SOME CONTRIBUTIONS OF THE SOKOTO
CALIPHATE SCHOLARS TO THE STUDY
OF MEDICINE

A guest speaker's address to the Students of the Faculty of
Medicine, Usman Dan Fodio University Sokoto, at the
occasion of 1993/94 ISMA Health Week, On April 22 1994.

The Phenomenon called Sokoto Jihad, started in the second half of the 18th century, as a movement of Muslim scholars aimed at the restoration of Islam in Hausaland. The jihad itself took a few years at the beginning of the 19th century (1804-1810) and led to the establishment of the Sokoto Caliphate, an extensive area made up the whole of Hausaland and parts of Borno. But the phenomena, like a wave in the ocean, went beyond its locus, sweeping westwards until it reached the shores of the Atlantic and eastwards until it crossed the Nile valley and reached the Red sea. Barely two decades after the Jihad and establishment of the Sokoto Caliphate, Ahmad Labbo, a student of the Sokoto Jihad leaders, rose against the tyranny in Masina, in contemporary Mali, carried out a jihad which led to the establishment of a caliphate. Another three decades later, Al-Hajj Umar al-Futi, a disciple of Sultan Muhammad Bello, started his own from the shores of the Atlantic and eventually established a state at Segu, in contemporary Mali. Yet another three decades later, the followers of Shehu Usman who had moved in to the Nile valley in anticipation of the appearance of the Mahdi, rose to support Muhammad Ahmad al-Mahdi, who carried out a jihad, liberated Sudan and established an Islamic polity on the ruins of the colonial state. The Sokoto Jihad and the waves it generated were all the products of scholarly movements which were inspired by Islam. These movements were heirs to the Islamic tradition of learning and reform, spanning several centuries. Thus scholarship became the very basis of the states created and the main thrusts of the institutions of the states. Learning was given a top priority, especially in the Sokoto Caliphate, where the triumvirate of Shehu Usman, his brother Shehu Abdullahi and his son Sultan Muhammad Bello authored an astonishing total of about three hundred books and pamphlets. Muhammad Bello, the youngest of the triumvirate, himself reported in his Infaq al-Maysur, to have read twenty thousand books. Understandably so because the basis of their inspiration was the search for knowledge. In his words, "everything has a support and foundation, and the support of this religion is knowledge."[1] Though each of the members of these triumvirate as well as their heirs, had some kind of areas of specialisation, yet they had such a wide variety of interests that made their knowledge encyclopaedic. They wrote on such a wide range of areas such as history, law, jurisprudence, education, psychology, political theory, exegesis of the Qur’an (tafsir), Language and poetry, and medicine. Their works on medicine, which is of our immediate concern, may come to about a dozen or so. The bulk of these were written by Muhammad Bello. Shehu Usman is said to have a work on Basur, haemorrhoids, which I have been unable to lay my hands on. Shehu Abdullahi has a work on general medicine, titled Masalihil Insan al-Muta’allaqa bi al-Adyan.[2] Muhammad Bello has the following: Ujalat al-Rakib fi ‘l-tibb al- Sa’ib;[3] Talkhis al-Tibb;[4] al-Tibb al-Hayyin fi Awja’ al-ayn;[5] al-Mawarid al-Nabawiyya fi ‘l-masa’il al-Tibbiyya[6]; al-Qawl al-Manthur fi Bayan Adwiyat illat al-Basur[7]; Al-Qawl al-Sanna’ fi Wujuh al-Talyin wa ‘l-Tamashshi bi ‘l-Sina’[8] and Tanbih al-Ikhwan ala Adwiyat al-Didan[9]. It is not feasible in a short address of this nature to analyse the contents of these more than half a dozen works. This we may have to leave in the competent hands of researchers who will require a substantial time and efforts to fathom these rather rich and copious mines of knowledge. The best we could do in the circumstances is to catch glimpses of their contents and appreciate their essence and import. In Masalihil Insan, Shehu Abdullahi argued the import of maintaining good health and seemed to have laid priority to the health of the mind. He suggested numerous means through which a healthy mind can be developed and maintained. He specifically suggested activities like regular extra prayers (tahajjud), regular supererogatory fasting and a host of other spiritual activities aimed at building and strengthening the mind. He then came to the body and suggested the need to strengthen it through daily and regular exercise. He stressed the importance of having these exercises at specific times