Islamic civilization derived its experimental sciences and knowledge from its own inheritance as well as through interaction with the inheritance of other civilizations, and used the experimental scientific method to ensure the validity of what it reached from these civilizations in all sciences and knowledge, including medical and pharmaceutical sciences, which combined the scientific heritage of the Arabs before and after Islam and the sciences of India and the Byzantine state, and the legacy of the remaining ancient civilizations in Persia, Iraq, the Levant and Egypt, where prestigious schools flourished such as the Jindishabour medicine in Iran, Damascus schools, and Alexandria school in Egypt all contributed to a huge medical renaissance in the Islamic state.

While Al-Harith bin Kildah Al-Thaqafi, Al-Nadr bin Al-Harith bin Kildeh and Atheer bin Amr Al-Scotti emerged in the Prophet's and Rashidun era, medicine began to flourish in a more specialized way since the Umayyad era, and some sons of the ruling Umayyad family will begin to study and absorb this specialization, such as Khalid bin Yazid bin Muawiyah, son of Caliph Yazid, grandson of the Umayyad Caliph Muawiyah I bin Abi Sufyan, and others who settled Damascus by virtue of being the capital of the Islamic state at that time, such as the Damascene rule, the son of Damascene rule, and Ibn Athal. and others. With this scientific and cultural leap and the extension of the Umayyad dynasty, and the increase in the number of patients, the Caliph Al-Walid bin Abdul Malik bin Marwan decided before the end of the first century of the Hijra to establish a specialized bimaristana (hospital) with different departments in Damascus, including a section for leprosy patients, and ordered not to mix with people so as not to spread infection and disease [1].

The House of Wisdom Foundation was not limited to translation and transmission only, but it was proven that Al-Maamoun established scientific teams specialized in many of these scientific fields. (Social Media)

Egypt has also known in that period some "hospitals" such as Bimaristan Alley of Qanadil, the most famous alleys of the city of Fustat, the first Islamic capital, as well as Alexandria knew similar hospitals, but the great revolution that took place in the field of medicine and in experimental science in general was with the advent of the Abbasids and their openness to the civilizations of India, Persians and Byzantines more broadly than those who preceded them, and their work to translate the scientific heritage of those nations since the era of Abu Jaafar Al-Mansur and Harun Al-Rashid and then institutionalized by Al-Ma'mun through the "House of Wisdom" and its sections Scientific that specialized in astronomy, medicine, mathematics, engineering, etc., and the House of Wisdom Foundation was not limited to translation and transmission only, but it was proven that Al-Ma'mun established scientific teams specialized in many of these scientific fields, and it added a great leap as we discussed before with the family of Musa bin Shaker.

I felt the effects of this scientific revolution in the field of medicine in many huge achievements at the level of authorship and experimentation, and at the level of therapeutic examinations, as well as in the expansion of bimaristans departments that spread throughout the length and breadth of countries, and the large number of doctors and even medical families such as members of the Bakhtishua family such as Georgios, Bakhtishua, Gabriel and Obaidullah, and the Masawiya family and his sons John and Michael, and Al-Kindi and Thabit bin Qurra and his sons and grandchildren, and the Abbasid doctor months Al-Razi, then Ibn Sina, and those who came after them from the most prominent doctors in the history of civilization Each of them contributed to the various medical fields to which we have referred [2].

Advances of Islamic Ophthalmology

While the medical and scientific revolution took place in Damascus, Baghdad and Cairo, it quickly spread to the Maghreb of the Islamic world, and enjoyed a large share of progress in Andalusia, where names shone that still bear an imprint that remains even in modern medicine to this day, such as Al-Zahrawi, the inventor of surgical tools, Ibn Zahr Al-Iyadi, Abu Al-Walid bin Rushd the grandson, Ibn Khalsoun, Al-Qarbaliani, and others.

Ahmed Ben Younes was the first Arab doctor to perform a water removal operation on the eye to treat cataract or cataract as it is known today with a hollow needle. (Social Media)

The field of medicine has flourished in Andalusia since the era of the founder of the Umayyad dynasty Abdul Rahman Al-Dakhil during the second century of migration, some sources mention that the first to become famous for medicine in Andalusia was Al-Walid Al-Madhaji, who entered Andalusia with Abdul Rahman Al-Dakhil, and was his doctor and the mastermind of his treatment, and in terms of medical authorship, we find that one of the first to mean this was Abdul Malik bin Habib Al-Salami Al-Iberi, who wrote a book in which he collected news about ancient Arab medicine, as he dealt with the vision of Islam for this profession through Quranic verses and hadiths of the Prophet, and revealed the new in his time in the field of medicine and treatment and types of medicines, food, moods and natures, and this book, which was written a thousand and two hundred years ago, was able investigator and former Moroccan minister Mohamed Larbi Khattabi to fall on a copy of it, and entitled "Medicine of the Arabs", as selected from it the most important chapters and worked to achieve and publish [3].

