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Editorial: Whitmont's legacy
by Colin Wood
These cases and other articles together identify a sensibility within the field of healing
that is not directly to do with schools, systems or theories.
One of its protagonists was Edward Christopher Whitmont, whose centenary falls on 5th
December. In his practice, he touched on all of these: homeopathy, analytical
psychology, anthroposophy, natural history, new physics, music, astrology, alchemy,
mythology, gaia, dreamwork and Central European social, cultural and rabbinic history.
Most of the contributors to this issue were inspired by Whitmont early on in their journeys
and went on to make their own paths. An important theme, then, will be different ways in
which this work is being continued. Jane Cicchetti has written a book on dreamwork that
treats of method and the language of materia medica. Kris Frank has long worked with
astro-psychology in the homeopathic context. Rachel Koenig is a practitioner of oriental
medicine who studied with Whitmont in a small regular group. Peter Morrell is a chronicler
of the Hahnemanian tradition.
One idea they all may well hold in common is the belief that finding the good remedy is
not in itself sufficient for cure, good idea though that is.
Categories: Editorials
Keywords: editorial
Remedies:
Edward Christopher Whitmont: a timeline
by Colin Wood
Edward Weissberg was the only child born, after many
miscarriages, on 5th December, 1912, to a couple who had migrated to Vienna from
Poland (now Ukraine). His father was said to be an illiterate furrier who never managed
to adapt to his new language and economic situation, who abused his wife and resented
his son’s gifts. Later, while a student, he worked to support his parents.
At the Wasa grammar school, Latin and Greek were the order of the day but also
German literature (among whom, Hahnemann’s contemporaries). While some of his
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teachers were 'sadists', his class teacher from the age of eleven was a devotee of
Goethe and implemented a system of classroom democracy. Already as a youth, Edi
Weissberg belonged to a social milieu that was passionate about Schubert piano
playing, psychology, anthroposophy, socialism, walking in the Alps and the thirst for a
universal education. This became a way for them to forget their Jewishness and
embrace Viennese cultural life to the full, with its coffee houses and, above all, the
opera - preferably Wagner. **
After hesitating between music and medicine, he chose the latter and graduated from
the University of Vienna in 1936. As he was unable to bear the bloody process of
dissection, he gravitated towards psychology, alchemy and homeopathy, especially
within a small group led by anthroposophist and physician Karl König from 1936. For
them, the purely psychological explanation of life was not sufficient, yet he remained
skeptical of some of the current spiritual excesses.
As an outspoken socialist, he was wanted by the Gestapo, from whom he escaped by
emigrating to the USA, arriving on 15th September, 1938; through his smartness, he
survived but his parents died in Auschwitz and, to the end of his days, he retained a
deep feeling of survival guilt. Once in New York, he connected with the pushy
environment and reinvented himself for a second time, changing his name to Edward
Christopher Whitmont and marrying, in 1940, a girl from the anthroposophical
background, Gretchen Foltz.
During the 1940s, he learned a more rigorous form of homeopathy from another
anthroposophist, Elizabeth Wright Hubbard. He taught homeopathy between 1947-51
and, from the 1950s, collaborated with Maesimund Panos. His interest in analytical
psychology was kindled and, after the war, he deepened his training after seeking out
the Jungian analyst Gustav Heyer in Berlin. Heyer had been a member of the National
Socialist Party and Jung would have nothing more to do with him, though Whitmont
tried unsuccessfully to arrange a meeting between the two.†
With his co-founding, in 1962, of the C.G. Jung Foundation in New York, there followed
a period that lasted the rest of his life, in which he was very present on the scene,
innovative, popular as analyst with his students, and a family man with five children and
a weekend house in Connecticut.
