Sebastian Kneipp and the Natural Cure Movement of Germany: Between Naturalism and Modern Medicine.

This study discusses the historical significance of the Natural Cure Movement of Germany, centering on the Kneipp Cure, a form of hydrotherapy practiced by Father Sebastian Kneipp (1821-1897). The Kneipp Cure rested on five main tenets: hydrotherapy, exercise, nutrition, herbalism, and the balance of mind and body. This study illuminates the reception of the Kneipp Cure in the context of the trilateral relationship among the Kneipp Cure, the Natural Cure Movement in general, and modern medicine. The Natural Cure Movement was ideologically based on naturalism, criticizing industrialization and urbanization. There existed various theories and methods in it, yet they shared holism and vitalism as common factors. The Natural Cure Movement of Germany began in the early 19th century. During the late 19th century and the early 20th century, it became merged in the Lebensreformbewegung (life reform movement) which campaigned for temperance, anti-tobacco, and anti-vaccination. The core of the Natural Cure Movement was to advocate the world view that nature should be respected and to recognize the natural healing powers of sunlight, air, water, etc. Among varied natural therapies, hydrotherapy spread out through the activities of some medical doctors and amateur healers such as Johann Siegmund Hahn and Vincenz Prie ßnitz. Later, the supporters of hydrotherapy gathered together under the German Society of Naturopathy. Sebastian Kneipp, one of the forefathers of hydrotherapy, is distinguished from other proponents of natural therapies in two aspects. First, he did not refuse to employ vaccination and medication. Second, he sought to be recognized by the medical world through cooperating with medical doctors who supported his treatment. As a result, the Kneipp cure was able to be gradually accepted into the medical world despite the "quackery" controversy between modern medicine and the Natural Cure Movement. Nowadays, the name of Sebastian Kneipp remains deeply engraved on the memories of German people through various Kneipp spa products, as well as his books such as My water Cure and Thus Shalt Thou Live! Wörishofen, where Kneipp had served as catholic priest as well as hydrotherapist for 42 years from 1855, changed its name to "Bad Wörishofen" ("Wörishofen Spa" in German). The Kneipp Cure and the Natural Cure Movement became a source of ecologica l thought which is currently gaining more and more sympathy from German people. It is regarded as a lieu de mémoire (site of memory) reflecting the collective identity of German people.

[Position hopeless lost--Heinrich Dreuw's lonely struggle against syphilis and Salvarsan]. / Auf verlorenem Posten--der einsame Kampf des Heinrich Dreuw gegen Syphilis und Salvarsan.

The invention of Salvarsan (Triaminotrihydroxy-arsenobenzol) in 1910 meant a revolution in the medical treatment. Chemotherapy was born and its founder Paul Ehrlich is still famous for his experimental work. In medical history mostly successes, not widespread discussions about misuse or failing of the new drug were. The Berlin doctor Heinrich Dreuw was a key figure in these debates. He and his colleagues presented evidence that Salvarsan was not an effective drug and just an expensive placebo, which helped pharmaceutical trusts earning more money. Dreuw even attacked state medical branches for infringement against patients. At last doubts about Salvarsan never disappeared.

[The admirable effects of panaceas: ideas between antiquity and early modern times]. / Die wunderbaren Wirkungen von Allheilmitteln: Vorstellungen zwischen Antike und Früher Neuzeit.

Panaceas, i. e. medicines that can cure many or almost all diseases, were used throughout the history from antiquity until modern times. The paper focuses on ideas developed to explain the admirable actions of these medicines. In antiquity such actions seem to be related to the large number of ingredients as well as to the presence of materials connected to potent poisons (e. g. viper flesh). Later, with the advent of alchemy, the alchemical preparation is regarded to produce medicines with such properties, the most pregnant example being lapis philosophorum. Such explanations are underpinned by the correspondences with higher astral influences as espoused by Paracelsus, as well as by van Helmont's idea that both disease and cure depend exclusively on the state of the 'spirit of life'. At the same time Galenic-like ideas survive, in the sense that panaceas are something like universal purifiers. Besides curing diseases panaceas were used to ensure long living, permanent health as well as for achieving rejuvenation. In this respect, they show an affinity to the so-called 'healing power of nature'.

A bug's life: change and transformation in early modern China.

Chanting wasps and shape-shifting worms were all in a day's work for sixteenth-century Chinese naturalists such as Li Shizhen (1518-1593). In an effort to understand the metamorphoses of both nature and the human body, he and other early modern Chinese scholars looked towards tiny creatures like roundworms, lice and demon bugs. For them, such animals could reveal the most intimate secrets of the universe.

Naturopathic medicine--a 10-year perspective (from a 35-year view).

