IsisCB Explore

Article ID: CBB889232108

United in Scholarship, Divided in Practice: (Re)Translating Smallpox and Measles for Seventeenth-Century Jews (2022)

Isis: International Review Devoted to the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences
Volume: 113
Issue: 2
Pages: 289-309
Publication date: 2022
Language: English

DOI: 10.1086/719576

URI: http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/719576

Outside Links

PubMed

WorldCat

Google Scholar

JSTOR

Expertise Transmission of texts Translations Jewish civilization and culture Measles Smallpox Experience; witness 17th century Wallich, Abraham Rivière, Lazare Zahalon, Jacob

This essay investigates the translatability of experience in seventeenth-century medical practica. It reconstructs the translation and the retranslation of the chapter on smallpox and measles taken from the immensely popular Praxis medica of Lazare Rivière. This text was adapted by two Jewish physicians: Jacob Zahalon, who translated it into Hebrew; and Abraham Wallich, who then modified it further. Both presented this work as their own. Reconstructing the decision making that went into their work, the essay argues that the erasure of some practical and experiential content does not constitute a failure of translation but, rather, a reevaluation of the content’s applicability in a new context. The essay, dealing with Jewish learned physicians, also examines how different environments were reflected in these physicians’ writing. It therefore shows how physicians of comparable expertise resorted to dissimilar practices.

...More

Citation URI

data.isiscb.org/p/isis/citation/CBB889232108

This citation is part of the Isis database.

Citations Indexes

Similar Citations

Chapter Altbauer-Rudnik, Michal; (2013)
Love for All: The Medical Discussion of Lovesickness in Jacob Zahalon's The Treasure of Life (Otzar ha- ayyim) (/p/isis/citation/CBB001201682/)

Article J. J. Eddy; H. A. Smith; J. E. Abrams; (2023)
Historical Lessons on Vaccine Hesitancy: Smallpox, Polio, and Measles, and Implications for COVID-19 (/p/isis/citation/CBB949210665/)

Article Lola Ferre; José Martínez Delgado; (2015)
Arabic into Hebrew, A Case Study: Isaac Israeli’s Book on Fevers (/p/isis/citation/CBB910965592/)

Article Taube, Moshe; (2010)
Transmission of Scientific Texts in 15th-Century Eastern Knaan (/p/isis/citation/CBB001031499/)

Chapter Zonta, Mauro; (2006)
The Jewish Mediation in the Transmission of Arabo-Islamic Science and Philosophy to the Latin Middle Ages (/p/isis/citation/CBB001020167/)

Thesis Lucia Finotto; (2016)
Between Arabic, Hebrew and Latin: Jewish Translators of Islamic Sciences in the Medieval Kingdom of Sicily (/p/isis/citation/CBB808901728/)

Article Mila Maselli; (2020)
Hippocrate empiriste? Un idolum entre philosophie et praxis médicale (Du régime, I, 4) (/p/isis/citation/CBB138871841/)

Article Michel Pretalli; (2019)
Hannibal versus Phormio: Theory and Practice in Italian Military Literature at the End of the Renaissance (/p/isis/citation/CBB555691679/)

Book Andrew J. Hogan; (2022)
Disability Dialogues: Advocacy, Science, and Prestige in Postwar Clinical Professions (/p/isis/citation/CBB207448799/)

Article Stefano Crabu; Ilenia Picardi; Valentina Turrini; (2023)
Refused-knowledge during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Mobilising Experiential Expertise for Care and Well-being (/p/isis/citation/CBB291581369/)

Article Alisha Rankin; (2022)
How to 'Be Expert' in Early Modern Europe (/p/isis/citation/CBB778994997/)

Article Philippa Hellawell; (2019)
“The Best and Most Practical Philosophers”: Seamen and the Authority of Experience in Early Modern Science (/p/isis/citation/CBB806762885/)

Article Ben-Zaken, Avner; (2009)
From Naples to Goa and Back: A Secretive Galilean Messenger and a Radical Hermeneutist (/p/isis/citation/CBB000931550/)

Article B. Harun Küçük; (2018)
Arabic into Turkish in the Seventeenth Century (/p/isis/citation/CBB988894664/)

Article Yeo, Insok; (2012)
Zhuzhiqunzheng, the Jesuit Translation of Western Medicine and Its Influence on Korean and Chinese Intellectuals (/p/isis/citation/CBB001210627/)

Article Lafont, Olivier; (2009)
Nicolas Lémery, providence des bibliophilies (/p/isis/citation/CBB000933419/)

Article Fortuna, Stefania; (2012)
The Latin Editions of Galen's Opera omnia (1490--1625) and Their Prefaces (/p/isis/citation/CBB001251297/)

Article Boschiero, Luciano; (2010)
Translation, Experimentation and the Spring of the Air: Richard Waller's Essayes of Natural Experiments (/p/isis/citation/CBB001032188/)

Chapter Sakai, Shizu; (1998)
Translation and the Origins of Western Science in Japan (/p/isis/citation/CBB000650903/)

Chapter Shi Yunli Zhu Haohao; (2016)
Calculating the Fate of Chinese Dynasties with the Islamic Method: The Chinese Study and Application of Arabic Astrology in the 17th Century (/p/isis/citation/CBB410817605/)