Medical History VII:  Medicine and faith: Christianity and Judaism: Medicine becomes a matter of great texts

“The Greatest Benefit to Mankind – A Medical History of Humanity from Antiquity to the Present” by Roy Porter was published in 1999. It’s a magnificent 848-page book that I’ve now read. Many people, I’ve discovered, own a copy but have dipped into it rather than read it through. I hope that I might do medical history, the world at large, students of medicine (surely all of us), and Roy, whom I knew and who died suddenly aged 55 in 2002, a service by posting extracts of his book on my website. The extracts might persuade you to read the book. Christianity as one of the official imperial faiths; from the early fifth century it was the sole official religion. Thereafter, by contrast with the naturalistic bent of Hippocratic and Galenic medicine, healing became more spiced with religion, for the rising Church taught there was a supernatural plan and purpose to everything (every human had a soul to be saved) and Christian doctrines, rituals and sacraments covered every stage through which…