In a recent article published in this journal,[1] Professor Vithoulkas asked whether homeopathy, as a particularly mild therapeutic approach, can survive in a world of violence. This is a meaningful and crucial question, and we would like to share our thoughts about the issue.

Homeopathic medicine has always been the prerogative of a minority of people. On the one hand, not everyone can be a homeopathy patient because it requires very deep self-awareness and active participation in one's own healing process. On the other hand, the number of classical homeopaths with proper organizational grounding and solid clinical experience has been decreasing over the years. The marginal role of homeopathy in our society is not new; nor is the failure of a wider recognition for its indubitable successes. This is probably due to the natural tendency of the medical system to protect itself. Being a low-cost medicine, homeopathy is an “anti-establishment” system: remedies are cheap, and a small amount of medicine is enough to cure a great number of people. Thus, it goes against the economic interests of drug corporations.

In Italy, we have experienced this issue very well, since the time that Professor Negro introduced the selling of homeopathic remedies into pharmacies in order to gain an economic incentive that could support and protect the rise of homeopathy. We believe that any form of pessimism is unfair, because what we experience nowadays does not differ from the problems our predecessors lived through: besides Hahnemann's well-known vicissitudes, C. Hering was obliged to move to the United States after having stood up for homeopathy against the fierce attacks of the medical establishment of his time. In addition, the nature of homeopathy is such that, unless a radical change in society occurs, official academic recognition would probably represent the greatest threat to its survival.

According to Hahnemann,[2] the first step to cure a sick person is eliminating the maintaining causes, such as continuous grief, repeated heavy tasks, or exposure to environmental pollutants. These causes represent clear obstacles to the healing process. The first task of a physician is to consider all these influencing factors and to steer patients in the right direction of cure. Homeopathy aims to re-establish individual balance; the person him- or herself can promote positive changes and ameliorate his/her own life conditions, after having acquired more stability and a deeper strength that comes from a renewed “vital force”.

The homeopathic physician has to discern and be confident of natural healing powers, not only of the individual, but also of society itself. Moreover, if it were true that a balanced organism is more vulnerable to disturbances than a compromised one, the principle and purpose of homeopathic treatment itself would fall apart. In our opinion, health is the capacity to resist the negative physical, emotional, and psychological perturbances that attack human beings, as well as resilience, the power of restoring harmony, the quality of adapting, and overcoming difficult situations. True deep-rooted healing is only achieved by the spirit. We believe that any health improvement obtained by homeopathic treatment must lead to a greater spiritual stability. By contrast, if we rely only on drugs, if we do not improve our life conditions and do not aspire to a higher purpose, we will face repeated health relapses. After all, what is the higher purpose of mankind other than spiritual elevation?

It has been a long time since we medicalized every stage of life, suppressed symptoms, and delegated treatment to the medical institution (the philosopher Ivan Illich had already observed it in the 1970s).[3] On the other hand, we notice a great gap between the innate perception that most people have of their own health (felt as subjective well-being) and the orthodox concept of health (an objectivized state, consisting of measurable quantitative variations from a standardized normality). For this reason, patients' expectations often widely differ from the results obtained by allopathic treatment, which can be profoundly inadequate, especially with regard to the chronic diseases dominating our time. The entire medical system has just started to realize the limits of this standardization and has been researching new individualized approaches. As homeopaths, we could certainly make precious contributions, and we should participate in that dialogue. To tackle this challenge, homeopaths need proper organization and, in many cases, more grounding based on long-term ad-personam teaching and mentoring.

In conclusion, we strongly believe that even in a world where violence has become structural, homeopathy can still play an important role in responding to people's emerging need for a gentle, non-violent, personalized medicine. Fighting for a fairer society will, in itself, be an effective therapy for everyone.

Publication History

Received: 14 June 2020

Accepted: 03 July 2020

Publication Date:
02 October 2020 (online)

© 2020. Thieme. All rights reserved.

