An exploration of Hahnemann's extraordinary medical art, a simple explanation of the nature of classical homeopathy, and what it can do for you.

1. Making the Case for a Real Cure: The Power of Homeopathy
c. 2009, Judith Acosta
With every new product, every modern corporate innovation we are moved, in
turn, to a new “want.” And, given the fact that we are as driven by our impatience
as by our desperation to acquire, we want it now.
We are a culture of consumption and compression—we want more, we move fast
and we’ll push things out of our way to get it. In this social and emotional
environment, acute disease is damned inconvenient. Who has time to spend two
days in bed getting over a flu? Forget the week or two or three that people used to
spend in spas recovering from their respiratory afflictions. Time off? Who’s got
any? If we’re not working 60 hour weeks for someone else, we’re frantically
struggling to manage the dozens of tasks we have on our docket at home. As a
result, we are more likely to tolerate a low-level chronic disease than give up our
lifestyle. So we suppress symptoms as soon as they appear. We’re so busy and so
active we don’t even want to take time to menstruate. To help us out, the
pharmaceutical companies now offer a pill to make our menses light and last only
2 days and a shot we can take that makes it go away for months.
Modern, allopathic medicine is primarily designed to suppress symptoms. It’s
moniker, “allopathic,” comes from the words allo, meaning against, and path,
meaning pathology or illness. The treatments provided are devised to work in
opposition to the disease state. So, if a person has a fever, they take an aspirin or
some other medication to force the fever DOWN. If a person gets a rash, they are
given some steroidal preparation to make it GO AWAY. Energetically, the rash is
actually being shoved further back and into the organism where it will eventually
express itself as something else. I have seen more than one person use drugs to
suppress acne only to develop symptoms of depression or anxiety or some other

2. chronic dysfunction. This principle is extended throughout the practice of
medicine as such.
Homeopathy, which is based on the laws of similars (homeo=similar), works in
precisely the opposite manner. Instead of using an opposing force to suppress a
symptom, homeopathic remedies, when well-chosen to fit the totality of a patient’s
state, are given to match the presenting symptoms and thereby stimulate the
organism to heal itself.
Here’s a simple example: A little boy wakes up suddenly with a very high fever.
His neck hurts, his cheeks are so red they are nearly purple, his pupils are dilated,
and he is slightly delirious. The remedy chosen is Belladonna. Why that one of the
thousands available? Because when that remedy (in a highly diluted and
“potentized” state) is given to a healthy person, it produces the exact same
symptoms that the little boy experienced. Like cures like. When he is give the
remedy that produces those symptoms—and he has those symptoms—that disease
state is cured and the symptoms vanish. This law was renewed by Samuel
Hahnemann, the founder of classical homeopathy, but was first brought to light by
Hippocrates himself, the father of medicine as we understand it today.
In homeopathy, suppression is seen not only as not helpful, but as dangerous
because while it may temporarily make symptoms disappear, it does not cure. In
fact, it drives the disease state deeper in and further up into the organism. So, a
person whose psoriasis is “treated” with cortisone may see his skin clear up, but in
due time, he becomes increasingly irritable, depressed and starts to develop a
cough and recurrent bronchial infections (one of many possibilities, but one in fact
which I have seen). He is in turn treated by antibiotics. So the acute inflammatory
state disappears, but he becomes increasingly agitated and has to be put on anti-

3. depressants. Soon, he develops arthritis. And so it went for years. He now has
cancer.
I have consulted for years on the value and place of homeopathy in the realm of
alternative therapies available to people. And in so doing have worked with
numerous medical doctors and their patients.
Many who come to learn about homeopathy often confuse it with herbal medicine,
naturopathy, holistic psychotherapy, acupuncture, the use of supplements, and
nutrition. While physicians and practitioners who employ those methods of
treatment may also at times use homeopathy, they are not the same.
Homeopathy has been at work for more than two hundred years. There is a statue of
Samuel Hahnemann, near the White House and in Liepzig, Germany, where he was born.
Medical schools still in existence were named after him. His contribution to the field of
medicine is incalculable even though it fell out of favor as the pharmaceutical companies
took center stage, claiming that their medicine was the “way” and that homeopathy was
“unscientific.”
In fact, homeopathy is quite scientific and clinically exceedingly thorough. What it does,
however, is fly in the face of what we believe to be true about human beings, in fact
about all of life. It follows more along the lines of quantum physics than it does along the
lines of ordinary chemistry, stating that we are beings (as all things are) of energy and
that it is our vital force that must be healed.
The birth of homeopathy, like so many great innovations, was serendipitous. Hahnemann
began experimenting on himself with medicinals and observed that when he took a dose
(doses in homeopathy are substances that are diluted to infinitesimal amounts, sometimes
so small that nothing can be seen even with a microscope) of Peruvian bark (Cinchona
officinalis), which is the essence of quinine, he generated a set of symptoms in his own

4. body that reminded him of malaria. When he gave a potentized dose to a person with
malaria, the malaria was cured.
This exquisite medicine, which is gentle, artful, and, gratefully, very, very effective, is
available to everyone. It is inexpensive. It is safe, when it is used properly and with an
appropriate understanding of its workings and the materia medica.
For more information, please write or email the National Center for Homeopathy in the
United States or go to http://www.wordsaremedicine.com/the-power-of-homeopathy/
Judith Acosta, LISW, is the co-author of The Worst Is Over and specializes in the
treatment of trauma, anxiety, addictions, and depression. Her new book, Verbal First Aid,
(addressing special needs of children and healing communication) will be out in June
2010. She has been in private practice for 25 years and lectures around the country on
Verbal First Aid, trauma, stress and risk management, and animal-assisted therapy. She is
also a consultant on the benefits of classical homeopathy.