Holy ignorance and the philosopher Hypatia
Hypatia is the first mathematician in human history. She is a teacher, astronomer, and philosopher who led the Neo-Platonist school in Alexandria.
In the year 380 AD, Hypatia was born in Alexandria in Egypt, which was under Roman rule. She is Egyptian of Greek origins. The name Hypatia is derived from Hypatos in Greek, which means high - of high status.
Her father is the Roman mathematician and philosopher Theon of Alexandria, who was president of the University of Alexandria and played a major role in teaching his daughter Hypatia what she knew about science, so that she would later excel at him.
When she was twenty years old, her father sent her to Athens and Rome to study various sciences and philosophies. When she returned to Egypt, she worked at the University of Alexandria as a teacher of mathematics and philosophy, and her lectures were popular among the students who came from distant regions specifically for her, and she exchanged letters with her students, most notably Synesius of Cyrene, who was the bishop of Ptolemy (Libya today). ).
Hypatia was very feminine and beautiful... and many of her students loved her, and many of them tried to marry her. But the history books mention that Hypatia never married. She had high morals, an honorable soul, and a mind that was occupied only with science and philosophy.
She was modest and did not like to appear in front of the public, although she would stand before the judges and rulers of the city without losing her prestige.
Hypatia lived in a time of conflicts between pagans, Christians, and Jews. She was an advocate of peace who had many followers among intellectuals and community leaders, such as the ruler of Alexandria, “Orestos,” who was one of her students and close friends.
The Church completely opposed the Platonic ideas spread by Hypatia, and the Bishop of Alexandria, Cyril I, decided to get rid of her completely. He gathered a crowd of church followers and incited them to kill her on charges of witchcraft and atheism. Indeed, a group of Christians followed her carriage heading to her home. After the end of one of her seminars; They forcibly took her out of the cart and attacked her with stones and beatings, then stripped her of her clothes and dragged her naked through the streets of the city. It is said that her skin was flayed with shells until she became a lifeless corpse. Not only that, but they set her body on fire on Cinaron Street, which is a matter of great symbolism. In an attempt to belittle its value. This happened in 415 AD, and Hypatia was only 35 years old
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