An Early Parallel to the Hippocratic Oath

Singer, Charles An Early Parallel to the Hippocratic Oath In: Gesnerus, 8 - 1950 + p. 177 - 180 7 \a SO sy SINGER Cx., An early parallel to the Hippocratic oath (qui serait un document pythagoricien] ; cf. Hippocraticum Corpus. Le | SINGER CH., An early parallel to the Hippocratic oath : Gesnerus VIII 1951 177-180. | Le texte de l’inscription SEG, 3¢ éd., N° 985, des environs de 100 av. J.C., provenant de Philadelphia de Lydie et ayant trait au culte de la déesse-mère Agdistis, présente de nombreux parallèles avec celui du serment hippocratique et vient appuyer la thèse de H. E. Sigerist selon qui ce serment n’aurait rien de chrétien, mais serait un document pythagoricien remontant au ve siècle av. J.C, PHILOLOGIQUE 1954, . « Genres WV dry 9 /

An Early Parallel to the Hippocratic Oath By CHARLES SINGER, Par (Cornwall) In all Greek medical literature no document has been more discussed than the so-called Oath. Among the most debated elements in it are the ethical clauses. These forbid (1) inducing abortion; (2) giving poison on the fessional attendance. patient’s request; (3) the unequal treatment of bond or free, male or female; (4) unchastity; (5) revelation of matters observed or heard during pro- The difference in the ancient attitude to (3) and (4) from that of a modern (1) In the Greco-Roman world abortion had no criminal implication. How could it have in a society which exposed its unwanted infants ? Moreover a method of inducing abortion is in fact described in the Hippocratic Collection. (2) The taking of poison, under medical guidance by those hopelessly sick, was recognised in antiquity. It was a regular and advised practice, specially among the Stoics. Suicide did not involve in antiquity the moral disapproval and legal obstacles that are attached to it in modern society. society of historic ally Christian origin extends to the ethical bases of the two societies. Discussion of these bases is not necessary here and would not further our enquiry. ; For reasons such as these some, and I among them, have sometimes thought there may be some Christian influence in that form of the Oath that has come down to us. No pre-Christian writer refers to these clauses. GALEN, who died in 201 a.p., never mentions the Oath at all. Since his GALEN’s time, and that it was revived, modified, and came into new powritings cover every aspect of medical activity, it might reasonably be conjectured that the Oath was an ancient formula which was disregarded in pularity, when given a Christian tinge, with the rise of Christian influence in the third century of our era. This view had difficulties of its own. Notably the invocation to ASCLEPIOS 177 had to be explained. How could this survive Christian influence ? To that certain considerations might be rejoined. Firstly it was not suggested that it was a fully Christian formula but one the asperities of which had been softened under pervasive but indirect Christian influence. Secondly that of all the pagan deities AscLEPIOS was the least unacceptable to Christian thought. So much was this so that he had at times been identified with one