From around 1948, his growing practice with patients consisted increasingly of an
eclectic gestalt form of psychotherapy, supported by homeopathy whenever he saw an
appropriate remedy picture.‡ “He wanted to find a different level of listening as a
homeopath.”* Going a stage further than Jung, he always sought an embodied response
to unconscious material.≠
These were decades when homeopathy itself was under a cloud. Articles on
homeopathy, written mainly between 1948 and 1955, were finally collected together in
book form in 1980. However, The Alchemy of Healing, 1993, considered by some to be
a central thesis for homeopathy and the healing art, is not widely read.
The last phase, the fifteen years up to 21st September, 1998, has a special
atmosphere, characterised from all accounts by an inner transformation.
For Whitmont, it was not good enough just to combine homeopathy and psychotherapy.
He wanted to find out what each on its own had to offer. Had he lived, his next book
was going to be an exploration of the relative therapeutic domains proper to each. ◊
This is a tale he told to a conference, in England, in 1993:
He gave a remedy to a patient, after which, she had a dream of there being feathers in
her mouth. She agreed, then, that they try physically stuffing feathers into her mouth.
After they had done this, her memory came back of a childhood incident in which, as a
young girl living on a farm, her uncle took her into a barn. He used chicken feathers to
stop her from screaming, as they were to hand.
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Here, we have the interplay of psychotherapy and homeopathy. Sometimes, the only
way forward is by dreaming, working with the unknowable.
References
* Sarah Schaleger, personal communication, 2012, on which, for the most part, this
article is based.
** H.W. Francke, Hans Schauder: Vienna - My Home, privately published by Agathe
Dawson, Edinburgh, 2002.
† Thomas B. Kirsch, The Jungians: A comparative and historical perspective, Routledge,
London, 2000
≠ Joyce Ashley, Edward Christopher Whitmont (December 5, 1912–September 21,
1998), The San Francisco Jung Institute Library Journal, 17:3, 1998, pp.75-76
Dana Ullman, personal communication, 2012.
‡ Edward Whitmont, personal communication, 1994.
◊ Nicholas Nossaman, 1) The Homeopath, No 72, 1999. 2) personal communication,
2012.
Photo: Edward Weissberg as a young man, by courtesy of Sarah Schaleger
Categories: General
Keywords: Whitmont
Remedies:
Edward Whitmont in perspective
by Peter Morrell
This essay explores the thinking and mindset of Whitmont, how he was influenced by
and used homeopathy and also what influence he has had on homeopathy. Whitmont
shows that homeopathy has been very willing to learn from Jung and Alchemy, but
Jungian analysts seem not to have shown so great a willingness to learn very much
from homeopathy.
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Edward Whitmont
graduated from the Vienna Medical School in 1936. (1, 2, 3) and specialised in
psychology, studying Adler (2) and Jung (1, 3). He escaped from the Nazis by
emigrating to the USA in 1938; both his parents died in Auschwitz. (3) He was trained
in homeopathy in New York by Elizabeth Wright Hubbard in the 1940s (1), and he then
collaborated closely, as friend and associate, with Maesimund Panos from the 1950s on.
(4) He taught homeopathy courses in the US 1947-51, but he had first come across it in
Vienna along with anthroposophy under Karl König (2, 5), where he had also studied
Steiner (1, 2) and alchemy (3, 5, 6, 9). He saw many important parallels and
correspondences between Jungian psychotherapy and homeopathy and traced their
origins back through figures like Goethe and the Romantics, (5) to Paracelsus and
alchemy (6). He made useful contributions to both psychotherapy and homeopathy.
Edward Whitmont represents a fertile and revolutionary approach, pioneered from the
1950s on, that eventually found great favour a generation later and has since become
more or less absorbed into the mainstream. It extends the original idea of Hahnemann
in his attempt to answer the question of what a drug is most useful and suitable for,
what type of sickness and what type of individual. In this matching process that
homeopaths must all inevitably employ, the proving became the solution to the age-old
issue concerning symptom correspondence and fine detail.
