It is my privilege to offer to the reader this new critical edition and translation of Maimonides’ On Coitus. The edition contains the original Arabic text, three medieval Hebrew translations—two of them anonymous and one prepared by Zeraḥyah Ben Isaac Ben Sheʾaltiel Ḥen, two Latin versions from the same translation, and a Slavonic translation. On Coitus was composed at the request of an unknown high ranking official, who is merely indicated as “the most honored Lord—may God perpetuate his glory”, and who asked for a regimen that would be easy to adhere to, and that would increase his sexual potency, as he had a large number of slave girls. Although this consilium belongs to a genre that was quite popular in medieval Arabic medical literature—as it was practised by a number of physicians—it differs in the way it stresses the impact of psychological factors, of the different states of mind on the sexual vigour. When coitus is desired, man experiences a perfect erection, whereas in the opposite case the male member is weak and dry. Although such an influence had already been recognized by the ancient physicians and also features in medieval treatises on coitus, Maimonides’ discussion is unique in the prominent place it occupies in the treatise, and in the detailed and lengthy exposition. This preoccupation with “the art of love” hardly left any trace in Western texts of the period. On Coitus was popular in Jewish and non-Jewish circles, as it survives in several manuscripts, both in Arabic and Judaeo-Arabic, and was a primary source for several recipes featuring in K. rujūʿ al-shaykh ilā ṣibāh fī l-quwā ʿalā l-bāh (The Old Man Young Again), composed by the Egytian scholar al-Tifāshī. Next to the three Hebrew translations, Maimonides’ On Coitus was translated into Latin by John of Capua, possibly from the Hebrew translation by Zeraḥyah. The Arabic Text of On Coitus has been published in the past by the German physician Hermann Kroner on the basis of MS Granada, Biblioteca del Sacro Monte. However, a new edition has become necessary, as Kroner’s edition suffers from mistakes and incorrect readings, which can be partly explained from the defective state of the manuscript, and because we now have more manuscripts than Kroner had access to. A new edition of one of the anonymous Hebrew translations edited by Muntner and Kroner was an urgent desideratum since Muntner’s edition is uncritical, eclectic and contains several mistakes, and Kroner’s edition is unreliable since it was done on the basis of one manuscript only, and also suffers from editorial mistakes. A new edition of the Hebrew translation by Zeraḥyah had become necessary, as Kroner’s edition is faulty in several cases. The second anonymous Hebrew translation which was discovered by Beit-Arié had not been edited before. The two Latin versions have been edited by Charles Burnett, and the Slavonic translation by Will Ryan and Moshe Taube. This edition of Maimonides’ On Coitus is part of an ongoing project aiming at critically editing Maimonides’ medical works which had not been edited at all or had been edited, but not in reliable editions. This project started in 1995 thanks to the support of the Wellcome Trust in London, and now enjoys the generous support of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft. So far it resulted in critical editions of Maimonides’ On Asthma (2 vols.), Medical Aphorisms (5 vols.), On Poisons, On Hemorrhoids, and Treatise on Rules Regarding the Practical Part of the Medical Art. All these volumes were published by the Middle Eastern Texts Initiative at Brigham Young University’s Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship, the series is now continued by E.J. Brill, Leiden. Thanks are also due to Jessica Kley, Fabian Käs and Felix Hedderich for proofreading the manuscript.
Preface
In: Maimonides On Coitus
Author:
Gerrit Bos
Gerrit Bos
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Editor:
Gerrit Bos
Gerrit Bos
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Charles Burnett
Charles Burnett
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W.F. Ryan
W.F. Ryan
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Moshe Taube
Moshe Taube
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