The spiritual physick of Rhazes
By: tr. from the Arabic by Arthur J. Arberry.
Edition: [1st ed.]
Series: Wisdom of the East series
Publisher: Murray
Published: 1950
Place of publication: London
Language: eng; ara
Number of pages: 110
Description: The introduction describes Rhazes' life, includes an anecdote of him healing a king in order to illustrate Rhazes' character, and discusses the scholarly reception of his writings. The text guides the reader through the logical steps required to reform one's character, centering around principles espoused by Plato and Socrates, that of moderation and the importance of controlling passion with reason. Rhazes begins the discussion with an affirmation of the value of divinely-bestowed reason, which he saw as the foundation for his subsequent discussion and which is the most obviously religious portion of the text. Then he argues for the importance of suppressing passion, and the remainder of the text is essentially case studies of how to suppress various kinds of passion.