Al-Rāzī, the Clinician
Al-Rāzī, the Clinician
by Pauline Koetschet
Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn Zakarīyāʾ al-Rāzī was one of the most innovative clinicians of the Arabo-Islamic Middle Ages, as well as a philosopher and an alchemist.
Al-Rāzī was born in Rayy near present-day Tehran in the second half of the ninth century, and died around 925, having risen to become director of hospitals both in Rayy and Baghdad. By the time of al-Rāzī, hospitals had become sophisticated institutions that welcomed elite physicians, and al-Rāzī used his hospital experience in his medical research. In several of his treatises, observations that he made during his time in hospitals often intermingle with his medical theories. Among his most important medical works is the multi-volume Arabic encyclopaedia called The Comprehensive Book of Medicine (Al-Kitāb al-Ḥāwī fī al-Ṭibb), which consists in a collection of lecture-notes gathered and arranged by al-Rāzī’s students after his death (see Savage-Smith 2012). The Comprehensive Book on Medicine was translated into Latin in 1279 under the title Continens by Faraǧ ben Sālim. He is also the author of the Book to Al-Manṣūr, a medical encyclopaedia dedicated in 903 to the governor of Rayy. This compendium had a prominent influence on the Islamic scholarly tradition. Al-Rāzī also wrote monographs on various diseases. One of his best-known works is the treatise On Smallpox and Measles, in which he distinguished between the two diseases. For a more general presentation of al-Rāzī’s life and writings, see Goodman (1995, 490-493).
Left: Among al-Rāzī’s most important medical works is the multi-volume Arabic encyclopaedia called The Comprehensive Book of Medicine (Al-Kitāb al-Ḥāwī fī al-Ṭibb), which consists of a collection of lecture notes gathered and arranged by al-Rāzī’s students after his death.
Al-Rāzī was very interested in medical ethics. In his History of Physicians, Ibn Abī Usaybiʿa attributes to him the saying that ‘the physician, even though he has his doubts, must always make the patient believe that he will recover, for the state of the body is linked to the state of the mind’ (ed. Müller 1882, vol. 1, 314, 28-9). In the Epistle to One of his Pupils, where he provides his advice to an apprentice court physician, he paints a picture of the noble physician as a man who lives in self-restraint, especially when he treats women, and who keeps the secrets of his patients. He insists that the art of the physician extends to the rich and to the poor. Indeed, his numerous case histories show his commitment to many patients from different social backgrounds. To be in the service of kings brings its own specific set of difficulties and duties. Rulers tend to be convinced that their physicians should know everything and never fail to treat them (preferably using treatments that suit their tastes). In order to be able to perform his art, the court physician needs to gain the king’s trust...
Right: The opening page of the Vesalius’ Abridgment of al-Rāzī’s Ninth Book for Al-Manṣūr (Paraphrasis in nonum librum Rhazae).
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"Al-Rāzī, the Clinician" by Pauline Koetschet
~ Chapter Fifteen, Pages 146-153 ~
~ Chapter Fifteen, Pages 146-153 ~
1001 Cures Book tells the fascinating story of how generations of physicians from different countries and creeds created a medical tradition admired by friend and foe. It influences the fates and fortunes of countless human beings, both East and West.