The Faculty of Homeopathy

中文翻译：

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顺势疗法一直受到攻击：意大利古典顺势疗法对 Vithoulkas 教授问题的回答

在该杂志最近发表的一篇文章中，[1] Vithoulkas 教授询问顺势疗法作为一种特别温和的治疗方法，能否在暴力世界中生存。这是一个有意义且关键的问题，我们想分享我们对这个问题的看法。

顺势疗法一直是少数人的特权。一方面，并​​不是每个人都能成为顺势疗法患者，因为它需要非常深刻的自我意识和积极参与自己的康复过程。另一方面，具有适当组织基础和扎实临床经验的经典顺势疗法的数量多年来一直在减少。顺势疗法在我们社会中的边缘作用并不新鲜。其无可置疑的成功也没有得到更广泛的认可。这可能是由于医疗系统具有保护自身的自然倾向。作为一种低成本药物，顺势疗法是一种“反建制”系统：药价便宜，少量的药就足以治愈很多人。因此，它违背了制药公司的经济利益。

在意大利，我们已经很好地解决了这个问题，自从 Negro 教授将顺势疗法药物的销售引入药房以来，为了获得可以支持和保护顺势疗法兴起的经济激励。我们认为任何形式的悲观主义都是不公平的，因为我们今天所经历的与我们的前辈所经历的问题没有什么不同：除了哈尼曼众所周知的沧桑之外，C. Hering 在坚持顺势疗法后不得不搬到美国对抗他那个时代医疗机构的猛烈攻击。此外，顺势疗法的性质是，除非社会发生根本性变化，否则官方学术认可可能是对其生存的最大威胁。

根据哈尼曼的说法，[2] 治愈病人的第一步是消除维持性的原因，例如持续的悲伤、重复的繁重任务或暴露于环境污染物中。这些原因代表了愈合过程的明显障碍。医生的首要任务是考虑所有这些影响因素，并引导患者朝着正确的治疗方向前进。顺势疗法旨在重新建立个人平衡；在获得更多的稳定性和来自更新的“生命力”的更深的力量之后，他或她自己可以促进积极的变化并改善他/她自己的生活状况。

顺势疗法医师必须辨别并相信自然治愈能力，不仅对个人，而且对社会本身。此外，如果平衡的有机体比受损的有机体更容易受到干扰，顺势疗法本身的原则和目的就会分崩离析。在我们看来，健康是抵抗攻击人类的负面身体、情绪和心理干扰的能力，以及复原力、恢复和谐的力量、适应能力和克服困难的能力。真正根深蒂固的医治，只有靠精神才能实现。我们相信通过顺势疗法获得的任何健康改善都必须带来更大的精神稳定性。相比之下，如果我们只依靠药物，如果我们不改善我们的生活条件，不追求更高的目标，我们将面临反复的健康复发。毕竟，人类除了精神上的提升之外，还有什么更高的目标呢？

自从我们对生命的每个阶段进行医学化、抑制症状并将治疗委托给医疗机构（哲学家伊万·伊里奇（Ivan Illich）在 1970 年代就已经观察到）以来，已经有很长一段时间了。[3] 另一方面，我们注意到大多数人对自己健康的先天认知（感觉是主观幸福感）与正统的健康概念（一种客观化的状态，由标准化常态的可测量数量变化组成）之间存在巨大差距。 ）。出于这个原因，患者的期望通常与对抗疗法所获得的结果大相径庭，这可能是非常不充分的，尤其是对于主导我们这个时代的慢性疾病。整个医疗系统才刚刚开始意识到这种标准化的局限性，并一直在研究新的个性化方法。作为顺势疗法者，我们当然可以做出宝贵的贡献，我们应该参与这种对话。为了应对这一挑战，顺势疗法需要适当的组织，在许多情况下，需要更多基于长期的基础ad-personam教学和指导。

总之，我们坚信，即使在暴力已成为结构性的世界中，顺势疗法仍然可以在应对人们对温和、非暴力、个性化医疗的新兴需求方面发挥重要作用。争取一个更公平的社会本身就是对每个人的有效疗法。

出版历史

收稿日期：2020 年 6 月 14 日

接受日期：2020 年7 月 3 日

出版日期：
2020 年 10 月 2 日（在线）

© 2020. 蒂姆。版权所有。

顺势疗法学院