What psychology, and Whitmont in particular, supplied to homeopathy was the means
to understand remedies as personalities, going beyond the mere facts of the proving,
fleshing out the proving into more credible, vivid and realistic images of real people.
(see Gladwin) This approach was emphasized by Kent and has since been adopted and
extended by people like Philip Bailey. It usefully illuminates the specific issues that each
person or remedy face, and which signs to look for both in the proving and in the
patient. This greatly assists the matching process.
Trained in Adlerian and Jungian psychology, he viewed remedies as people, through
their failures and successes, their strengths and weaknesses. By exploring their
unresolved underlying tensions, Whitmont was able to enrich and deepen our
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understanding of remedies in their essence. That in turn enabled the homeopathic
consultation to become a therapeutic event in itself.
His long-time familiarity with the work of Rudolph Steiner sharpened his perception of
materia medica, making it a vehicle for understanding human sickness, as well as the
wider problems of humanity, in terms of an interplay between symbolic polarising
forces. He thus universalised the issues that we encounter in our study of materia
medica and in case-taking.
Four key elements are visible in his work, which we can take or leave as we wish:
homeopathy pure, alchemy, anthroposophy and Jungian psychology. However, bound
up with these are various aspects of medieval and modern thinking about connections,
correspondences and energy fields, creating in all a 'rich soup' of ideas for the reader.
It is therefore pretty clear from reading his works that he viewed homeopathy primarily
through a Jungian lens and saw in homeopathic drug pictures the abundant symbolism
of archetypes, polarities and unresolved repressed psychological tensions. This mixture
formed the basis of his discussions of individual remedies.
Whitmont the man
Whitmont had a big impact on people who knew him: People noticed "his gentle, quiet,
and humble way... Dr. Whitmont’s humility, intelligence, and never-ending search for
truth in meaning." (7) "Walking with him, I admired the quick step of someone who
enjoys nature, and moreover, loves to move, to ascend, to overcome obstacles, to
break new ground continuously. He was young, very young - physically and mentally."
(2)
He was "a classic ectomorph, short, wiry, Whitmont had a restless nervous energy, a
quick and creative mind. He was forever dissatisfied with what he knew, constantly
exploring new avenues, prodded along by a Merlin-like quick silvery intuition." (8,
p.145) Generously sharing his knowledge with respect and affection... His passion for
life extended to nature. He loved to climb mountains and walk in the forest. Above all
else, he was an evolving, struggling human being, fully “in the soup,” confronting his
own shadow to the very end." (3)
His writings have proved insightful: "Dr Whitmont's erudition is immense, but his style
is deceptively simple and easy to read. It is not so easy to retain what one has read
because of the depth and complexity of the ideas presented, and the further
perspectives which they indicate. (1)
Jungian psychotherapy
– ego and dark ego, and setting boundaries
Whitmont describes the young child as existing in "the state of unconscious wholeness,"
(9, p.206) with unlimited psychic potential, some of which gets encouraged, realised
and developed through life experience, and some that does not. The child is testing,
experimenting and adapting. In this manner, the 'unmoulded' psyche manifests a
variety of impulses and attitudes to parents and others. Some of them get validated and
as acceptable, while others are rejected and repressed. Thus, what we might ordinarily
call the 'personality'—but what he calls the light or daytime ego—emerges gradually, as
we grow up, while the unused and repressed parts become the 'dark ego' or 'shadow.'
(9, p.204; 10, p.216; 4; 11, p.43; 12, p.110) It is this dark ego that forms the main
focus of psychotherapeutic exploration.
Parents set boundaries for the growing child, such as right and wrong, good and bad,
masculine and feminine. Such boundaries do not exist in the unmoulded psyche but
have to be learned, established and repeatedly reinforced. It can be a painful process,
meeting with the child’s resistance. Jungians call this the separation of the ego from the
Self.
