Islamic Medical Wisdom The Tibb al-A'imma

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.