History and Philosophy of Naturopathy Flashcards
Learning outcomes:
- The definition of naturopathy
- The history of the naturopathy
- The pioneers of naturopathy
- Terrain versus germ theory
- Naturopathic principles
- Naturopathic philosophy
- Natural therapeutics – hygiene
- Herring’s Law of Cure
Definition of Naturopathy
Naturopathy = natural healing.
Naturopathy is a system of health-care, which encourages and promotes the body’s own self-healing mechanisms.
* Naturopathy uses therapies such as nutrition, fasting, hydrotherapy, naturopathic manipulations, herbal medicine, acupuncture, homoeopathy and others, following naturopathic principles to promote the body’s own self-healing mechanisms.
History and Pioneers of Naturopathy; Cultures
Naturopathy (natural healing) dates back to the beginnings of human civilisation.
* Ancient Egypt (5000 years)
* India (ayurveda) (4000 years)
* China (TCM) (4000 years)
* Ancient Greece (3000 years)
* Native Americans (3000 years)
In all cultures disease was treated using methods such as fasting, diet, herbs, various forms and hydrotherapy.
Hippocrates
Hippocrates (468-377 BC); known as the father of medicine.
* A Greek physician from the island of Kos, where he established a renowned School of medicine based on the understanding that disease is due to diet, lifestyle and the environment.
* Used foods as the primary source of medicine, Health and healing. “first use food, then herbs, finally intervention”.
* Hippocrates believed in the healing powers of nature (‘vis medicatrix naturae’).
* “Nature is the physician of man”
* “Let food be thy medicine, and medicine be thy food”.
* Hippocrates understood that the physician restores balance with the help of the patient. This is important because, unless the patient takes responsibility in the process of healing, it is difficult to make meaningful changes.
* Hippocrates established the importance of careful case taking and keeping detailed medical records, allowing for the continuity of treatments and a better understanding of the progression of disease & healing.
Hippocratic Oath
Hippocrates is credited with writing the Hippocratic Oath, which physicians make on graduation from medical school. The original words have been altered many times and the oath is very different today– but the basic principles are the same.
- “I will apply dietetic measures for the benefit of the sick according to my ability in judgment.”
- “I will keep them from harm an injustice.”
- “I will Neva give a deadly drug to anybody who asked for it, nor will I suggest this effect.”
- “In purity and holiness I will guard my life and my art.”
Samuel Thomson
Samuel Thomson (1769 – 1843)
Regarded as the father of American herbalism.
* Born in New Hampshire, USA
* Grew up with no faith in doctors after his mother died and his daughter became ill.
* Set up a practice as a ‘root and herb doctor’ (herbalist). His only guidance was the teachings of Hippocrates.
* Often purged his patients with herb lobelia inflata – an emetic herb (causes vomiting), hence its old name ‘puke weed’.
* He eventually used 65 other herbs in this practice.
Thomson’s trilogy of healing: Elimination (herbs), restore body heat (cayenne), promote sweating (vapour bath).
* In 1805, an epidemic (likely yellow fever) allowed comparison of Thomson’s methods with orthadox doctors who used ‘blood letting’ and substances such as mercury, which caused patients to salivate (they believed this expelled the disease).
* Half the doctors’ patients died, but Thomson’s all survived. In 1835 the Governor of Mississippi claimed that half the state depended on Thomsonian medicine, and by 1839, he had three million faithful followers.
Johannes Schroth
Johannes Schroth (1798-1856)
Austrian naturopath who was the first to employ a specific nutritional dietary plan.
* Schroth observed that when horses and other animals are si k, they avoid food.
* This led him to believe that ‘fasting’ would encourage natural healing processes.
* Founded health spa in Austria which provided a combination of hydrotherapy (warm wet packs), dry diet and fasting as a cure for both internal and external conditions.
Developed the concept of ‘rhythmic changes’ to stimulate the body to detoxify more efficiently.
* Four example, alternating hot/cold applications, periods of exercise/relaxation, dry (solid food)/Wet (liquid) diet (known as the Schroth diet).
* ‘Dry’ day is low-calorie, high alkaline vegetable diet, with no animal protein, fat, very little salt and very little fluid. Followed by:
* ‘Drainage’ day involving large amounts of water, teas, juices and soup.
* The Schroth diet is an early example of a form of intermittent fasting or 5:2 diet (another form of rhythmic change) which reduces oxidative stress in the body (in balances between free radicals and antioxidants).
