Health And Medicine In The Islamic Tradition

Presents a selection of articles that illustrate the intellectual curiosity and theoretical vigour with which Arabs and non-Arabs living in the medieval Muslim world pursued scientific endeavours. The focus is firmly on articles published during the last 20 years, during which the discipline has enjoyed a new bloom.

This book showcases multidisciplinary research at the intersection of the Islamic tradition and biomedicine. Within this broad area of scholarship, this book considers how Islamic theological constructs align with the science and practice of medicine, and in so doing offer resources for bridging the challenges of competing ontological visions, varied epistemic frameworks, and different theologies of life and living among the bodies of knowledge. By bringing together theologians, medical practitioners and intellectual historians, the book spurs deeper conversations at the intersection of these fields and provides fundamental resources for further dedicated research.

A timely exploration of balancing Islamic heritage with contemporary medical and health concerns Muslim Medical Ethics draws on the work of historians, health-care professionals, theologians, and social scientists to produce an interdisciplinary view of medical ethics in Muslim societies and of the impact of caring for Muslim patients in non-Muslim societies. Edited by Jonathan E. Brockopp and Thomas Eich, the volume challenges traditional presumptions of theory and practice to demonstrate the ways in which Muslims balance respect for their heritage with the health issues of a modern world. Like members of many other faiths, Muslims are deeply engaged by the technological challenges posed by modern biomedicine, and they respond to those challenges with enormous creativity—whether as patients, doctors, or religious scholars. Muslim Medical Ethics demonstrates that religiously based cultural norms often inform medical practice, and vice versa, in an ongoing discourse. The contributors map the breadth and boundaries of this discourse through discussions of contested issues on the cutting edge of ethical debates, from fertilized embryos in Saudi Arabia to patient autonomy in Toronto, from organ trafficking in Egypt to sterilization in Tanzania. As the authors illustrate, the effects of Muslim medical ethics have ramifications beyond the Muslim world. With growing populations of Muslims in North America and Europe, Western physicians and health-care workers should be educated on the special needs of this category of patients. In every essay the richness of the Islamic tradition is visible. In the premodern period Muslim physicians were considered among the best in the world, building and improving on Greek and Indian traditions. Muslim physicians today continue that tradition while incorporating scientific advances. Scholars of Islamic law work closely with physicians to develop ethical guidelines for national and international bodies, and individual Muslims take full advantage of advances in medicine and religious law, combining them with the wisdom of Sufism and traditions of family and community. This exploration of Muslim medical ethics is therefore a foray into the richness and sophistication of the Islamic tradition itself. Designed as an engaging point of entrance for students in religious studies, anthropology, ethics, and medical humanities, this pathbreaking volume also has utility for health-care professionals and policy makers.

According to Fiqh E Jaferia..... Islamic Medical Wisdom - The Tibb al-A'imma by Imam Ali ibn Abu Talib (as) (Author), Andrew J. Newman (Editor), Batool Ispahany (Translator) The present is the first English translation of a text in the Twelver Shi'i prophetic medical tradition. As such it will prove of both interest and importance to specialists and non-specialists alike. The former include those pursuing study of various aspects of Islamic history and civilization in general and especially students of the history of Islamic medicine. The latter include both those wishing greater awareness of the Twelver Shi'i faith and heritage in general, and those desirous of greater familiarity with practical dimensions of the faith in particular. For these audiences a fuller appreciation of this text is perhaps best achieved by some discussion of the place of the prophetic medical tradition within the context of the history of Islamic medicine. Western-language scholars have generally defined Islamic medicine as composed of two distinct and dichotomous traditions, pre-Islamic Galenic medicine and prophetic medicine. Galenic medicine is understood to have become available to Islamic medical writers and practitioners as Greek scientific texts were translated into Arabic, beginning especially in Baghdad In the early 3rd/9th century. Supported by the Abbasid caliphs and other wealthy benefactors, over the next two hundred years the translation movement made much of Greek philosophy and science available in Arabic, the lingua franca of Islamic civilization. The Imams of the Ahl al-Bayt, peace be upon them, were as concerned with treating the body as they were with treating the soul, and their regard for the soundness of the body was similar to their regard for the refinement of the soul. They were physicians of the soul and the body, and Muslims would consult them for their physical illnesses as they would for curing their spiritual sicknesses. This collection of Hadith is ample evidence of that. The Imams, peace be upon them, were not merely conveyors of religious regulations and legislation, but were leaders committed to caring for the Muslims, equally concerned-if such a term is correct-with the health of their bodies and their beliefs, such that they encouraged the learning of medicine (al-.tibb). In his comprehensive statement on the divisions of knowledge, 'Ali b. Abu Talib (d. 40/661) Amir al-Mu'minin, peace be upon him, combined it [medicine] with the knowledge of jurisprudence (al-fiqh), saying: 'There are four kinds of knowledge: jurisprudence for religions, medicine for bodies, grammar for languages, and [study of] the stars to recognize the seasons. Much has been related from the Imams in collections [of Hadith] on medicine and preserving good health, just as there are more descriptions of various remedies related from them. Here for the reader are a small number of their sayings which are general rules for preserving health and physical well-being.

An up-to-date survey of medieval Islamic medicine offering new insights to the role of medicine and physicians in medieval Islamic culture.

The medical tradition that developed in the lands of Islam during the medieval period (c. 650-1500) has, like few others, influenced the fates and fortunes of countless human beings. It is a story of contact and cultural exchange across countries and creeds, affecting many people from kings to the common crowd. This tradition formed the roots from which modern Western medicine arose. Contrary to the stereotypical picture, medieval Islamic medicine was not simply a conduit for Greek ideas, but a venue for innovation and change. Medieval Islamic Medicine is organized around five topics: the emergence of medieval Islamic medicine and its intense crosspollination with other cultures; the theoretical medical framework; the function of physicians within the larger society; medical care as seen through preserved case histories; and the role of magic and devout religious invocations in scholarly as well as everyday medicine. A concluding chapter on the "afterlife" concerns the impact of this tradition on modern European medical practices, and its continued practice today. The book includes an index of persons and their books; a timeline of developments in East and West; and a section on further reading.