Part 4
However, from Hahnemann’s understanding of the infectious nature of psora, where the term psora was taken from the Hebrew word, Psorat, or fault, and from his description of Psora as that “most ancient, most universal, most destructive and yet most misapprehended chronic miasmatic disease which for many years has disfigured and tortured mankind,” one gets the idea of a fundamental affliction of mankind. No wonder that some homeopaths, Kent included, attribute this affliction to some variation of original sin, a moral affliction of sorts, even if Hahnemann never meant to say this. Richard Grossinger, in his book, Homeopathy, The Great Riddle, equates Hahnemann’s writings at this time with Freud’s Civilization and its Discontents, a negative portrayal of the human condition, motivated by frustration and failure as much as anything else. While that may seem somewhat overly critical, given the proven significance of miasmatic theory, he does make a point when discussing what would have happened if Beethoven had been given his appropriate anti-syphilitic remedy. Would all of his music been completed or would Van Gogh painted in the way he did.
However, an even more challenging concept in Hahnemann’s own thinking is explored by Dimitrialis on p. 24 of his book. Here he states that Hahnemann traces psora back through biblical time, suggesting that its original expression as leprosy was modified over hundreds of years due to hygiene, diet and general modes of living, so the expressions of psoric disease were seen only as a mild itch. However, Hahnemann concludes that the internal psora has not changed in any fundamental way, and that now the more mild itch is able to be more easily suppressed, “allowing easier development of a legion of secondary symptoms both cutaneous and otherwise.” (Dimitrialis p. 25) In this way, the latent conditions are activated by the suppression of the primary cutaneous expression. By implication, he is saying that an unadulterated expression of psora, especially in the form of leprosy is better for the overall health of a person and society as it cannot so easily be suppressed, leading to more serious expressions of diseases seen as secondary symptoms of psora, which include, according to Hahnenmann, 7/8ths of all diseases known to man.
This conclusion, it needs to be said, is highly speculative on Hahnemann’s part. As Dimitrialis points out, Hahnemann could not know whether 7/8ths of all disease stem from psora and Hahnemann himself changed his position on whether psora was the cause of ALL or MOST non-venereal disease. Furthermore, the conclusion that modification of leprosy through diet, hygiene and mode of life throughout hundreds of years only allowed psora to be more easily suppressed, leading to more serious secondary disease has to be questioned. Perhaps, over the many hundreds of years the original more “acute” expressions of psora on the skin evolved into being a mere itch and that it did indicate that the internal psora was also being tamed. Therefore, suppression of the primary itch expressions would not lead to the level of suppression that Hahnemann thought. One other point to consider here is the influence of the other two miasms, syphilis and sycosis. Hahnemann addresses them in light of their infectious miasmatic origin, with their clear acute and chronic symptom picture. He doesn’t make the connection between them and psora and that perhaps the spread of these diseases and the inherited susceptibilities subsequent to this may have overshadowed the impact of psora and diseases that originate with it. In other words, perhaps the other two miasms deserved more attention in Hahnemann’s time and all the disease he attributes to psora could equally be laid at the feet of syphilis and sycosis, not to mention tuberculosis.
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