Islam taught that since Allah controlled all things, disease was not spread by contagion but by the will of Allah, who alone determined who lived and who died during an outbreak of disease. As a result, Ibn Khatimah, a Muslim physician living in Spain, had to argue that plague was not caused by a contagion. The Arabs had believed in contagion before Islam, but now they knew better. It is open to debate whether he believed what he said, but it is clear that he believed he had to say it to keep from attracting unwanted attention from the religious and civil authorities. Ibn al-Khatib, another
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