Hippocrates
— Not The Father Of Medicine
By what authority do historians give
GREECE credit for the origin of modern
medical practice?
This question may come as a
surprise. Most early men of learning
taught that ALL civilization began with a single people: the
ancient Greeks. Until the Twentieth
Century, few students of medical origins have thought to question seriously
this commonly accepted theory!
In spite of advanced knowledge of
discovery, it continues to be generally
conceded that competent, modern medical procedures had their earliest
beginnings in Greece some 2,500 years ago.
In accordance with this out-dated theory, Hippocrates is labeled the
Father of Medicine! When in reality, we
now know this is more tradition than fact!
Through exhaustive studies of
ancient civilizations — those of Egypt, Mesopotamia, India, China, and Latin
America — historians in the late 1800s gradually began to understand a most
revolutionary fact: CIVILIZATION DID NOT BEGIN WITH GREECE, but with other,
more ancient nations! This was an
unexpected bolt that smashed many a cherished hypothesis. What would this discovery mean to the
accepted treatment of Medical History?
Would a simple alteration be sufficient — or was a new structure necessary?
Only time and further investigation would tell.
As important as this revolutionary
new view of the origins of our present civilization was to general history, it
did not, and alone, could not, alter the already assumed historical traditions about the origin of medicine. Serious work had yet to be done in the field
of ancient medicine before the
confusion could be unraveled.
And the problems to unravel were
many!
In the first place, artifacts of the most ancient medical
practice were destined to remain buried under the debris of bygone
civilizations until this century.
Gradually, certain material destined to alter present tradition was
discovered.
The first records to receive serious
attention came in the form of Egyptian
papyri. The papyri form the basis
of the secular literary record of
medicine from the most ancient times.
The most notable of these discoveries are the Ebers Papyrus (1862), the Ramesseum
Papyri (1894), the Kahun Papyrus (1889),
the Hearst Papyru (1889), the Edwin Smith Papyrus (1862), the London Medical Papyrus (1860), and the Carlsberg Papyrus (Singer, Science, Medicine and History, pp. 49-52).
Clearly, the importance of these documents initially was not understood! In the case of some papyri, it was not even
recorded how, or exactly when, authorities came to be in possession of
them. It is important to note, however,
that from the available records there is no indication any medical papyri were
discovered prior to 1800!
Of this group, the Ebers Papyrus is perhaps the most
important discovery to date. Discovered
in 1862, its importance continued unnoticed for another 11 years until
purchased in 1873 by Georg Ebers, a nineteenth-century German professor. After reading but the first few lines, he
immediately grasped its significance!
Here was an important book about early medical practice! For the introductory phrase stated: “Here begins the book on the preparation of
medicine for all parts of the human body” (see Ebbell, The Papyrus Ebers: The Greatest Egyptian Medical Document).
This was a medical textbook full of many unintelligible words — but obviously
containing many prescriptions. In addition to the medical text, there were calendar calculations, which dated the
contents to at least the 1500s B.C.
Immediately Eber’s mind recalled the
words of Flavius Clemens, a professor in Alexandria, who wrote in 200 A.D.,
that the scientific and technical knowledge of the Old Kingdom of Egypt (2254-1993 B.C.) had been recorded in an
Encyclopedia of forty-two volumes. Six
of these books were reputed to contain everything known about anatomy, physiology, pharmacology, surgery, and
gynecology (see Bryan, The Papyrus
Ebers, pp. 3-4). These were later
to be called the Hermetic books — after the Greek god Hermes.
In spite of Eber’s personal interest
in this manuscript, the first attempt at translation took place over fifteen
years later in 1890. This translation
was weak and incomplete, but confirmed Eber’s contention that it was an important medical treatise! However, once fully into the translation, it
proved not to be a Hermetic book, but rather an XVIII Dynasty “copy of a series of books many centuries
older” (Singer, Science, Medicine and
History, p. 49).
Suddenly, after many centuries of
mystery and doubt, a significant medical practice in ancient Egypt had been
revealed! Interest was kindled — work
was to begin on its interpretation in earnest.
