va Hekam” (proverbs and wise sayings) whereas it was
replete with all kinds of idiomatic expressions, technical terms, metaphorical
remarks, and traditions and religious narratives, which had nothing to do with
proverbs and wise sayings. Dehkhoda responded by saying that the reason for
this choice of the title was avoiding a much longer title like “Proverbs, Wise
Sayings, Idiomatic Expressions, Traditions, and Religious Narratives…”
It
is worth noting that the Dehkhoda Institute has gathered all the notes found
here and there which were written by Mr. Dehkhoda on the introduction to
‘ Amass va Hekam’ and, after arranging them properly, has published
them at the beginning of the book entitled “Excerpts from Proverbs and Wise
Sayings” (Bargozideh Amsal va Hekam).
Dehkhoda’s
Collection of Poetry. Dr. Mohammad Moeen has divided Dehkhoda’s poems
into three groups as follows: First, those poems written in the old tradition
of the earlier Iranian poets. Some of these poems enjoy such strength that they
are hardly to distinguish from the poetry of the early Iranian poets. Second,
are those poems in which some degree of modern literary style has been
observed? Many of the contemporary literary writers consider the repetition of
the hemstitch,
“
Remember the snuffed out candle, remember!” as the first sample of the modern
Farsi blank verse. Dr. Moeen considers the third group of Dehkhoda’s poems to
be the ones, which are humorous Dehkhoda purposely, used slang in writing these
poems. According to Dr. Moeen, Dehkhoda has displayed such a great talent in
using slang terms right along eloquent literary words that distinguishing them
from each other is only possible for those greatly skilled in literary
analysis. [Moeen (1)].
Dehkhoda’s
great Lexicon . Professor
Lewis Macinion, a professor at The University of France (collage de France) and
The School of Higher Scientific Learning of Paris, has called Dehkhoda’s great
lexicon a ‘Herculeux’ work (a gigantic work). Professor Henry Masse, a
professor at Paris University, and the former dean of El Saneh Sharghieh School
(
مدرسه السنه شرقيه)
And
a celebrated French orientalist has called Dehkhoda’s lexicon an immortal work.
And finally, Allameh Mohammad Ghazvini, has offered the following comment on
Dehkhoda’s lexicon:
x“The
first thing that comes to the reader’s mind is the expansive number of the
items included in this great dictionary… This colossal and magnificent
dictionary, in addition to its very high cultural and lexical value, is a
precious collection of some two hundred (to two hundred and fifty) thousand
verses of poetry written by some of the best poets writing in the Farsi
language from the advent of Islam up to the present time. Most of these poems
have been taken from manuscripts of poetry collections and composition of
verses which are not accessible to many people and he has gathered them
gradually …As you can see, regardless of its colossal size which is
incomparable to any other, and its gigantic number of collected verses which is
unique and no one has ever collected so many poems in one place before, it has
many other extremely valuable characteristics…So if someone simply remembers a
single verse or a hemistich or just a few words of a verse written by any of
the numerous poets mentioned in this great lexicon , and wishes to
remember the remainder of
the verse or the poem , whichever it may be the case, he can simply use one of
the prominent words of the verse and very easily find the rest in Dehkhoda’s
great lexicon. Thus, in addition to being culturally and lexically very
valuable, this lexicon may be a very useful source as a poetical index for
200000 to 250000 Persian verses written by a large number of Persian poets from
the oldest times until now.”
References:
[Moeen
(1)]:
Dr. Moeen, Mohammad. “ The Biography,
Preface to Dehkhoda Lexicon”, written by a group of authors, Tehran
University Press, Winter 1994).
[Moeen
(2)]:
Dr.
Moeen Mohammad. “ The Lexicon,
preface to Dehkhoda” written by a group of authors, Tehran
University Press, winter of 1994).
[Taghizadeh]:
Taghizadeh,
Seyed Hassan. “Dehkhoda,
Prefece to Dehkhoda Lexicon
”, written by a group of authors, Tehran University Press, Winter 1994.)
[Dabirsiaghi]:
Dabirsiaghi,
Mohammad. “ The Story of Dehkhoda’s Great Lexicon in the Preface of Dehkhoda
Lexicon”, written by a number of authors, Tehran University Press,
Winter of 1994)
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