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01-10-2019 | Original Paper

Avicenna’s Approach to Health: A Reciprocal Interaction Between Medicine and Islamic Philosophy

Author: Seyed Abbas Zahabi

Published in: Journal of Religion and Health | Issue 5/2019

Abstract

This paper elucidates how Islamic philosophy is associated with health and illness. Avicenna (980–1037) as the most important physician and philosopher in the Islamic world has undoubtedly affected various fields of thought and science in Islamic civilization. The basis and infrastructure of his understanding of medicine derive from his philosophical and religious views. According to Avicenna, the soul and body are two intertwined substances from which all human beings are composed. This reciprocal interaction between soul and body is essential in analyzing his medical concepts related to “health” and “sickness.” Other than soul, he believes in spirit which is originally a religious concept that he interprets. Avicenna distinguishes between soul and spirit (≈ rūḥ) and poses that, as an ethereal volatile substance, the spirit is a mediator between soul and body. He also proposes a hierarchical system of spirit through which he illustrates a special type which is called “Rūḥ Bukhārī” (= RB). Faculties of the soul firstly penetrate into this type of spirit and then enter the body’s organs. Consequently, health and sickness are interpreted through the terms and conditions of RB.

Avicenna considers all classified sciences as branches of ḥikmah (philosophy). For instance, see Avicenna (1908). Aqsām al-ḥikma in Tisʻ rasāʼīl fī al-ḥikmah wa-al-ṭabīʻīyat (the branches of philosophy in nine books in philosophy and physics). pp. 104–120. Cairo: Maṭbaʻah Hindīyah; Avicenna, Dāneshnāme-ye ʻAlāʼī (Encyclopedia of ʻAlāʼ), Ilāhīyyāt (Philosophy), ed. Mohammad Moʻīn, Hamadan: University of BūalīSina, 2004, p.1.

It is not surprising that in the history of Islamic culture, two of the greatest physicians have been also well-known philosophers (ḥakīm). One of them is Zakarīyyā al-Rāzī (also known by his Latinized name Rhazes or Rasis, (854–925), and the other one is Avicenna (980–1037). Avicenna was the master of both philosophy and medicine not only is the foremost philosopher, but also is arguably the foremost physician of his time.

She is one of the most important scholars who studied about Avicenna in the twentieth century.

In Avicenne (XIe Siècle), Théoricien de la Médecine et Philosophe: Approche Épistémologique, Floréal (2009) has explained some more connections between medicine and philosophy in Avicenna’s approach.

For more information about Avicenna’s psychology, see Sīāsī (1954). Ravān shināsī-ye Ibn Sīna (Avicenna’s psychology). Tehran: University of Tehran Press; Kaukua (2015), Self-awareness in Islamic philosophy: Avicenna and beyond, Cambridge University Press. 2015, pp. 12–89.

As a universal concept which implies to many disease, “sickness” should be negation of “health”.

For more information about Iranian ancient medicine and its relationship with "soul" and "spirit," see Najmabadi (1962). Tārīkh-i ṭibb-i Īrān (history of medicine in Iran) (Vol. 1). Tehran: Honar bakhsh, pp. 170–172.

For more information about the relationship between pain and temperament (mizāj), see Saeedimehr (2016) “The reason of the pain from viewpoint of Ibn Sīnā,” Ḥikmati Sīnawi, No. 56, 2016, pp. 5–16.

The notion of “energy” is modern and we have to be cautious to attribute it to warmth and coldness easily.

There is a slightly difference between the original book of Canon (Arabic version) and its English translation about classification of these factors. You can find this difference in: Avicenna, Treatise on the Canon of Medicine of Avicenna (1973, 30) and Avicenna, al-Qānūn (1950, 4), Vol. 1, Beyrūt: Dār Sādir (Reprinted from Cairo: Būlāq).

For detailed information about Galen’s viewpoints, see Hall (2004). Intellect, Soul and Body in Avicenna. Interpreting Avicenna: Science and Philosophy in Medieval Islam. Jon McGinnis and David C. Reisman (Eds.). Leiden: Brill, pp. 74–77; Pormann (2013). Avicenna on medical practice, epistemology, and the physiology of the inner senses. Interpreting Avicenna. Peter Adamson (ed.) UK: Cambridge University Press, pp. 8–100.

Cf. Qustā ibn Lūqā (al-Qūnna‛ī) (1953) al-farq bain al-rūḥi wa al-nafs. In Ibn-Sīnā, Rasā‛il, Hīlmī Zīaūlkān (Ed.). Istanbul: Maṭba‘a Ibrāhīm Kharūz. pp. 83–94. In the title page of this treatise, mistakenly Qustā has been introduced as a Greek while he was not Greek. ‘Qustā ibn Lūqā al- Yūnanī should be changed to Qustā ibn Lūqā al-Qūnna‛ī.

In Rag shināsi, yā, Risālāh dar nabḍ (angelology or the treatise on the pulse). p. 9, Avicenna says:

“و علم رگ که علم نبض خوانند، علم حال روح است”.

Avicenna uses sometimes other names for these faculties. For more information about soul and its faculties, see Rahman (1981). Avicenna's psychology. London: Oxford University Press (reprint edition), pp. 34 f; Fakhry (2004). A history of Islamic philosophy, 3rd ed. New York: Colombia University Press, pp. 143–145.

Accordingly, a planet could be healthy when the vegetative faculties are balanced, and animals also could be healthy, if their own faculties are in the equilibrium state. These two principles are taken from the words of Avicenna, although his discussion is only about human health.

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Title: Avicenna’s Approach to Health: A Reciprocal Interaction Between Medicine and Islamic Philosophy
Author: Seyed Abbas Zahabi
Publication date: 01-10-2019
Publisher: Springer US
Published in: Journal of Religion and Health / Issue 5/2019
Print ISSN: 0022-4197
Electronic ISSN: 1573-6571
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-019-00812-y

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Avicenna’s Approach to Health: A Reciprocal Interaction Between Medicine and Islamic Philosophy

Abstract

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