The decade of Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine's existence has seen dramatic advancement of the naturopathic profession in all areas: research, quality of practice, quality of education, licensure, inclusion in the political process, and public acceptance. Naturopathic doctors are now valued in the marketplace and in policy as a legitimate part of an overall system of healthcare. Momentum, infrastructure, acceptance, and conceptualization are all foundational to the future. Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine was one of the first journals to invite naturopathic doctors onto its Editorial Board (i.e., Pizzorno, Standish). Our profession thanks and applauds you for inviting us.

Naturopathy in Canada: changing relationships to medicine, chiropractic and the state.

It is said that we can learn as much about social processes from so-called 'deviant' institutions than from the more legitimate. 'Deviant' medical occupations have not attracted much attention from social scientists. Naturopathy is one of these nonconventional health occupations. It emerged in the 18th and 19th centuries and moved to Canada from the United States and Europe early in the 20th. The social history of naturopathy in Canada illustrates the importance of processes of occupational formation and organization as well as state recognition or legitimation. Furthermore, the development of naturopathy shows the importance of state-occupation and naturopathy-chiropractic relationships as well as the often noted relationships with the dominant health occupation of medicine. Incidentally noted are the changing relationships with the state and the dominance of the ideology of science.

The Kur in West Germany as an interface between naturopathic and allopathic ideologies.

In countries where biomedicine developed from earlier medical knowledge, medical pluralism provides unusual cultural parameters and perspectives on biomedical epistemologies. Past therapy traditions, which are still salient in the biomedical system of West Germany today, are examined historically and ethnomedically. The Kur, now part of a complex system of rehabilitation medicine utilizing medical bathing and environmental stimuli, illustrates divergent ideologies in the contemporary German health care system. The influence of cultural, social, and political-economic factors on therapeutic eclecticism and directions are discussed as cultural dynamics of the biomedical system in general.

The story of naturopathic education in Australia.

Early naturopaths in Australia learned their skills via a loose combination of self-education and an apprenticeship-style system. Naturopathic education developed gradually and outside mainstream education until the last decade. Now it has formalized to include university training. These changes in education are paralleled by dramatic increases in popularity in the practice of natural medicine. Legislative changes regarding the provision of higher education by private institutions, plus the popular acceptance of natural medicine in the last decade, have led to the current situation where degrees are available to naturopath via a number of different pathways.

The potential rejuvenation of American naturopathy as a consequence of the holistic health movement.

Naturopathy is a heterodox professionalized medical system which, in contrast to osteopathy and chiropractic, has received little attention from social scientists, particularly in the United States. This article is an attempt to correct that situation. It focuses on the history of this healing tradition by discussing three stages in the development of American naturopathy: 1) its emergence around the turn of the century; 2) its decline beginning in the late 1930s; and 3) its recent potential rejuvenation, particularly in the Pacific Northwest. The essay concludes that as a consequence of its philosophical and therapeutic eclecticism, naturopathy found itself pre-adapted to the holistic health movement that emerged in American society during the 1970s.

[Development of 'Ordnungstherapie' by Bircher-Benner in naturopathy of the 20th century]. / Entwicklung der Ordnungstherapie durch Bircher-Benner in der Naturheilkunde im 20. Jahrhundert.

BACKGROUND: The German term 'Ordnungstherapie' is one of the five therapeutics which defines naturopathy in German-speaking countries. OBJECTIVE: Who formed the term Ordnungstherapie in naturopathy and what does it mean? MATERIAL AND METHODS: Heuristics and criticism of literature of the 20th century as well as database research. RESULTS: Nowadays in German-language medical books Ordnungstherpie belongs to the five therapeutics which define European naturopathy. Yet, the interpretation ranges from health education to body-orientated forms of psychotherapy. The term Ordnungstherapie is often related with the German priest and hydropath Sebastian Kneipp, however, term and definition have been founded by the Swiss physician Maximillian Bircher-Benner. In 1937 he defined Ordnungstherapie as a complex concept of natural healing. It is based upon the rather nosological idea that health is order/harmony in the human body (physically, psychologically), the environment and the daily course. Illness occurs if disorder appears in one of these fields. The therapeutic setting of Ordnungstherapy is defined by 9 rules of conduct to maintain order, which include nutrition, the skin as an organ (exposure to light, air, water), breathing, movement, rhythm of life, and psyche. For all these aspects Bircher-Benner himself uses the terms somatotherapy (dietotherapy, sun and light therapy, hydrotherapy, exercise therapy, breathing technique, order of the rhythm of live) and psychotherapy. He chose these complementary methods subjectively after learning them from 1897 onwards in an eclectic manner and after gaining therapeutic empiricism. Nevertheless his ideas of the Ordnungstherapie correlate with the socio-political context of the 1940ies. CONCLUSIONS: The term Ordnungstherapie was introduced by Bircher-Benner as an umbrella term in 1937 to describe a complex concept of naturopathic therapies. It comprises, with certain limitations for phytotherapy, the therapies which nowadays define European naturopathy. Yet, in European naturopathy today Ordnungstherapie is mostly considered as one out of 5 constituents of naturopathy (dietotherapy, hydrotherapy, exercise therapy, phytotherapy, Ordnungstherapie). The classification of Ordnungstherapie as one of the 5 pillars of the Kneipp therapy was only done by Kneipp physicians in the middle of the 20th century and needs to be thought over.