of the day. He then took up the issue of diet. He argued that just like certain fruits are peculiar to certain climatic conditions so are diseases. The prevention as well as the cure for these diseases can best be achieved according to Shehu Abdullahi by a regular and balance consumption of these local fruits. Thus in Masalihil Insan, Abdullahi expounded not only on medicine but also on a philosophy of medicine. Muhammad Bello’s works are made up of both general and specific. The Ujalat al-Rakib fi ‘l-tibb al-Sa’ib and al-Mawarid al-Nabawiyya fi ‘l-Masa’il al-Tibbiyya appear to be works of general nature. Talkhis al-Tibb Sallalahu Alaihi Wasallam min Mawahib al-Dunya is an abridgement of a work by al-Qastalani. Though an abridgement it is relatively bigger than most of the other works. The other four works mentioned above are specific works. Al-Tibb al-Hayyin fi Awja’ al-’Ayn, as the title suggests, is a work on ophthalmology and an abridgement of Bello’s earlier and more extensive work on the subject. Al-Qawl al-Manthur fi Bayan Adwiyat Illat al-Basur is similarly specifically on haemorrhoids. Al-Qawl al-Sanna’ fi Wujuh al-Talyin wa ‘l-Tamashshi bi ‘l-Sina’ is a work on laxatives and purgatives, specifically Senna. Tanbih al-Ikhwan ala Adwiyat al-Didan is yet another specific work on parasitic worms and their medicines, helminthiasis in contemporary medical parlance.[10] To this list of works must be added the specific inquiries made by individual scholars or patients often in writing, such as the inquiries of the Amir of Bauchi addressed to Sultan Bello on some heart problems. Bello, as Murray Last reported, promptly responded with a prescription.[11] Certainly not all of such correspondences are extant and not all those extant have been collected and catalogued for easy access to researchers. In Ujalat Rakib, Muhammad Bello started by defining the limits of medicine and condemned such practices of mixing filth with some verses of the Qur’an in the name of healing. This was necessary then, as indeed today, when syncretism was the norm, and the scholars laboured to bring the Muslim community to the path of Qur’an and Sunnah free from elements of pagan practices that had through ignorance found their way into Muslim practices. He then went on to expound on the Islamic philosophy of medicine, assuring his audience that for every illness that Allah had allowed on earth, He has also provided its medicine. The sources of the knowledge of this medicine are the Qur’an and Sunnah on the one hand and the practical clinical experiences of medical experts on the other. Treatment according to Bello has similarly two basic components, medication and diet. He then proceeded to give examples of various medications, quoting profusely from the Qur’an and hadith, from specific prayers in the Qur’an and Hadith to such natural substances with medicinal properties, as honey. In al-Mawarid al-Nabawiyya fi Masa’il al-Tibbiyya, Muhammad Bello stressed the need for the maintenance of good health, if for nothing else for the purpose of ibada. He then proceeded to discuss a host of items of medicinal value specifically mentioned by the Hadith of the Prophet Muhammad (S.A.W.). He listed a number of items mainly of animal and plant origin that are used in the treatment of particular ailments. Honey and Senna leaves gained particular prominence. In Talkhis al-Tibbi, Bello concentrated on the incidences in the life of the Prophet Muhammad (S.A.W.) where the latter made specific prescription for certain ailments and sought to comment on their imports and applications. In the more specific work of al-Qawl al Manthur fi Bayan adwiyat Illat al-Basur, Bello started with a graphic clinical description of haemorrhoids, in its various degrees and manifestations. He then expounded on some of the causes before discussing the treatment. In discussing the treatment he made a list of the various prescriptions giving details of both the preparations as well as the applications. He then concluded the work with a discussion on diet, specifying certain food items that must be avoided and those that need to be encouraged either as adjunct therapies or as some form of propylaxis. Al-Qawl al-Sanna’ fi Wujuh al-Talyin wa ‘l-Tamashshi bi ‘l-Sina’ is a work on Senna leaves and its medicinal uses, it thus falls more under pharmacy than medicine. It contains a lot of pharmacognosical details on Senna, its description with its various names in various languages, its collection and preservation. It also described its various methods of preparation