INEXHAUSTIBLE POTENTIAL
Dr. M. A. USMANI
INEXHAUSTIBLE POTENTIAL
I’ve often said, and wrote at various places and occasions, that there are as many versions of homeopathy as there are homeopaths. But today morning I realized in a flash that homeopathy has inexhaustible potential in curing and tackling diseases. In whatever way you apply the ‘Law of Cure’, it works.
This flash of vision came while reading an excerpt from the lecture of a professor of homeopathy. He admits:
- The homeopathic field of medicine is so open to all kind of interventions, distortions and bad practice that its original form is almost totally masked or lost and its effectiveness reduced to a mere 10{2199fd5a08fd4327006de97eb55639ae209b35f77d7fcf7e4d124ba1edc48180} of its capabilities. This minimal10{2199fd5a08fd4327006de97eb55639ae209b35f77d7fcf7e4d124ba1edc48180} derives mainly from a small group of practitioners that have followed the original teachings of S. Hahnemann and the right lines of applications…… These practitioners were recognised as classical homeopaths, (Italics mine)
A bleak situation indeed! But also a rude jolt to ruminate at!! Why the efficacious and principled practice has been reduced to 10{2199fd5a08fd4327006de97eb55639ae209b35f77d7fcf7e4d124ba1edc48180}? Should not we, or is not it the occasion for us to analyze the concept of “classical”? Does a science admit the word “classical” as “living” at the same time? Can a thing be at once classical and scientific—scientifically extant? This is a contradiction in terms. The classical is classical, immutable, fixed and never changing. Such a thing can be a precious relic or monument. That can never be a scientific concept or scientifically vibrant entity. So the classical homeopath is not a scientific person doing his job scientifically. Admitting this we can make a queue of all the classical concepts, and give them a rigorous test for accepting or rejecting them on the scientific basis. Accepting this as true, we find many classical concepts lining up in a queue for their scientific evaluation. The classical concepts like the notoriously ubiquitous ‘Similimum’, the ‘Law of Direction of Cure,’ and the ‘Total or ideal Cure’, etc., etc. stand accursed.
We should not render ourselves handicapped by these crippling ideals. Medicine is a much explored field with stupendous discoveries, but still lies fallow for our ingenious and creative exploits. We should not wear shackles of antiquity. It is insult to the human intellect and the discovering genius of the present age. Let us traverse this field without the impedimenta of stifling ideals and ideas, which are no more relevant to modern knowledge and discoveries. Go with the modern impetus or choose oblivion! Any discipline of science should change or advance as science. What does not change is not science. Minds with clamped windows start effusing stench.
Homeopathy has mighty challenges ahead and a gigantic fight for its existence. The present inundating onslaught, in the world press, on daily basis, and by the FDA, against homeopathy, should alert the slumbering fraternity. Innocuous biochemic combinations for teething children are targeted as harmful and lethal. Even news has been concocted as some children had died of their consumption of these concoctions. And today’s news (Nov. 17, 2016) is: Homeopathic Medicines will carry Labels saying They are Unscientific. That is, you have to boldly print on every vial of homeopathic medicine that in this vial is a homeopathic medicine, and because it is homeopathic medicine, it is unscientific. This is a fodder for the authorities at the helm of affairs to chew and cud.
Only our candid acceptance and accommodation of modern discoveries and insights and our readiness to recast old concepts can keep homeopathy flourishing and buoyant. All these issues are expressly dealt with in my book: Homeopathy of Tomorrow. I’ve raised and answered all the possible issues in the body of my book.
A concerted campaign is afoot in the world press to malign homeopathy in such a way as to inculcate in people an uncompromising prejudice against homeopathy as being downright unscientific and intrinsically harmful. This book is a timely wake-up call for the gullible and complacent homeopaths to equip themselves against the imminent devastating onslaught. Never think that the dominant school will incorporate your knowledge into their therapeutics; but we, on the other hand, have to incorporate their knowledge, research and technological advances into our armamentarium to understand and discuss complicated cases among the members of the profession. Without imbibing their knowledge and terminology we can’t communicate intelligently with modern medical world.
Homeopathy is hung on two pegs generally: first, the aggrandizement peg, the peg of naked lust for fortunes and wealth, expressed in unfettered concoctions of nostrums or patents for every disease or ailment under the sun. They have no compunction or prick of conscience for their illegal deeds, or bold plundering. Illiterate homeopaths have left homeopathy and started prescribing these nostrums.
The second peg is of uncompromising (hence ‘unscientific’) infatuation for homeopathy and its founder. They are known as Classical Homeopaths. They are uncompromising devotees of the system and its founder. Every word that has been written or uttered by the founder is a gospel for them. The people of this category are an innocent lot, very selfless votaries of the system and its apostle. Changing a comma or a semicolon of his edicts is no less than an errant blasphemy. They insist to remain entrenched to the literal text of the aphorisms. Their fidelity is to the words and text of the founder not the spirit behind. The Organon ran to six editions in his lifetime, the 6th. edition was published posthumously. It shows that Hahnemann was not static, as no scientific person can ever be. This progress, this change in the ideas of Hahnemann discommoded many of his disciples. They left him ascribing the Master’s change of ideas to his advancing age and senility and remained stuck to the pristine lay-out of homeopathic prescribing, that was:
- Similar, single remedy;
- Minimum dose; and
- Least repetition.
In two aspects Hahnemann kept changing, i.e.
- he went on minimizing the dose to the extent of imponderablia; (which his first disciples could not pocket, and deserted him, as Richard Huges); and
- The repetition that was almost nil; he, later on, felt that repetition was many times essential. To keep the censure at bay, he first invented 50 millesimal potency and then enjoined daily repetition of the same in chronic diseases.
What he could have done about the single remedy (if he lived one decade more)…is anybody’s imagination.
If homeopathy is a science, then any—well founded—change can and should be expected. That is the scientific spirit. This will generate ‘Neo-Classical’ homeopaths—where ‘classical’ would mean ‘principled’, not the old cranky followers.