August 20, 1920
Harefuah (Medicine), the first Hebrew medical journal in Palestine, publishes its first issue with Aryeh Feigenbaum as its editor.
Feigenbaum was born in Lvov, Poland in 1895. At the age of 10, he was sent from his home to be trained for the rabbinate. After four years, the rabbi who was training him returned him to his family, feeling that Feigenbaum had lost interest in his studies. A short time later, according to Feigenbaum, he told a friend, “I’m going to be a doctor. I’m going to emigrate to Palestine. And I’m going to found the first medical journal in Hebrew.”
Feigenbaum would accomplish all three of his stated goals, becoming an ophthalmologist and moving to Palestine in 1913 to become the head of the eye department of the new Jewish Health Bureau in Jerusalem. While medical literature had been published at times in the yishuv on a variety of health education issues, most notably malaria, there was no regular journal. Feigenbaum joined with other physicians who not only wished to create a medical journal, but also recognized the need for a Hebrew medical dictionary as a way to expand the field of medicine.
Feigenbaum becomes the first editor of Harefuah. The journal is published quarterly by the Jewish Medical Association of Palestine. Its objectives, as outlined in the first issue, are to “strengthen and coordinate the medical forces of the country and to collaborate with doctors outside of Palestine; to give the medical work a national as well as a humane value; to prepare a native soil for Jewish scientists; and to help in the creation of the Hebrew University.”
The journal is still published monthly by the Israel Medical Association and distributed free to its members.
