Homoeopathy is an extraordinarily powerful system of health care because of its ability to treat people on three levels - body, mind and spirit. While orthodox medicine treats the physical body, there are frequently mental, emotional and spiritual blocks to recovery that might cause a patient to despair.
Homoeopathy treats the whole person, taking into account their personal history as well as environmental factors, both current and historical.
- The essential reference tool for every practising homoeopath, student of homoeopathy and interested patient
- Answers many of the questions about homoeopathy raised by patients, with examples and case histories
- Includes information on immunisation and the use of mind-altering drugs
- Addresses the role of the spirit, consciousness and karma in healing
- Examines the importance of hereditary aspects of disease
"This book is an expose of how a homoeopath thinks, it is about illness and disease but also about health and cures, achieved with painstaking work and flashes of insight... This is about clinical excellence achieved through a rigorous philosophy combined with intuition. It is not about first aid or self-treatment, but it will enlighten the intelligent reader about when to go and consult a registered and trained homoeopath." - Francis Treuherz, M.A., R.S.Hom., F.S.Hom., Hon. Secretary of the Society of Homoeopaths
Colin Griffith M.C.H., R.S.Hom. is a highly respected practitioner of homoeopathy. He is a founder member of the Guild of Homoeopaths and lectures regularly at the Centre for Homoeopathic Education. He is author of The Practical Handbook of Homoeopathy and The New Materia Medica.
- Author: Colin Griffith
- ISBN: 9781906787714
- 820 pages
- Paperback
- Printed in United Kingdom
Reprinted with the permission of The ARH (from the Journal 'Homeopathy in Practice', Winter 2005 edition). Reviewed by Theresa Partington.
This is a substantial book, almost three books rolled into one. The author says it is not being presented as a text book but as a 'companion' and contains answers to questions he is often asked by students; it therefore merely reflects his own practice and views. The first part is, however, as clear an exposition of the principles of homeopathy as you will find and I am sure the book will make its way onto college reading lists for this part alone.
Colin's knowledge of materia medica is immediately evident but it is reassuring not to be distracted and depressed by the spectacular application of obscure remedies that one might never have thought of (heard of?) oneself! The case examples illustrate the direction of cure, the need to assess remedy responses in the light of it and the importance of case management. From the point of view of the student this section of the book will provide a clear outline of homeopathic theory that few homeopaths, present or past, could take issue with, presented in an intelligent non-patronising manner. From the point of view of the interested patient, it will make sense of their own experience of homeopathic treatment, putting chronic and acute disease into perspective and comparing and contrasting the homeopathic perspective with the more familiar allopathic and 'scientific' ones.
The next part of the book, almost twice as long, is on maintaining causes and blocks to cure. The list of potential hazards is long and might make you want to give up homeopathy in despair but there are positive suggestions about what to do about these blocks when they occur, through homeopathy or by referral. Hahnemann himself was quite clear on the subject, which is skated over in many college courses, and would no doubt have endorsed the many additions to the list of possible maintaining causes acquired in the course of the 20th century. Mobile phone masts, aromatherapy, cannabis and, of course, coffee all come under attack as possible antidotes to homeopathic treatment. I did have one reservation in particular here: I must admit to being a bit uncomfortable with the idea that even if coffee-drinking patients feel they have benefited from treatment, they won't have benefited on the spiritual level and may indeed be risking a 'shutdown of spiritual awareness'. Furthermore, we are told that vegetarians and natives of coffee-growing countries are less likely to compromise their immortal souls in this way. Hmm.
Moving on - Colin obviously has a bit of a love-affair going with the human body in all its complexity and with all its elaborate mechanisms of self-healing and survival and explains at length how adverse events and interventions can interfere with this natural order so disruptively. He elaborates on the need sometimes to refer patients to cranial osteopaths, holistic dentists and even dowsers, where appropriate, in order to remove blocks to cure. Much attention is obviously given to the role of allopathic medication such as hormone therapy, cortisone and vaccination. Some of the more 'anti-establishment' statements are backed up with reference to papers and research in the endnotes but many are not. As Colin's knowledge seems so extensive it would be tempting to just take it all at face value but there are some claims made here which ring cautionary alarm bells. For example, we are told (in an endnote) that coeliac is nowadays 'the term used to describe intolerance to wheat generally'. I can find no backing for this statement anywhere and there is none provided in this book.