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The only thing that can harm one is that which is hidden from view. The more violently
or rigidly the boundaries have been imposed upon the child, his will thwarted and the
'unwanted' material repressed, the more likely it is that trouble lies ahead. Setting rigid
boundaries strengthens and clearly defines the daytime ego but at the same time
strengthens the dark ego. A more balanced person can be defined as someone whose
boundaries are in constant dynamic adaptation, who has accepted and embraces both
aspects of his psyche. Repressed impulses remain strong and active, impelling the
person to act in irrational and inexplicable ways.
All those elements that were not deemed as acceptable by one's peers and parents
become welded in the unconscious into a 'shadow self' or ‘dark ego,’ that holds all those
qualities which we dislike in ourselves and in others. According to this scenario, what we
dislike most in others are the potentials in ourselves that we were unable to see fulfilled
in our development. Thus the world and society mirrors in many ways the key elements
of our dark ego and spawns tensions, conflicts, polarities and unresolved anxieties that
reside within us.
The discarded and unvalidated impulses in ego formation are like bricks that were left
over when the ego was being built. Corresponding to archetypes, they lie dormant as
the dark ego. They are often polar opposites of the dominant ones in our usual
personality and can pull us this way and that compulsively. They become active and
manifest in dreams and daydreams and form part of the 'inner chatter' against which
we measure and evaluate ourselves, our life goals, and what we see as our successes
and our failures. In men, the feminine is a key part of the dormant repressed 'dark ego,'
while in women it is the masculine that takes this subordinate role.
Jungian analysis
During sleep, the boundaries defining the daytime ego become blurred and then
dissolve completely such that all aspects of the psyche can become accessible to the
conscious awareness. They appear to us in dreams, using "the symbolic language of the
unconscious" (9, p.207) and analysis is able to bring them into the light. Dreams are
viewed as dramatisations of various unresolved issues in the unconscious: "dreams are
allegoric and symbolic statements from a universal information bank." (13, pp.15-16)
By exploring them with help from the analyst, the analysand is able to see and come to
terms with the issues that are of concern to him. The patient becomes whole again by
"integration of unconscious material into conscious awareness." (10, p.240) Whitmont
and others realised, too, that homeopathic remedies likewise can greatly assist in this
bringing of issues to the surface.
Whitmont refers variously to the "daylight ego," (13, p.14) the "habitual ego
consciousness," (13, p.15) or "the ego consciousness," (13, p.15) that stands in sharp
contrast to the "non-ego or non-personal psyche," (13, p.15) which he regards as the
deeper source of our mental and emotional activity. "The prime human motivations are
pre-rational and unconscious. We do not understand them unless we have learned to
decipher the primordial language of symbolic images which happens to be the
spontaneous mode of expression of the pre-rational unconscious psyche." (15, p.56)
"The functioning of the ego is based on rationality and will. It is power-oriented." (15,
p.57) "The logical rationality of the ego has pushed emotion, intuition, and image into
the shadows of the margin." (10, p.216) In this view, "the language of the Self is that of
images, feelings, metaphors and symbols, called mythopoetic in contrast to the verbal,
rational language of the ego.." (10, p.241)
As a Jungian, he especially values dreams: "dreams are allegoric and symbolic
statements from a universal information bank," (13, pp.15-16) emerging from the nonego psyche; a dream is a "performance that mirrors our inner reality." (13, p.20)
During sleep, the normal waking ego is disengaged and fades from view, and aspects of
the primordial ego, with its cargo of unresolved issues, can take the stage. And so, in
dreams otherwise unconscious aspects of the repressed dark ego come more to the fore
and into play, which is why dreams are so important in Jungian analysis. They reveal to
the therapist where our tensions and conflicts lie.
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The purpose of therapy, and of dream analysis in particular, is to explore these hidden
aspects of the psyche, bringing them into conscious awareness, and so to release the
hidden tensions within us. "He applies his theory of the actualization of archetypes to
explain the emergence of the ego out of the self through body experience." (12, p.112)
The connection to homeopathy comes through looking at the dark and light elements in
drug pictures and seeing these polarities in actual people. In his practice, and his view
of the person, he also blends all of this with the symbolism of medieval alchemy which
he derived from his study of Paracelsus as well as various Steinerian concepts.
