Is It Correct to Use the Term “Islamic Medicine”?

Anyone who speaks of Islamic medicine is not claiming that their medicine is divinely revealed; rather, they are presenting their own deductions from the medical teachings of Islam.

Islamic jurisprudence, too, is based on inference. In our time, Islamic medicine is, in effect, medicine inferred from Islamic teachings.

There is certainly no objection, with due consideration, to using expressions prefixed or suffixed with “Islamic.” For example, “Islamic rulings” refers to the mujtahid’s efforts to infer rulings from Islam’s authoritative sources: the Qur’an and the Sunnah.

Likewise, “Islamic medicine” refers to a researcher’s efforts to derive methods of treatment from religious sources. Readers should deepen their understanding and recognise the difference between the age of the Imam’s occultation and independent legal reasoning, and the age when the Imam was present.