Apparently Greece was not the
mother of medicine after all!
However, it was not until 1930 when
Professor J. H. Breasted of Chicago published his translation of the Edwin Smith Papyrus that such papyri
were unquestionably demonstrated to
be reproductions of more ancient texts.
The Smith Papyrus, like the Ebers Papyrus, contained expressions,
which were no longer in current usage by Dynasty XVIII, but rather dated from
the Old Kingdom — PROVING that the
original documents belonged to the earliest era of Egyptian history.
The Smith Papyrus was adequately translated by 1930, but it was not
until 1937 that a Danish Egyptologist, Bendix Ebbell, finally rendered a
satisfactory translation of the Ebers
Papyrus. Even Ebbell’s work was to
be improved by a team of Germans in 1957 (see Thorwald, Science and Secrets of Early Medicine, p. 59).
As noted above, the facts of ancient
medical history have laid buried until recent times. Once exhumed they initially
did little practical good! It was
impossible until within the last thirty years to produce a responsible
translation.
The world lacked an Egyptologist with
sufficient pharmaceutical knowledge to express in modern terminology ancient
chemical data. When these
qualifications
became
available, real headway was made in ascertaining the quality of ancient materia medica.
The papyri only give a limited
explanation of how disease was
treated. Paleopathology, another modern means of determining the facts of
ancient medical history, presents the amazing picture of just which diseases were extant to treat! In 1893 Dr. Armand Ruffer, a French
physician, arrived in Egypt. His
education and interests lay in the then infant field of bacteriology. Once in Egypt
he became interested in a unique facet of that nation’s history — mummification. His investigations proved that an intensive study of the remains
of men who lived and died centuries ago provided an intimate knowledge of the
diseases encountered during their respective eras. It is from this recent work, reliably developed since 1910, that
we know what ailments were common to these ancient people.
It becomes obvious how recent the
significant technical research in this field has been. Actually, very little of it occurred over
forty years ago. The upshot of this
revolution in the facts of medical history is that material written on the subject prior to 1930 is incomplete at best — and virtually rendered null and void! Any work done since 1930, which has not
fully taken into account recent discoveries, is also misleading and
incomplete. To express the full impact of ancient medical history,
ALL recently developed material must be
included!
History is more than the simple
recording of facts. It is essentially an interpretative
art. “The reconstruction of ancient
history is an abstracting from the
facts by means of hypothesis . .
. “
(Wright, The Biblical
Archaeologist Reader, p. 19).
The present abstract of
MEDICAL HISTORY is
a tragic shame. BOTH THE
FACTS AND A PROPER HYPOTHESIS HAVE
BEEN MISSING!
Laboring under the delusion that
the ancient Egyptians were a primitive people emerging from the mists of
antiquity, it has been previously impossible for the historian to ascertain
from the simple facts of history, the significance
of ancient medicine.
Ancient efforts at the control of
disease have been considered, as late as 1945, to be nothing but primitive
experiments in witchcraft — sewer
pharmacology at best! In respect to
medicine, it was assumed that mankind
had remained blind, deaf, and dumb until 300-400 B.C. — the flowering of Greece
(see Robinson, The Story of Medicine,
pp. 1-10).
After all, historians mused, had not
men watched the sun rise and set for a million years before Copernicus saw the
significance of this daily phenomenon?
Had not apples fallen a billion times before Newton grasped the laws of
gravitation? These two comments are, of
course, written with tongue-in-cheek, yet, they do accurately picture the
viewpoint of evolution expressed in current writings.
The historical method based on this theory of evolution is the patent
HYPOTHESIS of historians: i.e., that God
or other supernatural power has never intervened in the course of history! Twentieth-century historians have fully
accepted the theory that man, apart from and without the supernatural, has
evolved from an ancient primitive culture to a modern advanced
civilization. So, students today are
presented with a radically new
interpretation of history — a history in which God and the supernatural are
summarily rejected! This is
particularly applicable to the treatment of Medical history. Every effort is made to separate
“scientific” medicine from what is depicted to be a sort of witchcraft which
flourished millennia ago.