To summarise, Whitmont describes Jungian psychotherapy as a system for
understanding the mind and for helping individuals who have unresolved psychological
tensions and issues. These are viewed as remnants of difficulties that have been
repressed into the subconscious mind during childhood and which therefore have a
power to make us act compulsively and irrationally without knowing why or being able
to stop it. He thus views the purpose of psychotherapy as the bringing into conscious
awareness that which lies hidden in the unconscious, by bringing into the light that
which is in the dark. (9, p.206) By repeatedly bringing such problems into the open,
they are deemed gradually to dissolve and their power fade away, leaving the patient
released in greater freedom and happiness. This is achieved through one-to-one
discussion, group work, dream analysis and dramatisation.
Homeopathy
Whitmont’s view of health and healing took in a broad sweep of modalities that included
“a post-quantum view (along with) Paracelsus, I Ching and Jung's workings on alchemy,
synchronicity and the collective unconscious”. (6, p.146) It was rooted in the
fundamental aspects of our lives. Life is full of tensions and disappointments:
"whichever way we turn we cannot avoid crisis, pain and disease." (16, p.9) We all
experience "tension, stress, conflict, repressions, depression and disappointment." (16,
p.9) Some of these give rise to sickness.
Whitmont points up the value of "the ancient recognition of the potency of natural
resources for healing. Our Post-Enlightenment Western society, rooted in a rational,
empirical way of looking at the world, resists the notion of ‘folklore, gods and healing’.
The ancients lived intimately attuned to natural resources (including dreaming) and
movements of the cosmos, and were therefore in a position to benefit from the
restorative properties of these sources." (17, p.126) Whitmont saw sickness and
proving symptoms as an "interplay of polarizing forms." (13, p.vii) He regarded
remedies as "substances administered in the ultramolecular transmaterial form." (13,
p.viii) Each remedy embodies "a specific personality type," (13, p.x) each one
"representing aspects of the human life-drama." (13, p.4) It is through potentisation
that drugs reveal their "specific dynamic characteristics," (13, p.6) in the patient,
behaving like "transmaterial fields." (13, p.7)
Whitmont makes a grand synthesis between homeopathy, humanity and cosmology
when he depicts the "patterns underlying the human microcosm and outer macrocosm
in mutual analogy and reflection." (13, p.8) For him, homeopathy illustrates the ancient
alchemical notion that "various states of human consciousness are encoded in various
mineral, plant and animal substances...they slumber in these materials waiting for their
unfolding on the human level," (13, 18) which become manifest only in the
homeopathic provings. He also feels that homeopathy is firmly linked "to his postquantum understanding of the universe." (6) Potentisation of a drug, "while
dematerialising on the molecular level, preserves its specific dynamic characteristics and
intensifies its energetic change." (6)
He describes homeopathic remedies as "transcendental patterns prior to and playing
with substance, directing the life force." (16, p.8) For every "illness pattern there is also
a substance pattern 'out there' which minutely duplicates it." (16, p.10) Homeopathy is
"a phenomenologically descriptive field." (16, p.17) "Hahnemann developed his theory
not on the basis of speculation, but as the result of pure observation." (16, p.40) He
regarded both Jung and Hahnemann as great empiricists, formulating their systems
from direct careful observation almost devoid of theories. The "totality of symptoms,"
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(16, p.55) forms the sole reliable guide to the remedy. With the provings, homeopathy
"has amassed a tremendous amount of reliable experimental material." (16, p.81) He
regarded the symptoms of the provings as a field of facts just as real as the symbols
and archetypes of Jung’s psychology. And between these two bodies of information he
saw massive correspondences.
