Medicine, Illness, and the Body: Jewish Healing and Healers from the Middle Ages to Early Modernity July 27-28, 2022 at the Institute of Jewish Studies, Freie Universitaet (original) (raw)
Related papers
Medicine among Medieval Jews: The Science, the Art, and the Practice
Science in Medieval Jewish Cultures. Ed. Gad Freudenthal. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011
During the Middle Ages, Jews participated in the medical systems of the Muslim and Christian milieus in which they lived. As a result, the theoretical basis and actual practice of Jewish medicine were largely shaped by the medical traditions of their host societies. This process began around the eighth century, when Jews participated from the very beginning in the translation, transmission, and appropriation of Greek science and philosophy by the Arabs. Arabic language and culture provided the Jews from Persia to the Iberian Peninsula with a common cultural and sociopolitical background that contributed to their cohesion.
Defining Jewish Medicine: Transfer of Medical Knowledge in Premodern Jewish Cultures and Traditions
2021
HARRASSOWITZ VERLAG Defining Jewish Medicine brings together a group of scholars from different fields within Jewish studies who deal with Jewish medical knowledge in ancient and medieval time from a comparative perspective. Based on various methodological and theoretical questions, they address strategies of interaction with earlier Jewish traditions and with other fields of rabbinic discourse (e.g. law, theology, ethics), while exploring the complex interplay between literary forms and the knowledge conveyed. The studies trace ways of transmission, transformation, rejection, modification and invention of pertinent knowledge in Jewish traditions and beyond by examining broader contexts and points of contact with medical ideas and practices in surrounding cultures (Ancient Near East, Graeco-Roman, Byzantine, Persian-Iranian, early Christian, Syriac, Coptic, Arabic and Islamic). Such a twofold perspective allows for assessing particularities of the medical discourse within Jewish his...
48th AJS Meeting, SAN DIEGO, DECEMBER 18–20, 2016, 2016
This session explores interrelated aspects of discourses on medical experts, healing and magic in Jewish Late Antiquity in the light of their different cultural and religious milieux. The ambiguous relationship of the Talmudic rabbis as religious experts to other fields of expertise will be discussed. Competing experts and approaches challenged the rabbis' views, especially in delicate areas such as medicine, healing and magic. The comparison with non-rabbinic and non-Jewish healing cultures (magic bowls/ Christian texts/ Greco-Roman medicine) will help to figure out the particularities of the Talmudic approaches. All close readings will focus also on the literary or textual (re)presentations and the contextual integration of those discourses. Finally, the still strong dichotomy between religion and magic or (rationale) medicine and magic will be scrutinized. Shulamit Shinnar (New York) will discuss the relationship between doctors, rabbis and patients as described in the Palestinian rabbinic traditions. The talk addresses the sometimes tension-filled process of knowledge exchange between those groups with a special focus on the rabbinic attitudes. What kind of expertise do rabbis seek from doctors and in what particular circumstances? Furthermore, the particular rabbinic knowledge about the body will be evaluated through close readings against the backdrop of medical practice in the Greco Roman world. Monika Amsler (Zurich) revisits the rather puzzling question of the connections between medicine, magic and religion in Talmudic Judaism. Through a comparison with contemporary Christian attitudes to magic in the field of healing some of the distinct aspects of the pertinent discourse in the Babylonian Talmud will be fleshed out. Jason Mokhtarian (Bloomington) complements this discussion with a comparative analysis of a shared discourse on magic and medicine in late ancient Mesopotamia. By contextualizing the Jewish incantation bowls within a broader Aramaic culture of healing as attested in the Bavli, Syriac-Christian and Mandaic traditions, such knowledge and practices might have been rooted in the realm of endemic ancient Mesopotamian culture. The panel brings together fresh perspectives on complex interrelations between medicine and magic as cultural knowledge and practices in late ancient Judaism. All presenters provide innovative readings of rabbinic and other relevant sources equipped with a broad range of theoretical and methodological approaches. The presentations and the contribution of Charlotte Fonrobert, who will discuss the three papers in her response, intend to inspire lively discussions among the panelists as well as conversations with the audience interested in late ancient Jewish attitudes to medicine in Talmudic culture and beyond.
"'Representations of the Physician in Jewish Literature from Hellenistic and Roman Times"
Harris, William V., (ed.), Popular Medicine in Graeco-Roman Antiquity: Explorations. Leiden and Boston: Brill: 2016, pp 173-197.
Ancient Jews who were afflicted with diseases had a number of options to explain the causes and to find healing. These options were partly overlapping and complementary, even though the underlying ideologies might seem contradictory. Biblical tradition traces illness back to sins; only God himself and the human observance of God's commandments were believed to change this state.1 Throughout antiquity various types of self-promoting healers offered their wares, ranging from herbal remedies to magical spells and amulets.2 In addition, trained physicians, whose knowledge was based on empirical science and Greek medical traditions, were active at least in the major cities of Roman Palestine.3 If we apply the labels 'religious' , 'popular' , and 'scientific' to healing, various overlaps between these three phenomena are recognizable: physicians might complement medicinal treatments with remedies based on 'popular' beliefs; religious leaders such as priests and rabbis would utilize physicians and their knowledge for their own religious and ritual purposes; and these leaders could also possess medical knowledge themselves and/or engage in 'spiritual' healings.
The objectives of medicine, the art of healing suffering human beings, are shared by all of humanity. The internal logic of medicine does not depend on prejudice or on cultural premises; it is perforce universal. In his The Merchant of Venice (3:1) William Shakespeare wrote (1598): I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do wc not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die?