Thursday, February 12, 2009

The Remedy (part 3 of 3)

The way Hahnemann created higher potencies in his remedies (after many years of trial and error) was to take a natural substance, crush it, pulverize it and then dilute it with alcohol or distilled water. Then he would take one drop of that dilution and dilute it again. In between dilutions, he would shake the solution by banging it against a springy type surface (like a thick book). He called the process of shaking/banging the solution, “succussion” or “succussing”. It is the succussion that increases the strength of the remedy during processing. The succussion would bring out more pronounced symptoms from a crude substance that had been diluted and create a potentized (high strength) “medicine”, called a Homeopathic Remedy.

As Hahnemann diluted dozens of crude materials to make into remedies, he gave the potentized remedies to groups of “provers” and made note of the symptoms that each remedy created in these individuals. Symptoms were then catalogued for each potentized remedy and kept in a book called the Homeopathic Materia Medica. This book is essentially a list of all symptoms created in a healthy person by ingesting a particular potentized remedy. During his lifetime, Hahnemann created and personally tested (proved) dozens of remedies. Now Hahnemann had his similar diseases and with them could treat and cure illness. Not obvious? Let’s take an example…

Hahnemann is approached by an ill patient who says he has pains in his eyes when looking down, frequent numbness in his fingers and legs and a ringing in his ears that will not go away. First, there is a check of the catalog of remedies (Materia Medica) and a search for the remedy that causes these same symptoms; Hahnemann reaches for the dilution of some substance that has shown in his “provers” to produce the exact same symptoms (Natrum Muriaticum- Latin name for common table salt- potentized). This remedy has been strengthened by succussion (banging and shaking) to make it strong and potent. This remedy creates an artificial disease that is to be greater or “bigger” than the natural disease of the patient (yet it is a similar disease). He gives this remedy to the ill patient… providing or causing a similar “disease” of symptoms to extinguish the same symptoms in the patient. The patient is cured by the law that “like cures like”. No two similar diseases can coexist within an individual; the greater disease will squash the smaller disease that is similar. One “medicinal” disease (the artificial disease created by the remedy- Nat Mur (abbreviation)) extinguishes the real disease in the patient because it is greater due to potentizing.

The End!

Just kidding, there is a lot more, but you now have the basic idea of how Homeopathy works.

4 comments:

  1. Interesting, though I've read quite a bit of homeopathy, I've never seen it quite described this way.
    Blessings
    Kringle

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  2. I am expressing some generalities and taking some license with the topic (to keep it succinct). This information is as close to an interpretation of Hahnemann's original writings as I can get without posting a book.

    My original search of homeopathy was from current books which in my opinion are largely wrong and misguided in their approach (wasting years of my exploring this topic). Some books just make it up as they go along. Hahnemann's writings are there for all to see and a good place to start is with one of his Organon's. His 6th is the most current, but analysis of the 4th to 5th to 6th is very worthy of study. I wouldn't suggest that just anyone buy these books unless you are very serious in studying the topic (it can be slow reading). The Organon takes many months/years of reading/re-reading to absorb the subtle ideas of his approach.

    The reason I started this blog was mainly to encourage people to study the topic from the ground up. Most/many current authors have not taken the time to tear apart the original writings of the masters and have misinterpreted simple ideas until they have changed homeopathy into something that doesn't really work or works by the odd coincidence. Smarter people than me need to wipe away these corrupted views and build on the original works to move us forward.

    Thanks for the comment!

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  3. I'm curious -- do you make your own remedies? And a question: If you needed a stronger dose of a remedy but couldn't readily get it, could you take a lower dose of that remedy if you had it and succuss(sp?)it to create the needed higher dose?

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  4. Hi Joyce,

    No, I don't make remedies even though Hahnemann said that if you were serious to make your own. I don't think it is feasible today. There are many manufacturers that are good around the world and prices aren't bad- easy to order.

    Yes you could succuss the remedy, but this would probably not get you very far. Usually if you need a higher potency it is not in the range that could be easily succussed. If you were to buy the 50 or 100 most common remedies in 30C or 200C ($100-$150), that should be good enough for most common illness. You can always dilute those for lower doses. It is harder to increase the potency, easier to lower it to some extent. Hope that helps. Thanks for the questions.

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