Whitmont built bridges between homeopathy and psychotherapy. He seems to have
seen remedies as somehow akin to archetypes, which means treating them in a noncausative, non-linear, phenomenological way, perceiving simply and without judgement
the issues and tensions in the person, as mirrored in the provings. For him this bridgebuilding enriched and deepened the matching process but it also opened up the
homeopathic consultation to a wider Jungian perspective of letting patients 'reveal
themselves' (as they must) to the homeopath, and in the process, watching while the
mental archetypes that typify the remedy come tumbling forth. His view of the
psychological benefits to the patient of this type of consultation was also strongly
coloured by his background in psychotherapy. He therefore began to apply to remedies
the same process that he had long been familiar with for patients.
All of this connects both with the therapeutic aspects of the homeopathic consultation
and also in the polarities we can see in the drug pictures. Therefore, what Whitmont has
to say greatly and profoundly enriches the work of homeopaths. His contribution
therefore amounts to a lot more than merely fleshing out the mental aspects of drug
pictures a wee bit. Furthermore, the phenomenon of somatisation of dark ego issues
means that Jungian analysis is directly related to all therapeutic interventions, including
homeopathy. There is an interplay between the unconscious mind and actual bodily
ailments not just in terms of how we might feel about aspects of our body.
He saw each remedy/person compassionately, and very much as individual fragments
or splinters broken from a much broader mosaic of human suffering. The issues that his
work brought to light, concerning damaged self-worth, betrayal, rapture, shyness, lack
of confidence, courage, salvation, self-harm, jealousy, anger, hatred, fear, anxiety, selfloathing, shock, grief, loss, pain, sentimentality, sexual deviance, psychosis, delusions,
clinging, reserve, revenge, secrecy, etc., were all, of course, grist to the mill of a
practising psychotherapist like Whitmont, and he sought to show vividly that the
contents of the homeopathic materia medica resoundingly echo all of that.
From an anthroposophist’s point of view, Ralph Twentyman (5) tells how: Whitmont
attempts "to get beyond the dualism of mind and body and the associated mechanical,
cause-and-effect thinking which still dominates the 'scientific' medicine of to-day.
William Gutman produced some excellent studies in a Goethean spirit. Karl König, an
old associate of Whitmont from Vienna days, produced some on the basis of Steiner's
anthroposophical ideas. Otto Leeser proceeded from orthodox pharmacology, adding the
refinements of provings to the experimental data. All these and others seem to me to
be essential for the task of bringing the raw material of homoeopathy forward....healing
is not to restore patients to the state of health they were previously in but to help them
through to a new phase of life. Illness should be creative."
He believed that the homeopathic provings had revealed mysterious and amazing things
about matter; subtle things alluded to only by alchemists centuries before, and the
significance of which had never been seen or systematically explored until Hahnemann.
He seems to have felt that this aspect of homeopathy connected deeply with Jungian
psychology to reveal interesting aspects of the human psyche, suffering, medicine and
healing.
Whitmont undoubtedly and vividly illuminated the psychology of a range of remedies,
and the materia medica in general. However, the practical application of this
information to homeopathy can prove a more difficult undertaking. The provings data is
clearly useful for illuminating psychotherapy, but the other way round things are not
quite so straightforward.
What he brought to our study of materia medica was a vast psychological insight which
penetrated down like bright sunlight into each remedy, revealing their sharp contrasts
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and hidden depths as actual people and all their psychological frailties. Like actors
moving on a stage, the people who populate the materia medica world were revealed by
Whitmont to be shadows that mirror actual psychological archetypes which dwell deep
within the mental world of humanity itself. This seems to be his most important and
lasting contribution to the homeopathic tradition. “The case for a parallel relationship
between homoeopathy and analytical psychology is made but not stressed. It is
characteristic of this author that he states the case and leaves the reader to make up
his own mind." (1)
Conclusions
Some might see, and therefore dismiss, Whitmont as just another New Ager like
Sheldrake and Capra, dabbling in this and that and writing long-winded and speculative
tracts – with "quantum silliness" (6, p.146) – while others see him as a true philosopher
of genius attempting a grand synthesis and knitting a fabric composed of many aspects
of the exciting post-quantum world we live in and linking together unfinished medieval
aspects of life with much that science has left behind in its assertive, masculine surge
towards rationalism and progress.