What many do not realize is that the
modern World-view of history [medicine included] without God is a radically new interpretation of human experience. Almost no
one today, it seems, has ever questioned whether this
new interpretation is right. It is
merely assumed to be right (Hoeh, Compendium
of World History, pp.1, 2).
Let a modern exponent of this new
approach explain it: “. . . the modern
study of history . . . does not take into
account any intervention of God or of the devil or of demons in the course
of history . . .” (Bultman, Jesus Christ and Mythology, p. 17).
This assumption has never been
proved. It remains only a hypothesis!
Nevertheless, “students in
particular — and the public in
general — have been led to believe that archaeologists, historians, scientists,
and theologians live with full assurance and in absolute conviction that this new interpretation of history without
God is correct” (Hoeh, Compendium of
World History, p. 2).
The application of this premise to medical history is a fatal blow! Without considering God, the Bible and the
supernatural, it is impossible to come to an intelligent understanding
concerning the origin of this practice, and the importance of its history to
mankind! Yet, we are “taught to reject
everything supernatural from history texts — even when evidence of the intervention of God [or the supernatural]
is recorded by eyewitnesses in ancient
secular records” (Hoeh, Compendium of
World History, p. 12).
This unscientific approach to
history is the universally accepted method of study. Since supernatural occurrences in history cannot be
scientifically tested today, they are rejected as myth. Any statement
referring to supernatural intervention is assumed to be mythological, therefore
worthless!
Anyone seriously asserting such
intervention “must be regarded as ignorant, superstitious, the victim of
hallucination or some other form of mental aberration” (Hockett, The Critical Method in Historical Research
and Writing, p. 62).
No
one wants to be ridiculed. As a result,
the ancient records, which substantiate, in this case, the truth of medical
history and the record of the Bible have been rejected as fabulous or
mythological.
There has been no true respect for
the history of the Bible and for accurate [ancient] secular annals. This
suppression of part of the truth is the primary reason the world has never
learned the lessons of history
(Hoeh, Compendium of World History,
pp. 5,16).
The charge that ancient medicine
prior to Hippocrates either originated with, or was limited to, meaningless
mystic incantations of a superstitious people is false! The exposure of this myth is overdue! It is
time to learn the lessons that lie hidden in the ruins of ancient
civilizations.
Hippocrates was not the father of Medicine! Furthermore, HE KNEW IT!
Notice the Hippocratic Oath to which Hippocrates, himself, reputedly
ascribed: “I [Hippocrates] swear by Apollo Physician, by Ascalepius, by Hygieia, by Panacea, and
by all the gods and goddesses, making
them witness . . .” (Marti-Ibanez, The
Epic of Medicine, p. 65).
Hippocrates swore allegiance to earlier
practitioners of the healing art. He
knew full well that the practice of medicine did not begin with him. Greece was not the origin of medicine —
Hippocrates not its originator! Rather, he lived about the middle of the
medical history experienced by mankind (ibid.,
p. 50).
In fact, altogether too much
importance is placed on Hippocrates. He
is a ghost of history, a semi-fictitious character of ancient Greece — about whom we know precious little! “All that we actually know of him as a man
can be told in a few short sentences.
He was born on the island of Cos about 460 B.C. He was a member of the Guild of
Aesculapidiae, those men who claimed descent from Aesculapius . . . . He is
said to have died about 360 B.C.”
“If so little is actually known of
Hippocrates, how does it happen that we
credit so much to him” (Haggard, The
DOCTOR in History, p. 67). This is
a valid question for which there is no satisfactory answer!
Another author writes: “We know little of his life — even less than we know of Christ’s youth — YET
Hippocrates of Cos has passed into History as the Father of Medicine. Like . . . Socrates, HIPPOCRATES NEVER WROTE
A WORD . . .” (Marti-Ibanez, The Epic of Medicine, p. 49).
The assertion that Hippocrates is
the Father of Medicine is indeed more tradition than fact. The truth is that “modern” medical practice
long antedates his era!
By 500 B.C., medicine had passed its
ancient apex and had degenerated greatly
from previous heights of worldwide acclaim.
