Extraction and Classification of Medical Narratives of the Book " Al-Kafi", According to Authentication

The precious book “Al-Kafi” written by Seghat ul-islam Kolaini, is one of the four valuable Shia narrative books. “Kolaini” is one of the prominent Shia clerics. A unique feature of this book, compared to the other three books, is the precedence in writing in a way that some of its narratives have been cited from the infallibles (AS) by three mediators. According to the documented narratives of the book, “al-kafi” is one of the most reputable Shia narrative reference books which its extraction of medical narratives and assessing their authentication, is of great importance.. This study aimed to extract medical narratives of the book “al-kafi”, determine their number, and evaluate their authentication.. The current research was a qualitative study which evaluated all narratives of the book “al-kafi”, by “Derayat An-nour” software designed by “Islamic Sciences Computer Institute”, evaluated its medical narratives and classified them according to the level of authentication.. From all narratives of the book “al-kafi” (pillars, furoo, and rouzat al-kafi), 2233 narratives which indicated the effect of material factors on human health, environmental health, and treatment were extracted as medical narratives. Extracted narratives were categorized in three groups: accurate, authentic, and poor. Total number of accurate/authentic and poor narratives were 1272 and 961, respectively. In other words, around 60% of medical narratives of the book “al-kafi” were assessed as accurate/authentic and just 40% as poor.. The current study showed that poorness and unreliability of “al-kafi” narratives is a vain thought. Hence, it is recommended to perform clinical trial studies (at least) on accurate/authentic narratives, and also consider them as reputable and valid narratives, along with traditional medicine references.