The Millennium of Ar-Razi (Rhazes)* (850-932 A

THE MILLENNIUM OF AR-RAZI (RHAZES)* (850-932 A. D.?) By L. M. SADI, M.D. DETROIT, MICH. Truth and certainty in medicine is an aim I once asked an old man of the town of difficult to attain and the healing art as it is Ray about Ar-Razi’s clinic. He said that described in books is far inferior to the prac Ar-Razi was a serious old man with a tical experience of a skillful and thoughtful large, drooping head who seated his physician. [Ar-Razi.] pupils in rows according to their grades fr ^HE exact date of Abu Bakr and attainments. It was Ar-Razi’s custom Muhammad ibn Zakariyya to call first upon the lower class to ex Ar-Razi’s birth is not known, amine a patient when he reported to the —IL but it is believed to have clinic. If this class failed to diagnose the occurred in the second half of the patient’s ailment he was handed over to the next higher class, and only after the ninth century at Ray of Iraq Ajemi. malady had eluded the knowledge of all The date of his death is generally the disciples did it come to the master’s accepted as 320 a.h. which cor attention.1 responds to 932 a.d. Hence this year is his Millennium. In his early life This system of clinical teaching was he was a student of music, a physicist probably an innovation of Ar-Razi’s and an alchemist. Not until the age and presents a striking similarity of forty did he undertake the study to the grading system used today of medicine. His decision to do so was in western medical teaching. the result of his frequent visits to the Having become renowned Ar-Razi hospital of Adudu’d-Dawla and his was called by Adudu’d-Dawla to contact there with the aged dean be the chief physician in the hospital of pharmacists whom he questioned at Bagdad, the final choice of fifty ceaselessly about medical curiosities. qualified applicants for the position. His tutor in the healing art was When a site for the Bagdad Hos Ali-ibn-Rabban of Tabaristan whose pital was to be selected Ar-Razi book, “Firdaws al-Hikmat” (Para determined it in an interesting way. dise of Wisdom), a treatise on medi He hung pieces of flesh in different cine and philosophy, was used as a sections of the city and in that text by Ar-Razi. Ar-Razi then applied district where the flesh showed the himself to the study of medicine and least amount of putrefaction, he lo philosophy, reading the works of cated the hospital.* Galen and Hippocrates and also ac Ar-Razi’s work, which exceeds two quainting himself with Hindu authors. hundred volumes, includes treatises His knowledge of physics and chem on philosophy, chemistry, physics, istry was a great asset to him. For astronomy, mathematics, theology, a while he was made physician-in- music and other subjects. chief to the hospital in his native * Usaybi’a doubts Ar-Razi’s being a contem city, Ray. In the Fihrist, Muham porary of Adudu’d-Dawla. Usaybi’a’s “Uyun- mad Ibn Hasan al-Warraq is quoted al a’nba,” Arabic edition by Imra-I-Quais-al- as saying: Tahhan. Cairo, Egypt, 1882, 1: 310. *Read before the Journal Club of Detroit College of Medicine and Surgery, November 12, 1932. As it is beyond the scope of this Stones in the kidneys and bladder paper to give a full account of his Reduction of fractures authorships, only a few of his works, Hospitals (their requirements) those that are of medico-historical Hemorrhoids, fistula in ano interest, will be mentioned *here. Burning occurring in the urethra These are as follows: and bladder (Gonorrhea?). Kitabu’L-Hawi or (Continens) Among the chemical treatises, the Al Mansuri (Liber ad Almansorem) “Arcandorum liber” is said by Sarton Kitab al-Jadari Wal-hasba (De Var to contain a description of a list of ious et Morbillis) twenty-five pieces of chemical ap or (De Peste or De Pestilentia) paratus. He further states that Ar- (monograph on Smallpox and Razi attempted to classify chemical Measles) substances and carried on original in Ja’mi (Compendium) vestigations on specific gravity by Kafi (Sufficient) means of the hydrostatic balance.2 Madkhal (Introduction) a. Lesser “Al-hawi” (Continens) b. Greater The work that heads the list, Muluki (The Royal) “AI-Hawi” (Continens), excells all Taksimu-I’ilal (Division of diseases) previous Arabic medical literature. (Divisiones) It was not only Ar-Razi’s most ex Fakhir (Splendid) f tensive work, but in it his originality The medicine of the laity. in diagnosis and treatment of diseases On venesection (De venoe-sect’ons) struck a new note in contrast to the A treatise on eye diseases with previous