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| Dr Samuel Hahnemann |
Even though homeopathy is the fastest
growing and the second most used system of healing in the world, it is probably
the least understood and most misunderstood healing modality. It is often
confused with herbal medicine, naturopathic medicine or just a synonym to all
natural medicines. Homeopathy is not an old or traditional system of medicine;
it is only about 200 years old. It was originated in Germany by Dr. Samuel
Hahnemann who was a Medical Doctor, a Biochemist and a prolific writer and
translator. Homeopathy has been developed to what it is today by thousands of
MDs and non MDs from around the globe.
Rather than adopting a mechanistic and
reductionist view of the human being, in which a person is considered as being
made of different parts, each part needing to be treated separately by a
different substance and a different specialist (three or more different
medications for someone suffering simultaneously from asthma, knee pain and
depression for instance), the homeopathic physician knows that the wholeness of
a human being has started from ONE original cell which has grown and evolved
into all these highly communicative interconnected intelligent organs. Parts
and pieces of a machine are built separately and then put together so if one
part malfunctions, it can be replaced or repaired. Even though this mechanistic
analogy can be applied to a human being and produce some beneficial results,
these benefits are often short lived and lead to either side effects or
suppression of the disease which will cause it to manifest in another part of
the body. Perhaps it would be more beneficial to compare a human being to
another living organism like a tree which also originates from a single seed
but as it grows and evolves it produces a tree with a multitude of branches. In
this view, all the symptoms of a patient, be it physical or emotional, are
viewed as various branches of the same tree, all connected intimately to a
common trunk. Rather than treating each branch with a different substance an
experienced homeopath will try to find the link between all the symptoms of a
patient and find a remedy for the trunk, the core original imbalance, which is
the “real cause” of all the disorders of the patient.
The goal of a homeopath is to analyze first what is the patient’s defence mechanism (his healing vital force) “already” doing to get rid of either the innate weaknesses (predispositions with which we are born) or the disease causing factors (pathogens, be it bacterial, emotional, environmental, genetic,…) and then to administer a substance that is able to act exactly in the same direction of the patient’s vital force in order to assist the immune system to create an environment in which the body can do what is already doing in a more efficient way.
Homeopaths think: “Assist and encourage” rather than “fight and oppose”. The word “Homeo” means “similar” and it refers to this concept of finding something in nature that is able to “mimic” and produce symptoms that are the most “similar” to the “totality” of all the past and present physical and emotional symptoms of the individual. Therefore we say homeopathy is based on the “law of similars” as opposed to allopathic (conventional) medicine, which is using the “law of opposites” to resist and suppress symptoms.
The homeopathic motto is: “first do no harm”. As such, the Homeopathic physician endeavours to administer their remedies in the smallest amount possible to get rid of all the “side-effects” which are inherent to all substances, whether from natural sources or manmade chemicals. This brought homeopaths to dilute (more and more) these substances. Clinical experience lead to the discovery that diluting a substance not only removed the undesirable side effects, but it also refined the healing effect of the substance. Some theorize that the extreme dilutions allows the substance to penetrate much deeper into the cells and its nucleus where the building block of life, DNA, is stored and cause a much deeper and longer lasting healing. If you are interested in knowing more about the science behind the homeopathic dilutions please refer to following links:
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