4.2.1 HISTORY OF MEDICINE, tarikh al tibb

Pre-Islamic roots of medicine are found in ancient Egyptian, Babylon, Chinese, Indian, Syriac, Persian, Arabian, and Greco-Roman civilizations. Medical knowledge in the early Islamic period (0 – 132 H) was based on traditional Arab medicine and medical teachings of the prophet. Medicine in the golden era of the Abassid period (132 – 656 H) started with translation of Greek and other medical texts. Muslims added the results of their observations and experimentation. Following the Tatar invasion and destruction of the capital of the khilafat in Baghdad, the Muslim world went into a period of decline. Medicine and medical knowledge also declined. Medical knowledge spread in Europe from Andalusia. Muslims made many contributions to basic sciences and the various clinical disciplines.

4.2.2 PROPHETIC MEDICINE, tibb nabawi

Tibb nabawi refers to words and actions of the Prophet with a bearing on disease, treatment of disease, and care of patients.  The Prophet enunciated a basic principle in medicine that for every disease there is cure.  The sources of tibb nabawi are revelation, empirical experience, and folk medicine of the Arabian Peninsula. Tibb nabawi can be spiritual, curative or preventive. Most of tibb nabawi is preventive medicine. Tibb nabawi is an authentic and valid medical system. The general principles of this system are applicable at all times and all places. The specific remedies taught by the Prophet (PBUH) are valid and useful. They however can not be used today without undertaking further empirical research because of changes in the human and physical environments.

4.2.3 ISLAMIC MEDICINE, mafhum al tibb al islami

Islamic Medicine is defined as medicine whose basic paradigms, concepts, values, and procedures conform to or to do not contradict the Qur’an and Sunnah. It is not specific medical procedures or therapeutic agents used in a particular place or a particular time. Islamic Medicine is universal, all-embracing, flexible, and allows for growth and development of various methods of investigating and treating diseases within the frame-work described above. This definition calls for basic transformation of current medical systems. Islamic Medicine thus becomes the result of an Islamic critique and reformulation of the basic paradigms, research methodology, teaching, and practice of medicine. This process is called Islamization of Medicine. The end-result of the Islamization process will not be a medical system for Muslims only but for the whole humanity because Islam is a set of universal and objective values.

4.2.4 ISLAMIZATION OF KNOWLEDGE IN MEDICINE, islamiyyat al tibb

Muslims failed to Islamize Greek medicine when they neglected the empirical scientific method of the Qur’an and adopted negative aspects of Greek philosophy that discouraged experimentation. Guided by empirical scientific spirit of the Qur’an, Muslims must be innovative, creative, and researchers in basic and applied medical sciences so that they may become leaders of the disciplines. A medical student starts by commitment to discipline reform process. He must master your discipline well. He should then get basics of Islamic methodology from usul al fiqh, ‘uluum al Qur’an and ‘uluum al hadith to be able to critique the basic paradigms of your discipline on the basis of tauhid and the universal and perennial values of Islam. This is followed by research, publishing, teaching, networking, and inspiring others.

4.2.5 THE ISLAMIC INPUT CURRICULUM

The vision of the curriculum has two closely related components: Islamization and legal medicine. Islamization deals with putting medicine in an Islamic context in terms of epistemology, values, and attitudes. Legal medicine deals with issues of application of the Law from a medical perspective. The curriculum has 5 objectives: (a) Introduction of Islamic paradigms and concepts in general and as they relate to medicine (b) strengthening iman through study of Allah’s sign in the human body (c) appreciating and understanding the juridical, fiqh, aspects of health and disease, al fiqh al tibbi (d) understanding the social issues in medical practice and research (e) professional etiquette, adab al tabiib.