Tawfiq Canaan

Tawfiq Canaan
Born	September 24 1882 Beit Jala
Died	January 15 1964 Jerusalem
Occupation(s)	Physician, Ethnographer, Author

Tawfiq Canaan (b. 24 September 1882 - 15 January 1964) was a physician and pioneer in the field of medicine in Palestine who is also well-known for being one of the foremost researchers of Palestinian popular heritage.

His first book was published in German in 1914 and entitled Superstition and Popular Medicine in the Land of the Bible. He also authored more than 37 medical studies on tropical medicine, bacteriology, particularly malaria, and other topics, such as leprosy, tuberculosis, and health in Palestine.

Canaan served as President of the Palestine Arab Medical Association, and was a member of the the Palestine Oriental Society, (established in 1920 by Albert Tobias Clay), and a member of The American School for Oriental Research, (established in 1900, the Jerusalem branch of which was headed from 1920 to 1929 by the American archaeologist William Foxwell Albright).

Canaan's keen interest in Palestinian folklore, popular beliefs, and superstitions led to his collection of over 1,400 amulets, now held by Bir Zeit university in Ramallah. His analysis of these and other folk traditions brought him recognition as an ethnographer and anthropologist. He published more than 50 articles in English and German on folklore and superstition that have served as valuable resources to researchers of Palestinian and Middle Eastern heritage. Canaan was also an outspoken public figure who wrote two books on the Palestine problem, reflecting his involvement in confronting British imperialism and Zionism.

Early life

Born in Beit Jala, Tawfiq Canaan was the second child of Bechara Canaan and Katharina Khairallah. After completing elementary school, he was enrolled in the Schneller School which his father had also attended and where he completed his secondary education. In 1899 he went to Beirut to study medicine at the Syrian Protestant College (today known as the American University of Beirut). Shortly after his arrival in Beirut, his father died of pneumonia. To lift the financial burden on his family, he began giving private lessons and doing other work at the university to supplement his income.

Of his father, Tawfiq Canaan has said:

"We used to go with my father on short and long trips all over the country in order to get acquainted with the country and the people. This continuous contact with the people nurtured in all of us, and particularly in me, love for the country and the people. This feeling of belonging and unshaken loyalty remained with me till this day."

Khaled Nashef, writing in the Jerusalem Quarterly, has ventured that Canaan's interest and knowledge of nature in Palestine, later reflected in his writings such as the article entitled, "Plant-lore in Palestinian Superstition" (1928) may be related to these trips.

Canaan graduated from the school of medicine with honors and delivered the graduation speech for his class on June 28, 1905. Entitled "Modern Treatment," the speech touched on the medical uses of serums, animal organs and X-rays. Published in Al-Muqtataf, it may constitute his first published piece.

Medical Career

Immediately after graduating, Canaan returned to Jerusalem to begin his medical career as an assistant to Dr. Gussendorf, Director of the German Hospital in Jerusalem. Canaan co-administered the hospital with Dr. Adolf Einszler in Dr. Grussendorf's absence in 1906 and also worked shifts at the the German-Jewish Hospital (Shaare Zedek) and the English Hospital. In 1910, he became the director of the clinic at the Shaare Zedek hospital.

In 1911, he published his first medical article on "Cerebro-Spinal Meningitis in Jerusalem," based on studies he was conducting with Dr. Wallach, Director of Shaare Zedek hospital. Between 1912 and 1914, Canaan went to Germany to specialize in tropical medicine and microbiology studies under Professors Mühlens, Ruge, Much, and Huntemüler.

In January 1912, Canaan married Margot Eilender, the daughter of a German importer. In 1913, they built their family home in the al-Musrarah district of Jerusalem where three of their children (Theo, Nada, and Leila) were born. Canaan opened a clinic there, the only Arab clinic operating in Jerusalem at the time.

Also in 1913, Canaan was appointed director of the Malaria Branch of the International Health Bureau, a world center for medical research and microscopic examination founded by The German Society for Fighting Malaria, The Jewish Health Bureau, and The Jewish Physicians and Scientists for Improving Health in Palestine.

In August 1914, after a four-month stay in Germany, Canaan returned to to work in the German Hospital with Grussendorf. As a citizen of the Ottoman empire who administered Palestine at the time, he was drafted as a officer into the Ottoman army when World War I broke out that October. First, he was the physician for a contingent in Nazareth, but was transferred that same year to 'Awja al-Hafeer. There, the German chief physician appointed him as Head of the Laboratories on the Sinai Front, a position which afforded him the ability to travel between Bir as-Saba, Beit Hanoun, Gaza, and Shaykh Nouran, as well as Damascus, Amman, and Aleppo. During this period, he collected more than two hundred amulets to add to his growing collection.

After the war ended, in 1919, Canaan was made Director of The Leprosy Hospital (Asylum of the Lepers) in Talbiyyah - the only leprosy hospital in Syria, Palestine, and the Transjordan. At the time, leprosy was considered an incurable disease. Research progress in the field of bacteriology and microscopic examination, to which Canaan contributed, resulted in the discovery of a cure using chaulmoogra oil.

In 1923, the German Hospital reopened and Canaan was put in charge of the Internal Medicine Division, a position he held until 1940, when the German Hospital could no longer continue smooth operations, as most German citizens had already left Palestine by 1939, or had been arrested by the British authorities.