Rhythmic diet example:
Try eating around one third less calories on alternate days:
Monday - 3000 calories, Tuesday – 1000 calories, Wednesday – 1500 calories, Thursday – 500 calories, Friday – 2000 calories, Saturday – 750 calories. Then back to 3000 and so on…
Vincenz Priessnitz
Vincenz Priessnitz (1799 – 1852)
Regarded as the father of my naturopathy and the founder of modern hydrotherapy.
* An Austrian farmer and a contemporary of Schroth, who built a sanatorium in 1822.
* In this career, he treated 40,000 patients, of whom only 45 died whilst in care.
* Understood the importance of bio– individuality (every person is unique and has individual nutritional and therapeutic requirements)
* ‘Our task is not to treat the disease, but the patient’.
Priessnitz advocated ‘drugless healing’ using a therapeutic regime including cold water treatments, a vegetarian diet of black bread, fresh vegetables and unpasteurised goats milk, fresh air, exercise, rest and sometimes fasting.
- One of these cold water treatments. The ‘Priessnitz bandage’, was a class bandage soaked in water, wrapped around the chest and abdomen, used to draw out toxins.
Heinrick Franke (Rausse)
Heinrick Franke (Rausse) (1805 – 1848)
A staunch opponent of allopathic medicine and its drugs.
* Born in Germany, slightly later than Priessnitz and Schroth, and like them, lead to nature cure by his own ailments.
* Treated for persistent diarrhoea by doctors with disastrous results, he then succeeded in restoring his health with the Priessnitz water cure.
* Believed in treating the person, not illness (bio – individuality).
Instrumental in using alternating hot and cold compresses the many conditions; wrote several books on hydrotherapy.
* Cold water increases respiration and slows circulation.
* Hot water restores respiration and increases circulation.
* Alternating hot and cold water stimulates blood flow, increases delivery of oxygen and nutrients to cells, and promotes lymphatic drainage.
- Example using the shower: warm/hot water for one minute, followed by cool/ cold water for one minute. Repeat five times, ending with cool.
Sebastian Kniepp
Sebastian Kniepp (1821 – 1897)
Known as the father of hydrotherapy.
* Born in Germany, he cured his own tuberculosis by bathing in the river Danube.
* Studied under Priessnitz.
* “Every application is to be accommodated individually to the patient” (bio– individuality).
Asked for a ‘different life not different pills’, and an ‘active patient not a passive one’.
* In the 1850s, he supervised the Dominican Nunnery in Worishofen, Bavaria, which developed into a renowned health spa.
* Established the link between American and European naturopathy, as many physicians came Europe to train under Kniepp and then took his knowledge back to the USA.
* Developed the idea of alternating hot/cold compresses (variation of the cold Priessnitz bandage).
Louis Kuhne
Louis Kuhne (1835 – 1901)
German naturopath who formulated ‘Unity of disease’ theory.
* Turned to nature cure in his 20s when doctors could not help him. Opened a sanatorium in the Leipzig.
* Saw disease as due to the presence of foreign matter in the body. This ‘root cause’ (Unity of disease) had to be addressed for healing to occur.
* Used cold water hydrotherapy to stimulate the lower abdomen and improve detoxification processes.
* Wrote ‘the new science of healing’ in 1894 which helped spread knowledge of nature cure around the world.
Dr John Harvey Kellogg
Dr John Harvey Kellogg (1852 – 1943)
Promoted the importance of the intestinal microflora.
* Morning Mitchigan, USA. Establish the Advantest Battle Creek sanatorium.
* Believed that ‘90% of diseases I due to improper functioning of the bowel’.
* The Kellog brothers produced shredded wheat and granola biscuits for residential patients, then started a commercial venture. On losing control of the business, product quality changed dramatically for the worse.
Advocated bowel cleansing.
* Kellogg promoted regular enemas as part of a protocol to remove ‘morbid matter’ from the colon, which he saw as fundamental in creating a state of ‘auto – toxaemia’ (self – poisoning), whereby internal toxins from a polluted colon are reabsorbed into the bloodstream.
* Famous for his 15 hour working days, high fibre breakfast cereals and his creation of peanut butter.
Adolf Just
Adolf Just (1859 - 1936)
Advocated raw food and ‘earthing’ (going barefoot).
* German naturopath who sought nature cure for his ‘neurasthenia’, a condition involving profound fatigue, (best understood today as adrenal exhaustion or chronic fatigue syndrome).
* Just believed that disease was punishment for disregarding the laws of nature.