“The decadence of the arts and sciences [from the time of the earliest
Egyptian dynasties] was accompanied by a
deterioration of medicine also.
Even though the new conquerors tried to preserve the ancient traditions,
and even though later, in the period of the Ptolemies [3rd century B.C.],
there are found traces in medical practice of these ancient traditions,
nevertheless, EGYPTIAN MEDICINE DETERIORATED and became merely a trade of sorcerers, drug vendors, and charlatans
who preserve only the mystic vestments of
the ancient medicine” (Castiglioni, A History of Medicine, p. 62).
Writing on the same subject, another
author comments, “Only near the end did the latter [empirico-rational medicine]
veer toward magic” (Marti-Ibanez, The
Epic of Medicine, p. 38).
Recently discoveries have begun to
reveal how advanced ancient Egyptian medicine actually was. “A capable
medical faculty was established in Egypt fifty centuries ago. There is no doubt that the Egyptians studied
medicine and surgery in the medical
colleges of Babylonia and in parts of Mesopotamia, and acquired a complete
knowledge of all the Oriental medical practices” (Selwyn-Brown, The
Physician Throughout the Ages, p. 34).
It was from this world-renowned
medical practice prior to its
deterioration, that the Greeks IMPORTED their knowledge of medicine.
It is most important to remember
that the most ancient scientific documents are MEDICAL and mathematical . . . there existed a scientific tradition that
was already old when Greece was young. Pythagoras,
Thales, and Hesiod in the sixth, seventh, and eighth centuries B.C.,
respectively, linked their work on mathematics with the old Egyptian theories.
The Iliad . . . grants credit to
Egypt as the place of origin of Greek drugs . . . . The [comparatively
recent] Egyptian texts [we have now] are merely copies of ancient texts made
when Egypt’s sun was already setting (Marti-Ibanez, The Epic of Medicine, p. 37).
This explains the inferiority of the texts —
including their bent toward witchcraft and superstition, which is evidenced in
all nations from about 800 B.C.
Until recently, the high degree of
development which medicine had reached over 4000 years ago, was never remotely
suspected! Had it been known, virtually
all medical knowledge up to the accidental
discovery of penicillin by Alexander Fleming in 1928, would have been put
to shame (see Ratcliff, Yellow Magic, pp. 3-25)! In 1928 chemotherapy was in disrepute. As many books had been written against the use of drugs to cure disease
as had been written in favor of it.
However, in the wake of the
discovery of penicillin, there followed a veritable stampede to find new drugs
to fight disease. The field of
chemotherapy was suddenly wide open!
Cure with chemicals became the great hope of man’s endless war against
disease. Research men in every country
were hot on the trail of substances, which would destroy bacteria. It seemed penicillin was the destroyer
researchers had been seeking since the discovery of microbes. With this discovery, today’s physician now
possessed, for the first time, an
effective means to combat the spread of bacteria. The AGE of the ANTIBIOTOC was born — the cornerstone of modern drug therapy!
As astoundingly revolutionary as the
discovery of antibiotics seemed in 1928, this
principle of today’s drug therapy was not new! The operational principle of antibiotics was common knowledge
among physicians 4000 years ago!
Furthermore, history records that
ancient physicians used the drugs with greater
accuracy than do their medical counterparts today. Astounding, but this will be proved true in
Chapter IV!
The words of Solomon, in whose day this medical practice yet
flourished, certainly rings true:
“The thing that hath been, IT IS THAT WHICH SHALL BE; and that which is done is that which shall
be done: and there is no new thing under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 1:9).
No, Hippocrates was not the Father of Medicine. Greece was not the origin of modern civilization. The records now available prove this all too conclusively! Scientists now realize medicine is of much
greater antiquity than previously believed.
All medical histories, except
for the most recent scientific annals,
are out of date.
The origin of medicine occurred in Egypt forty centuries ago. It was there that the concept of, and need
for, a competent medical faculty was born.
The Aesculapians of Greece and ALL subsequent medical societies must pay
homage to Egypt!
Chapter 2
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