work of Arabic physicians medicine and treatment which consisted mostly of translations An essay on the contraction and from Greek authors. Its style, how dilatation of the pupils in light ever, lacked clarity, and its method and darkness. of classification was imperfect. It Also individual books on: embodied his clinical notes which Dietetics were evidently meant only for his own Colic use. Absorbed in his clinic, he prob Paralysis (hemiplegia) ably left the compilation of these notes Facial paralysis and remarks to some of his students. The functions of the organs The “Continens” is found only in Essay on rose fever f parts today in several European libra Coryza and bronchitis ries and is hardly accessible beyond * A complete list of his work is to be found the wall of these institutions. Authori in Ibn-Abi-Usaybi’a’s “Uyun-al a’nba,” Tari- ties differ widely on the number of khuI-Hukma, and Fihrist. Also see Isis, 5: books which it contained. Some of the 26-50, 1923. Latin writers claim that it consists t Authorship is not certain. See Ibn-Abi- of twenty-five volumes, some thirty Usaybi’a’s “Uyun-al a’nba,” Arabic edition by Imra-I-Quais-al-Tahhan Cairo, Egypt, and some, thirty-seven; on the other 1882, 1: 318. hand, the Arabian authors agree on * Ar-Razi observed that a certain Abu- Zaid-al-Balkhi was afflicted with it every “Uyun-al a’nba,” Arabic edition by Imra-I- spring season when the roses bloom. Usaybi’a’s Quais-al-tahhan Cairo, Egypt, 1882, 1: 319. twelve.* Ali Abbas, the magi, in his quartan, and sometimes recurring once work (“Kamil-AI-Sinaat”) describes in six days. These attacks were preceded the “Continens” as: by a slight rigor, and micturition was very frequent. I gave it as my opinion . very comprehensive, in that it con that either these accesses of fever would tains everything necessary for the student turn into quartan, or that there was of medicine to know in remedying ulceration of the kidneys. Only a short diseases and ailment. But it fails in while elapsed ere the patient passed pus treating temperaments, humor, anatomy in the urine. I thereupon informed him and surgery. The material is unsystem that these feverish attacks would not atically compiled. It lacks the classifi recur, and so it was. cation necessary for scientific work, which The only thing which prevented me at is expected from so eminent an author. first from giving it as my definite opinion It seems to me, knowing the author as I that the patient was suffering from do, that he intended one of two things: ulceration of the kidneys was that he either that the work be a memorandum had previously suffered from tertian and for his own use, fearing that something other mixed types of fever, and this to might happen to his other works and in some extent confirmed my suspicion that case that the “Continens” might that this mixed fever might be from then suffice for all; or he may have in inflammatory processes which would tend tended it to remain as a monument of his to become quartan when they waxed achievement with the expectation of stronger. resuming its revision and classification Moreover the patient did not complain later on. Something must have hindered to me that his loins felt like a weight him, and death terminated his life too depending from him when he stood up; soon for the completion of the task.3 and I neglected to ask him about this. The frequent micturition also should “Continens” was translated into have strengthened my suspicion of ulcera Latin and published in i486 a.d. and tion of the kidneys, but I did not know later was given many other Latin that his father suffered from weakness of renditions. So far as we know no the bladder and was subject to this com complete Arabic manuscript of it is plaint, and it used likewise to come upon extant, but six volumes of the work him when he was healthy, and it ought in Arabic are treasured in the British not to be the case henceforth, till the end of his life, if God will. Museum and the Bodleian Library. So when he passed the pus I ad To these, Edward Browne, Professor ministered to him diuretics until the urine of Arabic at Cambridge University, became free from pus, after which I had access, and from this material treated him with terra sigillata, Boswellia he translated the following case report thurifera, and dragon’s blood, and his which may serve as a sample of Ar- sickness departed from him, and he was Razi’s clinical notes: quickly and completely cured in about two months.

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