* As well as raw foods andearthing, he used the healing properties of clay misty poulitices (therapeutic use of the earth).
Earthing (or grounding) reduces build up of electromagnetic stress in the body by taking up negative ions from the earth.
* Studies show it can reduce agglutination (clamping together) of both red blood cells and platelets making the bloodless viscous.
* Walk barefoot on the ground before bed for a minimum of 20 minutes to help remove the daily buildup of electromagnetic pollution. After seven days, the quality of sleep improves.
* Walking on to dew (morning for evening) is very powerful as moisture increases and conductivity and the uptake of negative ions.
Rudolf Steiner
Rudolf Steiner (1861 – 1925)
Renowned Austrian scientist and philosopher, who developed systems of medicine, education and farming.
* In 1930 he founded the and Anthroposophical Society, (anthroposophy derived from ‘anthropos’ (man) and ‘sophia’ (wisdom)).
* Advocated herbal medicine, vegetarianism and sought to find the ‘soul of plants’.
* Developed ‘biodynamics’, a system followed by many organic food producers involving crop rotations, special natural fertilisers and following the lunar cycles when planting and harvesting (in biodynamic, seeds are sown as the Moon wanes (get smaller) and crops harvested as it waxes (nears full moon).
Believe that poor health was due to an imbalance in the four planes of man: physical, emotional (etheric), mental (astral) and spiritual (pure consciousness).
According to this worldview:
* The ‘physical’ is governed by the ‘emotional’, thus emotions affect our physical cells.
* The ‘emotional’ is governed by the ‘mental’, thus emotions are governed by our thoughts.
* The ‘mental’ is governed by the ‘spiritual’, thus thoughts are governed by pure consciousness.
Henry Lindlahr
Henry Lindlahr (1862 – 1924)
Considered the founder of scientific naturopathy.
* Aged 35, he visited Sebastien Kniepp, who cured him of ‘incurable’ diabetes. He returned to the USA to spread the word about nature cure.
* Developed the idea of the ‘healing process’ (whereby initial mobilization of toxins leads to an aggravation of symptoms prior to their elimination).
* Viewed accumulation and suppression of morbid matter as the root of most illness. Thus restoring healthy elimination was the key to restoring health.
Pioneer of iridology who developed the ‘iris’ map.
* Held a similar philosophy to Steiner, that the physical body is dominated by the mind and the mind by inner consciousness.
* Thus he encouraged inner reflection to aid well– being, as well as physical practices such as fasting.
Arnold Ehret
Arnold Ehret (1866 – 1922)
Promoting alkaline diet to build ‘new blood’, focused particularly on citrus, green leafy vegetables and nuts.
* German professor developed incurable Bright’s disease of the kidneys aged 31. Medics advised him to eat meat, eggs and milk to replace lost albumin – which made things much worse.
* He sought help from Sebastien Kneipp – fasting and a vegetarian diet, particularly fruit.
* His condition went upinto remission and he set up a fruit-fasting sanatorium in Ascona, Switzerland.
Believed in the theory of ‘vitalism’:
Vitality equals power minus obstruction (V = P – O).
* Described fasting as “a process of elimination to relieve the body from obstructions of solid and unnatural foods; tissues are contracted, mucus is press out.”
* In 1922, wrote ‘the muscleless diet healing system’, about the benefits of avoiding mucus – producing foods (dairy, refined sugars, carbs, etc). The muscleless diet focuses on nuts, seeds, fresh fruit, vegetables and herbs.
Dr Max Bircher-Benner
Dr Max Bircher-Benner (1867-1939)
Advocated a 50/50 raw food diet, emphasising fruit.
* Swiss naturopath strongly influenced by Priessnitz.
* Founded the Bircher-Benner clinic in Zürich in 1897, renamed The Vital Force clinic in 1904.
* Believed that heat (apart from the warmth of the sun) degrades food by destroying enzymes, and that it was essential to maintain the nutrient profile of food.
* Famous for his Bircher muesli (raw oats, goat’s yoghurt and fruit, soaked overnight).
‘Good gut health is necessary for proper growth of cells and tissues’.
* Termed his to philosophy the ‘seedbed anaolgy’.
* The health of the human body is no different to the health of plants, which need the correct soil (pH, nutrients, water, etc.).
* Only if the internal environment is correct will our cells, tissues and organs developed and function properly.
Benedict Lust
Benedict Lust (1872–1945)
Considered the father of naturopathy in America.
