Ali Ibn Rabban Al-Tabari

Abu al-Hasan Ali ibn Sahl Rabban al-Tabari (Persian: علی ابن سهل ربان طبری) (c. 838–c. 870 CE) was a Muslim hakim, Islamic scholar, physician and psychologist of Jewish or Zoroastrian descent, who produced the first encyclopedia of medicine. He was a pioneer of pediatrics and the field of child development. His stature, however, was eclipsed by his more famous pupil, Muhammad ibn Zakarīya Rāzi ("Rhazes").

Ali came from a well-known Jewish family of Merv in Tabaristan (hence al-Tabari – "from Tabaristan") but became an Islamic convert under the Abbassid caliph Al-Mu'tasim (833-842), who took him into the service of the court, in which he continued under Al-Mutawakkil (847-861). His father Sahl ibn Bishr was a famous Astrologer.

Ali ibn Sahl was fluent in Syriac and Greek, the two sources for the medical tradition of antiquity, which was lost to medieval Europe, and versed in fine calligraphy.

His works

1. His Firdous al-Hikmah ("Paradise of Wisdom"), which he wrote in Arabic called also Al-Kunnash was a system of medicine in seven parts. He also translated it into Syriac, to give it wider usefulness. The information in Firdous al-Hikmah has never entered common circulation in the West because it was not edited until the 20th century, when Mohammed Zubair Siddiqui assembled an edition using the five surviving partial manuscripts. There is still no English translation.
2. Tuhfat al-Muluk ("The King's Present")
3. a work on the proper use of food, drink, and medicines.
4. Hafzh al-Sihhah ("The Proper Care of Health"), following Greek and Indian authorities.
5. Kitab al-Ruqa ("Book of Magic or Amulets")
6. Kitab fi al-hijamah ("Treatise on Cupping")
7. Kitab fi Tartib al-'Ardhiyah ("Treatise on the Preparation of Food")

Firdous al-Hikmah

Firdous al-Hikmah was the first known encyclopedia of medicine, and was divided into 7 sections and 30 parts, with 360 chapters in total. It deals with pediatrics and child development in depth, as well as psychology and psychotherapy. In the fields of medicine and psychotherapy, the work was primarily influenced by Islamic thought and ancient Indian physicians such as Sushruta and Charaka. Unlike earlier physicians, however, al-Tabari emphasized strong ties between psychology and medicine, and the need of psychotherapy and counseling in the therapeutic treatment of patients. He wrote that patients frequently feel sick due to delusions or imagination, and that these can be treated through "wise counselling" by smart and witty physicians who could win the rapport and confidence of their patients, leading to a positive therapeutic outcome.

Quotes

On the Quran he said: "When I was a Christian I used to say, as did an uncle of mine who was one of the learned and eloquent men, that eloquence is not one of the signs of prophethood because it is common to all the peoples; but when I discarded (blind) imitation and (old) customs and gave up adhering to (mere) habit and training and reflected upon the meanings of the Qur'an I came to know that what the followers of the Qur'an claimed for it was true. The fact is that I have not found any book, be it by an Arab or a Persian, an Indian or a Greek, right from the beginning of the world up to now, which contains at the same time praises of God, belief in the prophets and apostles, exhortations to good, everlasting deeds, command to do good and prohibition against doing evil, inspiration to the desire of paradise and to avoidance of hell-fire as this Qur'an does. So when a person brings to us a book of such qualities, which inspires such reverence and sweetness in the hearts and which has achieved such an overlasting success and he is (at the same time) an illiterate person who did never learnt the art of writing or rhetoric, that book is without any doubt one of the signs of his Prophethood."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ali_ibn_Sahl_Rabban_al-Tabari

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

References

1. ^ SN Nasr, "Life Sciences, Alchemy and Medicine", The Cambridge History of Iran, Cambridge, Volume 4, 1975, p. 416:"Ali b. Rabbani Tabari who was a convert from Zoroastrianism to Islam is the author of the first major work on Islamic medicine, entitled Firdaus al-Hikma."
2. ^ ^{a b} Amber Haque (2004), "Psychology from Islamic Perspective: Contributions of Early Muslim Scholars and Challenges to Contemporary Muslim Psychologists", Journal of Religion and Health 43 (4): 357-377 [361]
3. ^ http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Miracle/ijaz1.html#Rab
4. ^ Abdul Aleem, "I'jaz ul Qur'an", Islamic Culture, Op. Cit., pp. 222-223