Additionally, the Arabic translations of Galenic texts on anatomy, such as On Anatomical Procedures, did not censor the gory details of animal dissections found therein; nor were the translators ever rebuked by religious scholars for not doing so. In fact, an examination of the structure and function of the body through dissection was believed to lead the investigator closer to God, for it made him appreciate the foresight and wisdom of the Creator, as Ibn Rushd’s aforementioned quote implies. That is also the ultimate purpose of the dissection scenes described in Ibn Ṭufayl (d. 1185) and Ibn al-Nafīs’s respective fictional narratives, Ḥayy ibn Yaqẓān and Fāḍil ibn Nāṭiq, wherein their protagonists (Ḥayy and Kāmil) arrive at the knowledge of the existence of God through dissecting animals and observing nature. In short, contrary to popular claims, religion was not an obstacle to the study and practice of anatomy...
Left: The system of nerves as illustrated in Manṣūr’s Anatomy (tashrīḥ-i Manṣūrī).