Islamic civilization also knew scientific specialization in the departments of surgery, childbirth, orthopedics (Al-Mujbar) and eyes (Kahale), and this last section was within the departments of general medicine dealt with by Al-Kindi, Al-Razi, Ibn Sina and Al-Zahrawi, and also emerged as an independent section in its own treatment, authorship, specialization and research, and emerged in it as Muslim Halon such as Ahmed and Omar bin Yunus Al-Harrani, two doctors close to the Umayyad Caliph Al-Mustansir Billah in Andalusia, and Ahmed bin Yunus was "the first Arab doctor to conduct a water removal operation on the eye to treat cataract or " Cataract" as it is known today by a hollow needle. While some have argued that Ibn Zuhr was the first to use this needle, the fact is that Ibn Zuhr came 150 years after Ahmad ibn Yunus, and it is likely that he took it away from him. Unfortunately, "the drawing of this machine has not reached us, and it is truly unprecedented precedent"[4].

In this medical specialization, the famous Kahhal Ammar bin Ali Al-Mawsili appeared and wrote the book "The Chosen One in the Treatment of Eye Diseases", Ali bin Issa, the author of the book "The Ticket of the Kahalin", and the most famous doctor Al-Hassan bin Al-Haytham, the author of the most famous theory in optics and lenses and their types, and he is one of the most influential Muslim opticians who influenced Western civilization.

Ibn Aslam Al-Ghafiqi and his book Al-Murshid

Muhammad bin Qassoum bin Aslam Al-Ghafiqi Al-Andalusi was interested in developing an accurate scientific approach to study and deal with all diseases that occur in the eye, and to detail what saves it from the symptoms. (Shutterstock)

Among these great scientists in the field of ophthalmology research, treatment, authorship and specialization we will find Muhammad bin Qassoum bin Aslam Al-Ghafiqi Andalusian, who lived in the latter half of the sixth century AH and the first section of the seventh century AH, and we unfortunately do not have detailed information about his life in Andalusia only fragments we found in his book "Guide in Kohl" does not heal yield, where it seems that from a village called Ghafiq was close to Cordoba, and perhaps Al-Ghafiqi was a descendant of the governor of Andalusia The most famous and conqueror of large sections of southern and central France Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi, the martyr of the battle of the martyrs' court.

The German ophthalmologist and orientalist Max Mayrhoff was the first to be interested in the modern era in the heritage of Muhammad bin Aslam Al-Ghafiqi and his most important author "The Guide in Ophthalmology" or "The Guide in Kohl", and worked to investigate, publish and translate it into Spanish in 1933 on the occasion of his participation in a scientific conference held in Madrid, but the most comprehensive study of this book investigation and publication was by Dr. and ophthalmologist Hassan Ali Hassan, who achieved the book "The Guide" in full to obtain a doctorate degree from Spain, and in This book we will see Al-Ghafiqi devotes more than 55 chapters to the study of eye structure, diseases and treatments [5].

It is noticeable in Al-Ghafiqi's book Al-Murshid that he divides medicine into two aspects, theoretical and practical, or "science and action", and then divides science into several sections, namely the science of natural things such as mood, humours, organs, forces and spirits, and the knowledge of abnormal things such as air, food, drink, movement, stillness, sleep and wakefulness, and knowledge of things outside nature such as diseases, their causes and symptoms. As for the work, Al-Ghafiqi divides it into two parts: preserving health for healthy people, then this great title descends on the eye in terms of first preserving its health in the beginning, then preserving the health of the eyes that began to deviate from health, and then preserving the health of weak eyes such as the eyes of children and the elderly. He also deals with eye diseases and their treatment, which was done through food and medicine, or surgical intervention[6].

(Social Media)

In fact, the book of the guide of Ibn Aslam Al-Ghafiqi Al-Qurtubi was one of the scientific revolutions in Andalusia in particular and the Islamic medical heritage in general, Al-Ghafiqi criticized in the introduction to this book the apparent shortcomings in the writings of his predecessors such as Ammar Al-Mawsili, Ibn Al-Haytham, Hunayn bin Ishaq and others, he says: "My son, when I looked at this medical industry, I mean ophthalmology, I did not find in it a comprehensive book for all the science and work it needs; That's two books that he took on the path of shortcut... As for Ammar bin Ali al-Mawsili, he wrote his book in al-Ain in a very brief way"[7].

Eye diseases and their treatments as mentioned by Al-Ghafiqi

Al-Ghafiqi was interested in developing an accurate scientific approach to study and address all the diseases that occur to the eye, and detail what saves it from the symptoms, starting with talking about the sections of the eye, then its characteristics, then what strengthens it from nature or what treats it from medicines, bandages and ointments, and finally surgery, if we want to return to the section specialized in preserving eye health, we will see Al-Ghafiqi dealing with the beneficial and harmful colors for eyesight, he says about the beneficial colors for eyesight: "The most useful colors for the eye are the colors of clothes and other things, the tanical (dark blue), black, green, and violet color." As for the colors that are harmful to eyesight, they are: "bright color, bright color, white color, red color, and yellow, these colors disperse contact and dissipate the light of sight"[8].

