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Talmudic medical recipes (12)

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05 Scientific knowledge and scholarly lore
05 Scientific knowledge and scholarly lore



 		Keywords
Jews
medicine
Period
No period specified 		Channel
Jewish philosophers and scholars

Text
Babylonian Talmud, Gittin 69b:
Take sinews (or veins) of the vaginal duct (of an animal), reverse it and pour water over it, and let (the patient) drink (the water).

The prescription indicates that this is a recipe for potency, because ‘sinew’ is a euphemism for the penis. The procedure may be similar to a medical ritual in an Akkadian prescription for potency, which calls for the physician to catch a male patridge while it is copulating, hang it up for several months, then crush the tendons and intestines in a pestle, which are soaked in a solution which includes various seeds, which is then diluted with beer and given to the impotent man to drink, so that he will achieve an erection.

Source (list of abbreviations) (source links will open in a new browser window)
Babylonian Talmud, Gittin 69b

Bibliography

Biggs 1967, 56-58Biggs, R. D. SA.ZI.GA. Ancient Mesopotamian Potency Incantations. Texts from the Cuneiform Sources 2. Locust Valley: J.J. Augustin 1967.
Geller 2000, 25Geller, Mark J. “An Akkadian Vademecum in the Babylonian Talmud.” In: S. Kottek and M. Horstmanshoff (eds.). From Athens to Jerusalem. Medicine in Hellenized Jewish Lore and in Early Christian Literature. Rotterdam: Erasmus Publishing 2000, 13-32.

Links (external links will open in a new browser window)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (1)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (2)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (3)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (4)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (5)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (6)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (7)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (8)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (9)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (10)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (11)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (13)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (14)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (15)
Cf. Talmudic medical recipes (16)
Cf. Talmudic nosebleed recipes (1)
Cf. Talmudic nosebleed recipes (2)

Mark Geller


URL for this entry: http://www.aakkl.helsinki.fi/melammu/database/gen_html/a0000965.php

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