The Mystery of Numbers

The Mystery of Numbers was developed by Annemarie Schimmel from an earlier text in German by Franz Carl Endres. Presumably, Schimmel's version (for publisher Ulf Diedrichs) was originally in German also. No translator is credited here, but Miriam Rosen was the editor, whether in English or German is unclear. Schimmel uses "components" (e.g. on page 14) to mean factors, which is a little confusing in US mathematical idiom, and possibly an artifact of translation from German. German folklore and poetry does loom a little large in a book that on the whole makes serious efforts to be a wide-ranging cross-cultural survey.

There are seven chapters of "Introduction" discussing the history of number systems and evolution of number symbolism. show more Generally, depth is sacrificed for breadth, in an effort to touch on systems throughout Western history, and also in Asia and pre-Columbian America. The historical essays are followed by "A Little Dictionary of Numbers," organized in numerical order starting at 1. The highest value to receive an entry is 10,000, but even below 50, many numbers significant to me are not represented with their own articles, such as 23, 31, 34, and 44.

On the whole, the book is a decent introduction to its topic, and it can be a useful supplement to other more specialized treatments. show less

Annemarie Schimmel is Professor of Indo-Muslim Culture at Harvard University, and author of numerous books on Islamic literature, culture, and religion.

This work is a descriptive study of folklore, rather than mathematics. Numbers play a conspicuous role in our daily lives, since the beginning, and across every society. Examines individual numbers from "one" to ten thousand.

She notes that al-Ghazali, like medieval Christian scholars, "sought to arrange their writings in meaningful combinations of numbers". In Revivification of the Sciences of Religion, his number was 40, leading to the central figure of Mohammad in the 20th chapter, with acts of mystical love in the final meeting with the Lord at the moment of death. Augustine's City show more of God was 22, corresponding to 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Dante's Divine Comedy exhibits elaborate number symbolism based on the 3 of the Trinity.

Curiously, the author mentions the number 19--long a sacred number in the Near East, drawn from the 19 dieties of the 19 limbs of the body in the Egyptian Book of the Dead, and the 19-year Metonic Cycle of the ancient Babylonian calendar.

"Recently someone in Pakistan has tried to prove that the Quran is based upon the number 19 (incidentally the number of guardians of hell) and its multiples. However, despite the clever use of computer technology for this study, its results have been challenged by most Muslims." [224]

"On the other hand", she goes on, "19 is uncontestably the sacred number of the Baha'is (again based on the numerical value of wahid), and they even divide the year into 19 months of 19 days each." [224] show less