Among the diseases studied by Al-Ghafiqi are headaches, migraines, eyelid diseases and tumors of all kinds, but he addressed the causes of blackness under the eyes (dark circles) and the bandages that treat them, which are medicines extracted from single plants or compound plants that are ground and then kneaded and placed in the site of the disease, in the chapter "Bandages benefit from the occasional blackness under the eyes" and what was caused by a blow that left the purple color under the eye; "Patience is crushed with honey and prepared for smudge on the relics... And another like it: garlic is taken and burned and kneaded with honey and smeared under the eyes hopefully, it goes purple color"[9], and today we know through the latest medical studies about the great benefits of garlic as a natural antidote against many diseases and infections.

Al-Ghafiqi also devoted a long and important talk about ophthalmic and conjunctival diseases and their treatment, and conjunctivitis or what is known as pink eye is an inflammation of the transparent membrane that lines the eyelid and eyeball, and its causes are often bacterial, viral or allergic, and Al-Ghafiqi describes that conjunctivitis has accidental causes of sunlight, dust, steam, paint, or internal causes (often viral or bacterial), so the treatment is according to knowing the causes of the disease, he says: "If ophthalmia is a type of tumor, it should be treated with tumors in a way that suppresses and deters... Because the eye is a sensitive, pain-susceptible organ, you should not suffer it in the beginning with medicines, but you must know the active cause of ophthalmia", and then he deals with treatments according to the types of ophthalmia that he dealt with at the beginning of this chapter[10].

(Social Media)

The book also dealt with the treatment of children in innovative smart ways, and he acknowledges that around children disappears with time if he adopts the correct methods in his treatment, he says: "The accidental strabismus of boys at birth disappears by placing the burqa on the face to be their vision straight. The strabismus is exposed from the expansion of the motor muscle of the eyeball, and it is also treated with a lamp placed against them and makes its light from one side, and if the eye is tilted towards the nose, it is attached to the maq, which follows the temple, a red or black wool to be looked at and his eyes are even." We understand from this that natural strabismus, as Al-Ghafiqi mentions, is to attract the attention of the eye for as long as possible towards the side to be treated and to maintain these therapeutic exercises.

But what if strabismus is a disease that later occurred on a large age? Al-Ghafiqi believes in this case that he "presents heat and stiffness, and often acts on the head a disease such as headache, dizziness and severe headache, even if you take the ratta (Indian hazelnut plant) and check it (crush it) and squeeze its water and raise it with kohl and use it to benefit the squint. Squint is useful for olive leaf juice"[11].

Al-Ghafiqi's medical genius did not stop at this point, as many researchers specialized in his medical heritage revealed that he was able to perform cataract or cataract operations, and researcher Nabil Darwish confirms that Al-Ghafiqi was the first to invent glasses, contrary to the famous novel that it attributes to Roger Bacon, and Al-Ghafiqi is half a century earlier than Bacon, and the evidence for this, as Darwish says from the Spanish language itself, the word glasses in Spanish means "Gafas", which is derived from the name Al-Ghafiqi " Alghafiqi", and few people associate them, he said.

Al-Ghafiqi did not write the book "Al-Murshid" in ophthalmology only, but he also has another book missing in pharmacy and drugs called "Single Medicines", and it is clear to us through the book of the guide itself the extent of the great experience that Al-Ghafiqi had in single and compound medicines, and there is no doubt that this missing book was not specialized in eye medicines only, but also other treatments for diseases and other medicines.

These are some of the contributions of Muhammad ibn Qassoum ibn Aslam al-Ghafiqi, a physician and pharmacist in the field of Kahale, known as ophthalmology, and there is no doubt that the presence of this man in Andalusia in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries AD contributed to the translation of his works and the Europeans got to know them;

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Sources

  • [1] Ahmed Issa Bey: Bimaristans in Islam, p. 205.
  • [2] Kamal Al-Samarrai: History of Arab Medicine, Medicine in the Abbasid Era.
  • [3] Muhammad al-Arabi al-Khattabi: Medicine and Doctors in Islamic Andalusia 1/11.
  • [4] Al-Murshid in Ophthalmology by Al-Ghafiqi, Introduction to the investigator Dr. Hassan Ali Hassan, p. 29.
  • [5] Al-Ghafiqi: The Guide in Ophthalmology, Introduction to the Investigator.
  • [6] Jamal Bami: Muhammad bin Aslam Al-Ghafiqi.
  • [7] Al-Ghafiqi: Al-Murshid, p. 45, 46.
  • [8] Al-Ghafiqi: Al-Murshid, p. 253.
  • [9] Al-Murshid, p. 302.
  • [10] Al-Murshid, pp. 382, 383.
  • [11] Al-Ghafiqi: Al-Murshid, p. 457.