Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: "The Book of Medicine" by Asaph / Süssmann Muntner. Source: Wellcome Collection.
![BIOGRAPHY [Reprinted from ABRAHAM LEVINSON ANNIVERSARY VOLUME STUDIES IN PEDIATRICS AND Mepicat Hisrory, Froben Press, Inc., New York 1949] 'The Book of Medicine by Asaph SUSSMANN MUNTNER IR THIS PAPER on Asaph the Physician,* I shall show the source from which the author derived his wisdom and what he added from his own store of knowledge and from the medical folk lore of his people. Asaph’s first source of information was the work of Hip- pocrates of the ancient Alexandrian School. Asaph also delved into the medical archives of Greece, Chaldea, India and Egypt and the medical lore of Ethiopia (Abyssinia and Arabia before the Islamic era). His Hebrew sources took him back to the Bib- lical period of the Judges and the books of the Talmud. To all these, he added much of his own knowledge. Of particular interest are Asaph’s personal contributions to medicine. He promulgated many vital principles of medical ethics and physical hygiene. As a native Palestinian, it is to be expected that most of his observations would take into account the flora, the climate and people of the Holy Land. His language is the Hebrew of the Mishnah or the early Midrashim, supple- mented occasionally by medical terms from other languages like the Aramaic, Greek, Latin, Persian. Arabic was not yet spoken in Palestine during Asaph’s time, so one finds but few Arabic terms except for some of the drugs and merchandise brought into the country by Islamic caravans from time to time. Asaph’s knowledge of compound-medicines came to him from * Asaph the Physician, is known through his book, “Sefer Refuah,’ The Book of Medicine. This is considered the oldest medical treatise in Hebrew. The date of the book is not well-established historically but it is placed approximately in the ninth or tenth century. Dr. Muntner, of Israel, has made an intensive study of the various manu- scripts of the “Sefer Refuah,” scattered throughout the world, in the libraries of Florence, Paris, Munich, Vienna and London. He has unearthed a great deal of interesting medical material of historic value. Due to technical difficulties the paper had to be abridged.—Ed. [1]](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b33632613_0001.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