with useful pharmaceutical details, giving the various additives that facilitate the extraction of the active ingredient and enhance the efficacy of its pharmacological activity. By far more detailed and more systematic is the Tanbih al-Ikhwan ala Adwiyat al-Didan, the works on worms. Here Muhammad Bello first identified the worms along with the fly[13] as a major source of infection for the human body. He then proceeded to identify the major sources of these worms: food items especially vegetables and some fruits. Once in the human body, the author followed and described the stages of developments of these worms. He then continued to describe the various types of worms giving idea of their sizes. Bello took a detailed descriptions of the symptoms and clinical consequences of infestation of these worms, mentioning weakness, pain and the effects on the eyes.[13] In discussing the treatments, Bello started, as usual, with the preventive, recommending that the sources of these infestations should be watched and measures taken to avoid it. He then proceeded to list about one dozen prescriptions, giving details of the formulations and, in a few cases, even the mechanism of action. Some of these prescriptions include what we today know as enema, oil laxatives and cathartics and a range of anthelmintics. Generations of scholars after Muhammad Bello appear to have continued with this tradition of the study and writing on medicine but certainly not with the same vigour as the earlier generation, as Bello would have wished. Perhaps the last may be the work of Aliyu DanSidi, the Amir of Zazzau, sometimes in the first decade of this century. This work is rightly titled, Talkhis Tashil al-Manafi’, for it is the abridgement, an ingenious one though, of Tashil al-Manafi’ fi ‘l-Tibb wa ‘l-Hikma[14] of Shaykh Ibrahim al-Azraq (ca. 890 AH). It was ingenious in the sense that Aliyu DanSidi gave local substitutes of some of the herbs and substances suggested in the prescriptions. Though the occasion will not allow for detailed discussion of the contributions of these scholars to medicine, it may still be necessary to look at the peculiar features and characteristics of these contributions even if briefly. Having been written by Islamic scholars, these works subsume the basic Islamic assumptions, that the ultimate cure for any ailment comes from Allah the Most High, the creator and nourisher of man and the universe he lives in. In a way this is true with all traditional medical care system. But what is unique here is that it has maintained this relationship with God while accommodating science and the spirit of inquiry. Western Medicine is wholly and exclusively science based, but like the science that created it, it has no place for the Lord and creator of the universe. For Western science exists in spite of God and the Christian Church and not because of it.[15] Similarly the traditional heath care system is belief based and has no room for science. The Islamic system is the one system that has been able to accommodate both God and science just as the human body accommodates in perfect harmony the spirit and the flesh. In a word it is simply natural. Because it is natural it is holistic in its approach to the human body as well as the wider cosmos in which this body lives and thrives. It appreciates this inextricable link between the state of the mind and the state of the body, Shehu Abdullahi in Masalih al-Insan and Muhammad Bello in al-Qawl al-Manthur have articulated this point with impressive clarity. It is easy to see, therefore, why this approach emphasises preventive rather than curative medicine. Even in the curative the emphasis is on herbs and such naturally occurring substances which are more agreeable to the nature of the body than the ever increasing synthetic chemicals that invade us today.[16] As we may have noticed in this tradition of medicine the practice of what we know today as medicine and pharmacy were one and the same thing. The separation even in the West was a fairly recent phenomenon which came in the wake of specialisations.[17] Judged by the level of the knowledge of medicine and level of technology in their own times, the works of these scholars stand out very tall on the horizon. But spectacular as they are, these works are not particularly novel, for they represent a continuity with a tradition which started at the time of the prophet, matured during the era of the Abbasids and attained excellence in Bagdad, Syria, Islamic Spain (al-Andalus) and Egypt. By the twelfth century the city of Bagdad alone had about sixty full-fledged hospitals and Cordoba in Spain had more than fifty such hospitals.