* Developed TB in America I returned home to Germany to die. However, he was cured by Kneipp in eight months and trained in the ‘water cures’.
* Return to America in 1896, and began using the term ‘naturopathy’ to describe an eclectic approach to natural feeling. Founded the first American College of Natural Medicine in New York in 1902. His wife (Louisa) studied under Louis Kuhne.
* A great opponent processed foods. ‘Nature does not err’.
Milton Powell
Milton Powell 1881-1978
Rallied Naturopaths to form an association.
* British naturopath introduced to nature cure by Bernarr Macfadden (American publisher and proponent of body-building and nutrition).
* Worked at Macfadden’s Brighton sanatorium from 1909 to 1910, and wrote on the early history of the nature cure movement.
* Organised the first UK conference of naturopathic practitioners in 1921.
* Wrote ‘outline of the naturapathic psychotherapy’ in 1967.
Dr Max Gerson
Dr Max Gerson 1881 - 1959
Toxicity and deficiency are the two planks underpinning health.
* Born in Germany and licensed to practice medicine in New York in 1938.
* Developed a treatment based around alkalizing the body with fresh organic vegetable juices and detoxifying with coffee enemas.
* Initially focused on TB (446/450 patients fully recovered). Then used the ‘Gerson’ therapy for cancer (success rate – 25% of terminal cancer patients free of cancer after five years)
Dr Gerson was ‘one of the most eminent geniuses in the history of medicine’ (Albert Schweitzer, Nobel Laureate).
* Gerson understood unity of disease, (there is one underlying imbalance and different illnesses are merely symptoms of that imbalance).
* Thus the same therapeutic protocol could cure a variety of illnesses including cancer, diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, tuberculosis: hypertension.
* See Charlotte Gerson at CNM:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qquuvi6Gvvmcandt=
James C. Thomson
James C. Thompson 1887 – 1960
Advocated the importance of fibre from unrefined get grains, raw vegetables and fruit.
* Scottish naturopath who trained for four years under Lindlahr.
* Set up a practice in Edinburgh in 1913.
* Opened the Edinburgh School of Natural Therapeutics in 1919, the first naturopathic training college in the UK.
* Set up the Kingston clinic in Edinburgh in 1938.
Stanley Lief
Stanley Lief 1890 – 1963
Established the British College of Naturopathy in 1949.
* South African, trained with Bernarr McFadden in Chicago, and ran McFadden’s Orchard Leigh Sanatorium in the 1920s.
* Founded the magazine ‘Health for all’ in 1927.
* Establish the Hygienist School with Herbert Shelton and Harry Benjamin (another prominent the UK naturopath), focusing on a diet, fasting, hydrotherapy, sunshine, rest and exercise. Based in Tring, Hertfordshire, UK, it could accommodate 100 patients.
Dr Herbert Shelton
Dr Herbert Shelton 1895 – 1985
Consider ‘toxaemia’ to be the universal basic cause of all ‘so-called’ diseases.
* Born in America, he trained at Bernarr McFadden’s School of Physculopathy and Lindlahr’s college in Chicago.
* Founded the Natural Hygiene school in Texas which focused on fasting, diet, exercise, sunshine and rest.
* ‘No intervention: that only make to do the work.’
Father of food combining and promoted raw food.
* ‘What does the average individual now about keeping well? Almost nothing… the people and their doctors are all in the same boat together with a blind man at the helm. They lack the chart and compass and drift aimlessly on a sea of ignorance and misinformation.’ (H.Shelton)
* Mahatma Gandhi was influenced by Shelton’s methods of fasting and invited him to India.
Alfred Brauchle
Alfred Brauchle 1898 – 1964
First historian of the nature cure movement.
* Medical doctor, Born in Schopfheim, Germany.
* Director of Priessnitz hospital in Berlin 1929 - 1934.
* Prescribed raw foods, Cold and hot water treatments, air/sun hey, baths, fasting a massage, they considered nature cure incomplete without psychological guidance and spiritual well-being.
* ‘Only those who lives are threatened take up nature cure.’ Nature Cure in biographies’ in 1937.
Alfred Vogel
Alfred Vogel 1902 – 1996
Believe the only fresh plants with their ‘Life force’ are capable of curing.
- Born in Switzerland, and third-generation herbalist.
- Use many different poultices and compresses utilizing the herbs he found growing locally.
- Set up Naturopathic practice in the Swiss village of Teufen 1933.
- Wrote ‘The nature doctor’ in 1952.
- His message: ‘Trust the healing power of nature’.
