Is this contradictory?

Homeopathic remedies are only homeopathic if they are diluted and succused as proscribed--and if they are homeopathic to the totality of each individual case. Deviate from that basic foundation, and you're not practicing homeopathy.
So you'll have to call it something else, because labelling it homeopathy is just not accurate.

Scientific method, particularly one like Hahnemann's, which was refined repeatedly over the course of 50 years, is really something that must be followed precisely if you want to obtain predictable results. If you don't follow the method, you can't say you're recreating it at all.
It simply is irrelevant what time we are living in, as the scientific method still applies in homeopathic practice today. Do it right: it works and it cures. Do it another way, and you might get a cure, but it won't be likely, and it won't be by homeopathy.

I think all homeopaths agree: if it isn't in the Organon (and the Chronic Diseases, really), it is not homeopathy.

using remedies allopathically is just not curative.
And that fact will never, ever change, no matter how long ago Hahnemann said it.

To:

You have to prescribe on the totality of the vital force.
One patient, with one vital force, only needs one remedy.

Why? Because that is how homeopathy works.

personally, I'd redose with the constitutional remedy

[All found by one member in one tread]

Explanatory:
The vital force, or living principle rules with unbound sway and holds all the parts of the organism in admirable, harmonious, vital operation, as regards both sensations and functions, --- [ par.: 9]

Constitutional remedy= a term alien to homeopathy. A medication becomes remedial by its symptom-similitude with the existing disease and its proper application.

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Hans Weitbrecht
Consultant Homeopath

I think what is at issue here is the fundamental differences between two paradigms. Hahnemann was a child of the Enlightenment. His approach to healing and medicine was based on the new models of science that were emerging at that time. In fact, he may have been the first to bring the scientific, inductive method to the practice of medicine, with his emphasis on careful observation and rigorous experimentation (the word 'proving' is merely an anglisized version of 'prufung', which means experiment in German). This new worldview was largely concerned with the material world and how it works, believing that knowledge is gained through experience (the word 'experiment' has the same root). [It should be noted that Hahnemann was not a materialist, although he subscribed to that methodology.]

The previous (Aristotelian) paradigm viewed the world as more or less static. It was believed that every thing had an unchanging nature or essence. To know a thing was to grasp, to conceptualize that essence. It was also believed that the world, Nature, God could be known through reason alone, and deductive reasoning was used to this end. This is the worldview of constitutional homeopathy.

David Bohm, the theoretical physicist who worked with both Einstein and Krishnamurti, explains that the word 'theory' has the same root as the word 'theatre', and that a theory is just a way of looking. So, these different paradigms present different ways of looking and understanding the patient, the world, sickness, health, homeopathic remedies and practice.

I don't personally believe that each of us has a static, unchanging nature that correlates with a homeopathic remedy. And I like to begin a case by simply looking at the symptoms of the patient. However, neither do I discount the insights of modern homeopaths into the behaviors and mental/emotional workings of those afflicted with various imbalances. This way of looking can be especially useful in those deep, chronic cases that only need a single remedy for cure, and which have pronounced derangement in the mental sphere. The problem, as I see it, with constitutional homeopathy is its tendency to view all cases as essentially "constitutional" in nature.

[ 01. April 2004, 21:34: Message edited by: Shali ]

What makes you think homeopathic remedies are static, and unchanging?

Homeopathy is not, contrary to a lot of peoples' beliefs, typology. Our natures are always dynamic: pay attention to that word, it is of primary importance. Hahnemann knew remedy substances are dynamic; human beings are dynamic beings; and disease, itself, is a product of dynamic interaction. Therefore, as we see clearly in practice, a constitutional remedy, selected to treat the entire symptom picture of an individual human being, can actually be used to treat any ailment, at any time, in that patient. This is such a typical reality in homeopathy, I have a hard time understanding why people simply can't see it.

That's all I'm going to say about it. Hans, I'd appreciate you not quoting me out of context in the future, thanks.

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...and deliverance has many faces<br />but grace<br />is an aquaintance of mine

On the philosophical background of Hahnemann it can be said, that he put into practise what Kant a short time before him found and postulated in the critique of pure consciousness. Kant found, that deductive reasoning ends up in the sphere of empty terminology. Kant blames this aproach to be the main reason for faliour of all science til 1798, and with his paradigm of inductive reasoning opened the door to modern science.

