Dental Care in Islamic Medical Science: Muhammad al-Aqkirmani (d.1760) and his Risalah fi hukm al-Siwak

Yakubovych, М. (2018) Dental Care in Islamic Medical Science: Muhammad al-Aqkirmani (d.1760) and his Risalah fi hukm al-Siwak. Muslim Heritage.

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Abstract

Among the corpus of Islamic medical texts there are few which specially connect medicine and religious law (fiqh). These are the forms of treatment mentioned in basic Islamic texts of the Qur’an and Sunnah. One of them is the usage of Siwak or Miswak, a teeth cleaning twig usually made from the arak tree (Salvadora Persica). “The toothstick is cleansing for the mouth and pleasing to the Lord”, says one of the ahadeeth from the al-Bukhari collection. As a rule, it was used before going to congregational prayer, just after the ritual abolition. Today, Siwak can be purchased in almost every market, amongst Muslims, in the Middle East or the West. The texts providing rules for general dental care already existed in the “Golden Age” of Islamic medical scholarship, which there are a few treatises dedicated specially to the issue of Siwak, virtues of its usage and other benefits. Among the oldest texts, addressing the subject, there is one by Yuhanna ibn Masawayh (d. 854) and Hunayn b. Ishaq (d. 873).[1] Numerous contemporary studies confirm that the Salvadora Persica plant and its extracts exert beneficial effects on oral tissues and help to maintain good oral hygiene.[2] Most of the oldest Muslim treatises on Siwak remain in a manuscript form. However, similar works on this issue have also appeared in later periods. The newest manuscript (still unpublished), which is going to be analyzed in this article, is written by the great Ottoman encyclopedist, Muhammad bin Mustafa al-Aqkirmani (d. 1760).

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