The Book of Healing

The Book of Healing (کتاب الشفاء; Sufficientia; also known as ) is a scientific and philosophical encyclopedia written by Abu Ali ibn Sīna (aka Avicenna) from medieval Persia, near Bukhara in Maverounnahr. He most likely began to compose the book in 1014, completed it around 1020, and published it in 1027. This work is Ibn Sina's major work on science and philosophy, and is intended to "cure" or "heal" ignorance of the soul. Thus, despite its title, it is not concerned with medicine, in contrast to Avicenna's earlier The Canon of Medicine (5 vols.) which is, in fact, medical. The book is divided into four parts: logic, natural sciences, mathematics (a quadrivium of arithmetic, geometry, astronomy), and metaphysics. It was influenced by ancient Greek philosophers such as Aristotle; Hellenistic thinkers such as Ptolemy; and earlier Persian/Muslim scientists and philosophers, such as Al-Kindi (Alkindus), Al-Farabi (Alfarabi), and Al-Bīrūnī. In astronomy, the book proposes the theory that Venus is closer to Earth than the Sun. Ibn Sina's theory on the formation of metals combined the alchemical sulfur-mercury theory of metals (although he was a critic of alchemy) with the mineralogical theories of Aristotle and Theophrastus. He created a synthesis of ideas concerning the nature of the mineral and metallic states. Toulmin and Goodfield (1965), commented on Avicenna's contribution to geology:Around A.D. 1000, Avicenna was already suggesting a hypothesis about the origin of mountain ranges, which in the Christian world, would still have been considered quite radical eight hundred years later Paleontology Ibn Sina also contributed to paleontology with his explanation of how the stoniness of fossils was caused. Aristotle previously explained it in terms of vaporous exhalations, which Ibn Sina modified into the theory of petrifying fluids (succus lapidificatus), which was elaborated on by Albertus Magnus in the 13th century and accepted in some form by most naturalists by the 16th century.

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Related concepts (36)

Islamic philosophy

Islamic philosophy is philosophy that emerges from the Islamic tradition. Two terms traditionally used in the Islamic world are sometimes translated as philosophy—falsafa (philosophy), which refers to philosophy as well as logic, mathematics, and physics; and Kalam (speech), which refers to a rationalist form of Scholastic Islamic theology which includes the schools of Maturidiyah, Ashaira and Mu'tazila.

The Book of Healing

Science in the medieval Islamic world

Science in the medieval Islamic world was the science developed and practised during the Islamic Golden Age under the Umayyads of Córdoba, the Abbadids of Seville, the Samanids, the Ziyarids, the Buyids in Persia, the Abbasid Caliphate and beyond, spanning the period roughly between 786 and 1258. Islamic scientific achievements encompassed a wide range of subject areas, especially astronomy, mathematics, and medicine. Other subjects of scientific inquiry included alchemy and chemistry, botany and agronomy, geography and cartography, ophthalmology, pharmacology, physics, and zoology.