Less important from the trusting patients viewpoint but more importantly for the student and practitioner are phrases that come up in the lengthy section on vaccination: notably the repeated (and repeated and repeated and repeated) reference to injection of vaccines 'directly into the bloodstream'. Before taking public issue with this I conducted some lengthy research of my own! There is no doubt, of course, that the blood ends up being the medium of transport for most if not all substances that enter the body for systemic use or abuse and it is also true that the word 'bloodstream' is not the most technical of words. It does, however, have a meaning commonly understood by those most concerned with injections. Nurses, diabetics and users are amongst those in no doubt at all that 'bloodstream' refers to flowing blood as found in veins and arteries: it is important to them either to hit those veins or not. Capillaries won't do for heroin users or those administering intravenous antibiotics and a nurse giving a flu jab will take pride in avoiding even capillaries. Injectable insulin products are compared by how long they take to get from the point of injection 'into the bloodstream'; first aiders are advised on how to increase the time it takes snake venom to get from the puncture point 'into the bloodstream'. The only place you will read about vaccination 'direct into the blood stream' is in anti-vaccination literature. Why? What for? Cui bono? The expression will elicit one of three responses: there will be those who conclude that the writer/speaker doesn't know what he is talking about; there will be those who just accept it and go on through life believing that the mainlining of DPT and MMR is the common experience; and there will be those who interpret it as an attempt to place a negative spin on a practice of which the speaker/writer does not approve, through the misleading use of words. Now, 'spinning' is a concept with which we are all too familiar in the political and military arena but even the politicians have had to accept that it can antagonise more than it convinces or converts. The case against vaccination is solid and never better expressed than in this very book - we really don't need this! Again, on another subject later on, we read that 'Contrary to popular belief, verrucae are not contagious'; the word 'popular' is, unusually, being extended to include the beliefs of all acknowledged experts and specialists in the field of skin diseases apart from homeopaths and perhaps a few other holistic thinkers, and many of those might actually prefer to qualify the statement! Again, why? What for? Is the case for susceptibility and predisposition so weak? Or do we want to become a small mutual admiration society rendered unable to communicate with the outside world by our personalised use of language? Is this the sixth miasm in action?
To summarise, this section of the book fills a gap in homeopathic literature and is really interesting and informative, but if you are thinking of quoting from it you would be well advised to check the 'science' thoroughly and make sure you know what the generally accepted 'facts' are before arguing the case for your 'truths'; otherwise you might see yourself as an Alastair Campbell and yet end up as a Gerald Ratner!
On to Part Three. In this longest section by far Colin addresses the biggest maintaining causes and blocks of all - the miasms. Amazingly, nearly 180 years after the publication of Chronic Diseases, the debate about miasms, what they are, where they came from and how our understanding of them should impact on our practice is still very much alive, much to the confusion of the poor student - particularly when some homeopaths don't seem to take them into account at all and others give explanations for how miasms can inter-relate and manifest that read more like formulae for winning the pools, Then, of course, there is the ever increasing number of miasms to be considered: the addition of the tubercular and cancer miasms to the first three is generally accepted, but we now have five more added to the basic list by Sankaran, the AIDS miasm (from Misha Norland, Peter Fraser and others) and the leprosy miasm from Prakash Vakil, introduced by Colin himself as the sixth major miasm (cholera, typhoid, diphtheria, malaria and AIDS having been relegated to minor miasm status). Apart from the somewhat idiosyncratic positioning of the leprosy miasm he once again manages to integrate the essentials into a convincing and intelligible whole. The miasms are seen as predispositions to disease, even the diseases after which they are named. The history and nature of those diseases are investigated with many historical and literary allusions; their relationship with acute diseases is discussed and the use of their nosodes, the multi-miasmatic presentation of some diseases and polycrest remedies is explained and confusing anomalies thereby clarified. The case examples illustrate what comes over as a very English style of prescribing (with apologies to all the influential Scots in our history!). One gem is, in fact, a case of Burnett's where Colin explains every prescription in the light of Burnett's own philosophy: would that Burnett himself had been so kind to his admirers. Nevertheless, the author's own unique style and perceptions come to the fore in this section on miasms. His views on karma, separated from the general discussion in acknowledgement, presumably, of the different philosophical and spiritual belief systems which support the practice of homeopathy, are obviously essential to the author's own understanding of miasms and of what he is achieving as a homeopath.
This is a long review of a big book - big in size and in the sense of being wide-ranging and authoritative. It is not a materia medica nor a detailed instruction manual for homeopathic prescribing - indeed the 'practitioner's guide' subtitle was apparently an autonomous decision of the publishers! However, homeopathy is nothing without philosophy and homeopathic philosophy can be a bit sterile without the constant reference to people, practitioners and patients that you will find here. Likewise, finding the 'right remedy' will only get us half way without the kind of effective case management so amply illustrated in this book, so it really does deserve to be read by all students and practitioners as well as being of more general interest outside the profession.
There are a couple more points perhaps worth making. One is that any reader frustrated by the total lack of bibliography in the book can get the missing pages direct from the errant publisher and the other is this: Colin Griffith is associated primarily (in the eyes of many) with the Guild of Homoeopaths of which he was a co-founder and while this might make some go out and buy the book instantly, it will, if we are to be honest, put others off! Don't be put off! There may well be a book in progress about new remedies and meditative provings with all the associated controversial assumptions, but this isn't it. Here you will find the roots of homeopathy and personal philosophy is, generally speaking, clearly owned.