[From Swiss herbs to the global plant system and individual use--a biographic approach to Alfred Vogel]. / Von Schweizer Kräutern zum globalen Pflanzenreich und individueller Anwendung--eine biographische Annäherung an Alfred Vogel.

BACKGROUND: Even 100 years after the birth of Alfred Vogel there is a lack of reliable data about his life as a non-doctoral therapist in the fields of naturopathy and phytotherapy. OBJECTIVE: Which documents about A. Vogel do exist, which facts do they prove about his career and which interpretations of his point of view of phytotherapy do they allow. MATERIALS AND METHODS: With the methods in medical history (heuristic, critic, interpretation) video, audio and written documents from the A. Vogel Museum and A. Vogel publisher in Teufen, the A. Vogel collection in the Museum in Aesch and the Bioforce AG in Roggwil have been examined. RESULTS: From 1923 to 1932 A. Vogel runs a grocer's shop or a herb and health-food store in Basel and later Bern, Zürich and Solothurn. The economic success of his health-food stores and his interest in the field of naturopathy enable him to take part in a training to become a 'natural doctor' and in 1933 he is registered by the 'Natural Doctors Association of Switzerland'. From 1935 on he is working as a nutritionalist in his own spa pension in Trogen and produces plant extracts in his 'Laboratory Bioforce'. From 1937 to 1957 he has a spa hotel in Teufen and is producer of extracts from fresh plants. He is able to travel all continents of the world from 1958 on, in order to observe customs and medical habits of different tribes. He writes about his findings in his own magazine and books. His knowledge about the usage of herbs in different cultures inspires his production of herbal extracts in his company. In 1963, to meet the increasing sales of his products, he founds the <> where he, until the early 1990s, takes part in the adjustment of the recipes to the new pharmaceutic-medical standards. CONCLUSION: Because of his work as a 'natural doctor' A. Vogel becomes one of Switzerland's best known non-doctoral therapists in the 20th century. The publication of his collected wisdom in a lay-like language is a contribution to the tradition and popularity in this field through which, as well as through the development of extracts from fresh plants, he becomes a promoter of phytotherapy.

[About healing with nature and about love for the patient]. / Vom Heilen aus der Natur und von der Liebe zum Kranken.

In the light of a nature-centered philosophy and its image of man and universe, the medical science of Paracelsus appears 'enlightened by nature'. Based on this experience, the physician found his medical art on the 'four pillars' ('Philosophia', 'Astronomia', 'Alchimia', 'Physica'). Acting out of the healing power of nature would be incomplete, if 'Physica' would not be accompanied by 'Virtus', the ethical component of all medical actions. This is described by Paracelsus by the picture of mercy ('Barmherzigkeit'), in whose sentiment all medical acting finds its final motivation. Therefore, the script concentrates in particular on what Paracelsus describes as 'love for the patient'.

[Scientific theoretical founding of medicine as a natural science by Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-1894)]. / Die wissenschaftstheoretische Begründung der Medizin als Naturwissenschaft bei Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-1894).

In this study an attempt will be made to discuss the epistemological problems in the theory and practice of modern technical medicine in the writings of Hermann von Helmholz. An inquiry into the relationship between von Helmholtz' thinking and the critical philosophy of Immanuel Kant is followed by the characteristics of von Helmholtz' philosophy of science which he himself called "empirical theory". The question of medicine as a science finally leads to the main problem of medical epistemology, viz., the relationship between theoretical knowledge and practice in medicine. In this context the anthropological dimension is brought into consideration.

Water, air and light--Arnold Rikli (1823-1906).

This article is a reminder of a famous Swiss healer, Arnold Rikli, who is also considered to be one of the pioneers of the modern health tourism in Slovenia. Rikli moved to the Alpine region of Lake Bled in 1855 to build a health resort after having established his own natural healing method based on the effects of light, air and water on the human body. His resort was visited by rich patients who were treated for numerous diseases under special, "revolutionary" conditions. The inhabitants of Bled and the official medicine strongly opposed Rikli's activities, also because of Rikli's particular character, but some of his practices are still relevant today.

[In awe of creation: "Tota substantia", "calidum innatum", "generatio spontanea" and atomic form teachings of Daniel Sennert]. / Das Staunen vor der Schöpfung: "Tota substantia", "calidum innatum", "generatio spontanea" und atomistische Formenlehre bei Daniel Sennert.

A thorough study of the system of a philosophy of nature, elaborated by the well-known German physician Daniel Sennert (1572-1637). At the beginning of the modern era, Sennert developed a new and very complex concept of the relations between matter and the guiding principle active in it, the Aristotelian form.