Beginnings as a researcher of Palestinian heritage

In 1911, the geographical journal Globus published a German translation of a lecture Canaan delivered in Arabic on "Agriculture in Palestine" on May 22, 1909 which remains a useful basic reference on the development of agriculture in Palestine at the time. In this first article outside the realm of medicine, Canaan reveals himself as a well-versed researcher in the field of "Oriental Studies", quoting Schumacher, Bauer, Guthe, Burckhardt, alongisde classical sources, like Strabo and Josephus, and Arab sources like Mujeer ad-Din. Canaan's focus on Palestinian peasantry is also here first apparent.

Canaan used the Bible, particularly the Old Testament, as a basic source to compare past and present agricultural practices. He was influenced in this by the Old Testament studies produced by Gustaf Dalman, Albrecht Alt, and Martin Noth. Canaan and Dalman, who headed The Evangelical German Institute beginning in 1903, apparently shared the idea that it is not possible to understand the Old Testament without studying Palestinian folklore.

In 1913, the Journal of the German Palestine Society Canaan's article on "The Calendar of Palestinian Peasants," his first work in the field of Palestinian folklore. A year later, he published his first book, Superstition and Popular Medicine.

Philosophical bases

According to Salim Tamari, Tawfiq Canaan was the most prominent of a school of 'nativist' ethnographers who published their works in The Journal of the Palestine Oriental Society (1920-1948). This group was driven by the concern that the "native culture of Palestine", and in particular peasant society, was being undermined by the forces of modernity. Tamari writes:

"Implicit in their scholarship (and made explicit by Canaan himself) was another theme, namely that the peasants of Palestine represent - through their folk norms ... the living heritage of all the accumulated ancient cultures that had appeared in Palestine (principally the Canaanite, Philistine, Hebraic, Nabatean, Syrio-Aramaic and Arab)."

Tamari notes that unlike the Canaanite revivalist writings produced after 1948, which were in many ways a response to Zionist narratives tracing Jewish connections back to the time of the Israelites (See Canaanite movement), "Canaan and his group, by contrast, were not Canaanites. They contested Zionist claims to biblical patrimonies by stressing present day continuities between the biblical heritage (and occasionally pre-biblical roots) and Palestinian popular beliefs and practices."

Canaan's political positions and his strong sense of nationalism find clear expression in two of his published works: The Palestine Arab Cause (1936) and Conflict in the Land of Peace (1936). Published in English, Arabic, and French, The Palestine Arab Cause was a 48-page booklet that "resembled a political pamphlet directed at British public opinion". First published as a series of articles in the local and foreign press after the outbreak of the 1936 revolt, the writings were considered by the Mandatory authorities to be subversive. Canaan described British policy as "a destructive campaign against the Arabs with the ultimate aim of exterminating them from their country." He questioned the nationality laws enacted by the Mandatory authorities which prevented Palestinian immigrants in the Americas, who had been citizens of the Ottoman Empire, from obtaining Palestinian citizenship.

Canaan was also a co-signatory of a document sent to the Higher Arab Committee on August 6, 1936 and there is reason to believe that Canaan strongly supported providing the Arab rebels with arms.

Tawfiq Canaan collection of Palestinian amulets

This collection was put together by Tawfiq Canaan beginning in the early twentieth century until 1947. Currently held by Bir Zeit university, it gathers together more than 1,400 amulets, talismans and other objects, related to popular medicine and folk practices. Canaan collected these objects from his patients who came from various Palestinian cities and villages, and other Arab countries including Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Yemen.

Canaan was of the opinion that there was a close relationship between popular beliefs and superstitions used in curing diseases and scientific medicine. His patients explained their reasons for wearing the amulets and the effects they had in curing the physical and the mental disorders they were suffering from.

Canaan's analysis of the talismans were facilitated by the interviews he conducted with individuals who wore them, though he also used specialized sources and references on sorcery and witchcraft. He deciphered some of the symbols and wrote about the meanings of the shapes, writings, letters and numbers used. He published one such article on the subject in a journal published by Antiquities Museum of the American University in Beirut in 1937.

Canaan's collection continues to provide valuable information on folk medicine and the manifestations of magic in the popular beliefs and practices of Palestinian and neighboring Arab societies - practices that exist to this day.

Published works

Folklore and ethnography

• "Agriculture in Palestine" (1909). In Globus, a translation from Arabic into German of a lecture he delivered on 22 May, 1909.
• "Demons as an Aetiological Factor in Popular Medicine" (1912). In Al-Kulliyeh (Beirut), a translation from German into English of part of his book Superstition and Popular Medicine (1914).
• "The Calendar of Palestinian Peasants" (1913). In Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palestinavereins (Journal of the German Palestine Society).
• Superstition and Popular Medicine (1914).
• "Haunted Springs and Water Demons in Palestine" (1920/1921).
• "Tasit ar-Radjfeh" ("Fear Cup"; 1923).
• Mohammedan Saints and Sanctuaries in Palestine (1924-1927).
• "Plant-lore in Palestinian Superstition" (1928).
• Belief in Demons in the Holy Land (1929, in German).
• "Studies in the Topography and Folklore of Petra" (1929).
• "Arabic Magic Bowls" (1936). In Journal of the Palestine Oriental Society.

Politics

• The Palestine Arab Cause (1936). Published in English, Arabic, and French.
• Conflict in the Land of Peace (1936). A 48-page booklet originally written in English.

Medical

• "Cerebro-Spinal Meningitis in Jerusalem" (1911). In Al-Kulliyeh (Beirut).

External links

• The Tawfiq Canaan Collection of Palestinian Amulets - A virtual gallery