[18] The larger Hospitals had libraries, outpatient clinics and medical schools. One such Hospital, al-Mansuri Hospital in Cairo had "separate wards for women, children and convalescents, wards dedicated to specific diseases, an extensive library and outpatient clinics. In addition to that there were smaller libraries and private collections each boasting of no less than 100,000 books."[19] Some of these books include the major works not only in the field of medicine but other scientific works authored by Muslim scholars. The major medical works included the works of Muhammad Ibn Zakariyya al-Razi (Rhazes) 865-925 C.E. whose masterpiece al-judari wa ‘l-Hasba (Smallpox and Measles), in which he describes the grounds for the differential diagnosis for the two diseases, was the earliest work of its kind. It also includes al-Rhazi’s pioneering works on paediatrics. There was also the works of Hunyn Ibn Ishaq, 809-873 C.E., al-Ashr Maqalat fi ‘l-Ayn, a pioneering work on ophthalmology. Similarly, the collections include the work of Ibn Rushd, (Averoes) 1126-1198 C.E., al-Kulliyat fi ‘l-Tibb which was the first to recognise the functions of the retina and of immunity in cases of smallpox. There was again the famous al-Qanun fi ‘l-Tibb or the Cannon of Medicine of Ibn Sina (Avecinna) 980-1037 C.E., a work which formed the main textbook of medical schools in Europe until the end of the 18th century.[20] This astonishing and unprecedented intellectual output not only in the field of medicine but in literally every field of learning and human endeavour has its roots in the Qur’an, whose first word of revelation was the command to read! [21] This command to read was immediately followed by a reference to the creation of man from a clot of blood. Thereafter, the Qur’an, emphatically and consistently continued to appeal to Muslims to study and advance the cause of science.[22] So replete is this call and so powerful is the appeal that some scholars like the French surgeon, Maurice Bucaille, wondered if someone who had no scientific background could even understand the Qur’an. [23] With this impressive history and this unmistakable and powerful appeal of the Qur’an, which luckily we still read, the question must now be asked, What has happened to the Muslims? From producers of knowledge, science and technology, they have today become consumers, poor ones at that, of knowledge, science and technology produced by a culture and civilisation that has no place, much less, role for the very Lord and creator of man and the universe. At a time when genetic counselling, artificial insemination and surrogate motherhood and frightening advances in genetic engineering are making it possible to shop for a baby in the same way we shop the latest design in the cloth industry and have therefore unleash a whole range of ethical questions, what should the Muslims do? Have the Muslims the intellectual capacity to address these challenges and stem this no doubt dangerous tide? This is certainly neither the place nor am I the person to answer these searching questions. But we may very quickly allude to some of the areas to look for these answers. The first place it seems to me is our minds, especially that part of it which the Qur’an thought it necessary to address first, our spirit of inquiry. This spirit of inquiry has, over the last century or so, been chained by the shackle of taqlid, something the Qur’an kept attacking consitently nad persistently. Under the pressure of this blind imitation of the no doubt great scholars of old, the Sharia and the Islamic thoughts that feed it lost their dynamism and our learning stagnated and so did the Ummah. The Western arts and sciences, divorced as they had been, from God, could not have been of much avail. Indeed, it is increasingly being realised that they have created far more problems than they have solved. While the West itself is gradually, if grudgingly, opening up to other non-Western alternatives, not only in medicine but in a whole range of fields of human endeavour, our universities continue with their blind imitation of the West, regimenting the minds of our youth to thoughts and ideas that are out of harmony, not only with our world-view but also with our socio-cultural environment. Either way we don’t seem to be getting far. We all know what happens to a human body fed on a poor and poisonous diet, the best one could hope for is a stunted growth. And this is what