Abstract

MANDRESSI, RAFAEL. The Best Physicians on Earth. The "People of Israel" in Examen de ingenios by Juan Huarte (1575). Anu. colomb. hist. soc. cult. [online]. 2016, vol.43, n.2, pp.59-87. ISSN 0120-2456.  https://doi.org/10.15446/achsc.v43n2.59070.

Examen de ingenios by the physician Juan Huarte de San Juan, which was widely diffused from the publication of the first edition in Baeza (1575) until the beginning of the XVIII century, postulates a theory of aptitudes based on medical knowledge and Aristotelean-Galenic natural philosophy. It is also a political book, because from this theory Huarte proposes a classification of individuals by "wit" or talent for which they are naturally equipped for the study or exercise of a specific discipline, In the chapter dedicated to medicine, an extensive argument aims to demonstrate the superiority of the Jewish people, the "people of Israel", with respect to medicine. An analysis of this long passage yields a close association not only between a natural "talent" and a science, as in the other chapters corresponding to the applied section of the book, but also the association of both with a people and thus hereditarily transmittable. The manner in which Huarte grounds this special aptitude of the Jewish people for the practice of medicine constitutes, in the context it is expressed, a significant and robust political gesture.

Keywords : (Author) Examen de ingenios; Juan Huarte; (Thesaurus) medicine; Jew; cultural discrimination; censorship.

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