February 07 2020
The Management Center of Iranian Seminaries has condemned a cleric for burning a standard medical book while claiming that “Islamic medicine” has made such texts “irrelevant.”
A battle between advocates of “Islamic medicine” and the health community erupted a few years ago as the advocates of old-style medicine emerged to promote the old health practices energetically and forcefully.
A video of the book-burning went viral and many outraged social media users strongly reacted to it. Several prominent clerics, as well as officials of the Health Ministry, have condemned the act and a member of the Majlis Cultural Committee, Fatemeh Zolghadr, has suggested that the cleric be referred to the Special Court for Clergy.
The cleric, Abbas Tabrizian, whose followers address him as Ayatollah, advocates treating patients on the basis of Islamic medical tradition, particularly the many sayings of the Prophet and Shiite Imams preserved in books since the early years of Islam.
Resort to Islamic medicine was highlighted in December, when the son of the late Ayatollah Mahmud Hashemi-Shahrudi, who was widely seen as a possible successor to the Supreme Leader, said his father died because he trusted Islamic medicine.
Ala Hashemi-Shahrudi said, “The so-called Islamic doctors had convinced my father to ignore what modern physicians said about his illness and how to treat it.”
Tabrizian who lives in Qom, has written several books on Islamic medicine and runs an Islamic Medicine Center. Herbal and natural medicines, as well as other products such as “Islamic toothbrushes,” “Islamic soap,” sormeh (eyeliner made from natural products), and “Islamic ink” in various colors, are also on sale on the website of the Islamic Medicine Center.
In its statement January 25, the seminary management body said Iranian seminaries condemn Tabrizian’s “obscene and ignorant” act of burning Harrison’s Textbook of Medicine, which is one of the major medical texts.
Drawing a parallel with Alexander the Great’s torching of the Library of Alexandria, the burning of books by Mongols and Nazis and other book burnings, Deputy Health Minister Alireza Raisi condemned the burning of the book, which has been translated into Persian and is one of the major textbooks taught in Iranian medical schools.