appeared to have happened to the Ummah. But perhaps even worse, we appear to have imbibed such lethargy, apathy and lack of commitment to anything serious, we are only active in the pursuit of the frivolous and the transient and have since become consumed by a false and fruitless search for peace and progress which become more and more illusive with every passing day. The challenge to the members of the Ummah, both in and out of the field of medicine, is clearly how to overcome these two major obstacles to our progress. We have so much to learn from the scholars of the Sokoto Caliphate. The thoughts and ideas that inspired their development were in harmony with their socio-cultural environment. The medicine they developed was appropriate to their level of development in terms of its simplicity, acceptability and accessibility. Perhaps the starting point is to first allow some of these ideas into our university curriculum. [24] Let us hope, therefore, if and when we come back to our senses and get a leadership worth the name, we can put an end to this cultural and intellectual imperialism by redesigning our curriculum to reflect our world-view, culture and history. Then and only then can we have a mind we can call our own, reconcile our thoughts with our culture and build on our rich intellectual heritage. Perhaps then we can expect the Ummah to regain its strength, recover its dynamism and recapture its glory. So help us God! References: [1] M. A. Al-Hajj, ‘Tarikh al-Wanaghirah’, Kano Studies, Vol. 1, No. 4, P. 7. [3] Source, Kaduna NA A/AR3/8 and O/AR2/22 [3] Source, Kaduna NA A/AR5/38 [4] Source, Kaduna NA P/AR5/21 [5] Source, Sokoto CIS 3/7/83 [6] Source, Zaria NHRS 22/3 [8] Source, Sokoto CIS 3/9/122 [8] Source, Kaduna NA P/AR1/11 [9] Source, Kano BU MB 6/317 [10] Helminthiasis is believed to be the most common disease in the world. See L.S. Goodman and Gilman (eds.) The Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutics (5th ed.) New York, Macmillan, 1975. P. 1018. [11] See Murray Last, Sokoto Caliphate Longman, London, 1967. [12] Some worms like the Onchocerciasis are transmitted by a certain fly. [13] Today Onchocerca-volvulus, the worm that causes river blindness, is known to affect the eyes. For details, see E.H.O. Parry, (ed.) Principles of Medicine in Africa, (2nd. ed.) Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1984. Pp 495-500. [14] This book has now been published in Istanbul, Turkey in 1976. On its margins is al-Tibb al-Nabawi of Al-Hafiz Abu Abdullahi Muhammad b. Ahamd b. Uthman al-Dhahabi (748 AH). It was earlier published in Cairo by Muassasa al-Halabi wa ‘l-Sharka li ‘l-Nashr wa ‘l-Tauzi’ n.d. [15] The Church had stood on the way of science. Thus science had to rebel against the Church in order to develop. Hence the conflict between religion and science in the Western world. The Muslim case was entirely different, not only did the religion of Islam encouraged its adherents to study science, it made the pursuit of learning generally and science in particular over and above worship. [16] Recall the recent Newsweek cover story on the increasing inefficacy and dangers of synthetic antibiotics. See also ‘The Cure is Green’ a leading article on herbal medicine in the British Sunday Observer Magazine of April 21, 1991. [17] Since the last two decades or so there has been an increasing realisation to re-unite medicine and pharmacy in the interest of the patient. Hence the development of the field of Clinical Pharmacy, which brings the doctor and the pharmacist together in the ward rounds. This field is most developed in the United State. [18] See Muhammad Al-Akili, Medicine of the Prophet, a Translation of parts of Ibn Qayyim’s Work, Zad al-Mi’ad, Pearl Publishing House, Wartford, UK, 1994, P. xx. [19] Ibid. [20] Ibid. xxi-xxii. [21] See Qur’an 96:1-5. [22] See Qur’an (23:12-16); (41:53); (50:6-8); for example. [23] See Maurice Bucaille’s The Bible, the Qur’an and Science, Delhi, Taj Company, 1990 and What is the Origin of Man? Paris, Seghers, 1982. [24] Our universities today continue to teach only the thoughts and ideas of European scholars as if on earth we never had a tradition of learning of our own. In fact the Islamic tradition of learning has had a much longer and richer history than contemporary Western tradition, which was an off-shoot of the Islamic. The Muslim University of Al-Azhar, in Egypt and the Muslim University of Cordova, in Spain, were established in the tenth century, three centuries before the establishment of the universities of Paris and Oxford.