On remedies-- by the proving symptoms only can they be determined, and those are not dynamic-- the preparation and aplication of remedies is dynamic. If the symptoms brought forth would be dynamic, then we would need only one remedy for all possible diseases, as by its own dynamic the remedy would adopt to each situaion perfectly;
My original question still remains-- is the above contradictory?

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Hans Weitbrecht
Consultant Homeopath

Constitutional remedy is for constitution- will be just making your constitution better & stronger to fight with any ailment at any time. It just increases/corrects your vital power. Accidents & epidemicus are not of constitutional nature, still a strong & healthy constitution can handle these ailments in a better way then a weak constitution.

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Homeopathic & Biochemic system existed because Drs.Hahnemann & Schuessler thought differently.
Successful people don't do different things, they do things differently..S.Kh.

Constitutional prescribing is not homeopathy, as constitution is not disease.

The art in homeoapthy is not the guess- art many practitioners use, --the free floating adaptation of any theme forming the basis for the remedy selection, lacking discrimination in what belongs to the desease to be cured and ignorant to the proving information established in the MMP, [=unskilled in the craft of homeopathy].

And constitutional prescribing is not in the organon-- just to continue the topic.

And it is contradictory to advocate Hahnemannian principles as the decisive whether one therapist is a homeopath or not and on the other side calling oneself a homeopath treating ''constitutionally'' .

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Hans Weitbrecht
Consultant Homeopath

hans -

is there any art to the practice of homeopathy? if so, as i think most would have it, then this speaks to the dynamics of symptoms as they present in the patient, as you seem to say. the fact that we need more than one remedy, then, points to the reality that there are many dynamics, as many dynamics as individuals, and that individuals can be recognized for who they are by - to coin a phrase - the composite impressions of their manifold traits (including but not limited to symptoms), or what might be called, however imprecisely, their "personality" or their "constitution." the similimum must be similar to their constitution, just as it is similar to the individuality of the totality of their symptom picture: for how can you separate the totality of the case from the totality of the person? butperhaps it is not necessary to even consider the question, from a very rigorous base in the strictest practice of hahnemannian homeopathy?

still, i think it is not too outrageous to think that "constitution" can at the least serve as a convenient tool - a word, after all - to reference a perceived entity, even if that entity is not as well defined as others might be, nor as technically reliable. which is why, i presume, even homeopaths who prescribe constitutional remedies continue to take a full case, even so.

aaanyway ... just some humble if verbose thoughts about the subject from one who is inclined to look favorably on the concept of constitution and constitutional remedies, even though they are fraught with difficulties both conceptual and empirical.


divina -

yes, the constitutional remedy can be used to treat any ailment at any time - this is something i am coming to appreciate. however, i wonder about the limits. for example, will it treat the famous bruising pain from falling downstairs as well as arnica treats it? will it be as useful in an epidemic as the genus epidemicus? in short, what are its limits?

bach

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"The need to perform adjustments for covariates...weakens the findings." BMJ Clinical Evidence: Mental Health, (No. 11), p. 95.... It's that simple, guys: bad numbers make bad science.

no argument. Hans is correct.

It may be for the reason of 'to avoid Contradiction'.

However, both public/patients & healers have right & are required to discuss & clear suspicions.

Constitutional inherited & aquired accumulations in the form of strengths & weaknesses are definately there in any person. Weaknesses may in the form of disorders- may not be the diseases. If it is not there in classical homeopathic theory then it should be considered as a weakness of the theory & so should be added/corrected.

We should not consider everything said 200 years back-as an absolute. Time factor is very important. Few things are to be added, corrected & amended considering the new research & need of the time. It looks bit obsolete & odd to treat & make a patient like a 200 year's old type person & expose him to current environment.

[ 06. April 2004, 07:01: Message edited by: kayveeh ]

__________________
Homeopathic & Biochemic system existed because Drs.Hahnemann & Schuessler thought differently.
Successful people don't do different things, they do things differently..S.Kh.