of the Christian sacred figures. His name is often used ja Latin Christ; documents and there are conventional representations in which the pers of Cunist has merely replaced that of AscLEPIOS. It was for such reasons these that I myself felt that the Oath, in the form in which it has surviw (a) Undertaking to give no deadly drug, even if asked, nor to take any share in such counsel. (c) Undertaking to have no sexual relations with any member of a house- (b) Undertaking not to give an arbortifacient. (d) Special inclusion under (c) of bond and free, male and female. hold where the physician is called. (e) Pledge of silence on all things in the lives of those seen in the course of treatment “which ought not to be blabbed abroad”. IV. Penalty. This is purely moral and involves only “loss of face’. had been to some degree Christianised. This view became improbable, and perhaps untenable, with the publi, tion by Professor Lupwic EDELSTEIN of his important work on the Qu issued, very appropriately, as the first ‘Supplement’ of the ‘Bulletin of | Toward the end of the second century B.C. or perhaps at the beginning of the first—say about 100 B. c.—a private shrine to the goddess AGDISTIS remained unnoticed in this connection, I would now draw attention. It is needless to consider here the very familiar text of the Oath itselt is enough to recall that it divides naturally into four parts, each of whi History of Medicine’ under the editorship of Henry E. Sicerisr. Ep STEIN’S careful investigation showed that the Oath is probably throughn a Pythagorean document and that it may well be of as early as the ff century B. c. It still remains, however, an almost unique document vi very few parallels in ancient literature. To one such parallel, which |, fifty years earlier and was part of the Attalid Empire based on Pergamum as capital. It shared the Pergamenian culture as a remote provincial town. AcpISTIS was a mother-goddess whose cult was widely spread in Anatolia, Egypt, and even in Attica, from the third century B.c. onward. Such a 179 and may all men and women who are confident of their uprightness touch this such offences, and will not tolerate those who transgress their commands ... These commands were set up by the rule of Acpisris, the most holy guardian and mistress of this shrine. May she put good intentions in men and women, free and slave alike, that they may abide by what is here inscribed; into this shrine; for in it are enthroned mighty deities, and they observe avenge. A man is not to have relations with the wife of another, whether a free woman or a married slave, or with a boy, or with a virgin, or to counsel this to another ... Let not woman or man who do the aforementioned acts come or purposes any of these things they will not keep silence but will reveal it and will steal nothing but will be well-disposed to this house, and if any man does love-charms, abortives, contraceptives, or doing robbery or murder; that they ‘Let men and women, slave and free, when coming into this shrine swear by all the gods that they will not deliberately plan any evil guile, or baneful poison against any man or woman; that they will neither know nor use harmful spells; that they will neither turn to nor recommend to others nor have a hand in shrine at Philadelphia is the following inscription: subordinate but sometimes AGDISTIS is associated with Zeus. On her as AscLEPios, but more often under other names. Generally her consort is tolian cults of the time. She is often associated with a male deity, sometimes mother-goddess, under various titles, is characteristic of the numerous Anawas built at Philadelphia in Lydia. That city had been founded only about presents its own problems. I do not propose here to discuss these probly but merely to remind the reader of a few of them. I. Invocation. This involves in effect only AscLEPIOS for the two ot named deities, HycıEıA and PANACEIA, have hardly any existence in pendent of him. With rare exceptions they are little more than his ‘at butes’. After the family of AscLEPIOS “all the gods and goddesses”; thrown in, as a matter of courtesy. It is evident that the mind of the; vocant is occupied by Ascırr1os. This formula of naming a specific g and adding “all the gods and goddesses” is a regular convention for im cations, especially in the later pre-Christian centuries. In the mind of ma educated Greeks “the gods” thus became more or less interchangeable. II. Duty of the Physician to his Teachers. My parallel has little refer to this section. It suffices to recall that the Oath here involves some son closed association. This is not limited by any rite, as often in such societ; but merely by common agreement—something like Society, with a cap; Sin fact ‘a gentleman’s agreement’ but nevertheless making very gr demands on the invocant. The society is limited however by a written do ment, a syngraphe or contract, usually rather weakly translated into Eng as covenant, _ IMI. Duty of the Physician to his Patients, In this section there is a serie undertakings. Those relevant here are:

In its broac references to £ the terms “pl in particular | tripartite soul and who does not. O Saviour Zeus, hear our words, and give us a good re quital, health, deliverance, peace, safety on land and sea.’ (Italics added | writing, which gives the commandments of the god, at the monthly and a: the annual (?) sacrifices in order that it may be clear who abides by thera To what extent Pythagorean elements may be traceable in the cult al terminology f psychic spirit to the details 100 8.c. may well be a subject for enquiry, The similarity of some of th by author of article.) Acpistis and the survival of such distinguishable elements as late a fications. We: the question: the vital spir In their ow ventional san in liver and v (rveöua quo wording of the ethical elements in the AGpISTIS inscription to those of th “Hippocratic” Oath are, in any event, self-evident. To read them will leaw, that document less isolated than it was before. The Text of the Acpisris inscription is given in W. DITTENBERGER Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum, Edition 3, no 985. I have reproduced th medicine, es} Thus the pseu translation of Professor A.D.Nock of Harvard from his work Conversioa The Old and the New in Religion from Alexander the Great to Augustine | and arteries?. three forms 0 Cape, for having drawn my attention to this passage. Hippo, Oxford 1933, by whose permission and that of the Clarendon Pre this is here printed. I am also grateful to my colleague, Professor V. € of the so-call fluenced by S at all in thei ancient pneu On Galen’s Pneumatology had been “h has briefly st: Definitiones The English ALLBUTT'S ( 4 See above, r 5 Morris R. McGraw-Hi op. cit., P- 1! 3 Cf. ibid., def also further | the pneumat du stoicisme « 2 Definitiones| 1 De placitis H myself in sul later ages ha By Owser TEMKIN, Baltimore As is well known, GALEN believed that the soul had three divisions | each of which a special anatomical seat could be allocated. He devoted | work On the dogmas of Hippocrates and Plato to the proof that the divi soul with which man thinks dwells in the brain, while passion (especia the arteries containing blood and vital spirit (nveöua Lorıxdv) depa wrath) and desires have their principles in the heart and liver respective To this psychological division corresponds a physiological one, The br; houses the psychic spirit (nveüua pvyueór) and forms the origin of the n ves which conduct sensations as well as voluntary impulses. From the he regulating the innate heat of the body and nourishing the psychic pneux The liver ist the main organ of hematopoiesis and also the origin of | veins which carry nourishment to the rest of the body.