He saw the essences found in plant, animal and mineral remedies as acknowledging
"the alchemical roots of homeopathy," (14, p.1) and resonating as a kind of energy set
free and purified by the metamorphosis of potentisation. Take away the molecules and
only the purified essence is left behind. It's a kind of transmutation, a kind of alchemy.
"By undergoing potentization, the original material substance is dematerialized and
thereby spiritualized; the substance's inherent healing properties are released. As such,
homeopathy can be seen as a practical application of alchemy, tapping into the endless
Mercurial fountain, the mystery of the boundless spirit and energy that is present in
matter, the source of healing vitality and animation that lives in a potential form in all of
us." (14, p.4)
Exactly as Paracelsus had said centuries before, as above so below. "The healing
properties of homeopathy derive from profound resonances between substances in the
outside world and phenomena in the inner world of the organism." (14, p.3)
The sub-molecular idea of potentised substance struck him as a primordial dynamic
underpinning all matter, suggesting that a previously undisclosed unknowable essence
resides in every substance. Such an essence forms a drug's unique ‘spiritual fingerprint’
which can be made to manifest its psychic properties only through the proving
technique. The proving thus provided him with sufficient proof that not only humans but
all matter, and thus the entire universe, is permeated by and underpinned with an
otherwise invisible fabric of unseen essences with seemingly infinite and inexhaustible
potential. As he puts it: "the elements of form...precede our material existence." (16,
p.130)
With the symptoms of the provings, homeopathy seems to have provided Whitmont
with the language of the psyche. In other words, through the language of the provings
he found expression of the symbolism and polarities of the collective unconscious.
Homeopathy allowed him to tap into this rich vein of archetypes and see the feminine
and irrational shadow or dark ego, simultaneously providing him with strong
confirmation of his long-standing Jungian and alchemical interests.
He applies his Jungianism equally to society which he holds to be in imbalance because
dominated by the masculine, fragmented, linear, reductionistic, forceful daylight ego
that yearns for rationalism, order, control, progress and domination—qualities all
recognised, rewarded, applauded and revered in our modern technological existence—
while the feminine, the irrational, gentle, circular, holistic, dreamy, intuitive, creative,
emotional and nurturing shadow self or dark ego of humanity remains generally
repressed, ignored, neglected, sidelined, unrecognised, bypassed and unrewarded. In
The Return of the Goddess Whitmont urges that mankind needs urgently to rediscover
those feminine aspects. He thus universalises Jung, homeopathy and alchemy.
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Acknowledgement
I wish to express my grateful thanks to Gregory Vlamis for tracking down and supplying
some of the reference material for this article.
Sources
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1998, Vol.11.4, p.186
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1998), The San Francisco Jung Institute Library Journal, 17:3, 1998, pp.75-76
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p.329
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1992
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pp.56-59
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18. Peter Morrell, Hahnemann: the True Pioneer of Psychiatry, JAIH/AJHM 95.1, January
2003, pp.164-169 & Peter Morrell, Was Hahnemann the Real Pioneer of Psychiatry?
chapter 4 in Johannes & Van der Zee, 2010, pp.86-94
Bibliography
Phillip Bailey, Homeopathic Psychology: Personality Profiles of the Major Constitutional
Remedies
Frederica E Gladwin, People of the Materia Medica World, India: National Homoeopathic
Pharmacy, 1974
Rosemary Gordon, Review of Return of the Goddess, J Analyt Psych 1984, 29.1, pp.8587
Christopher K. Johannes & Harry van der Zee, Homeopathy and Mental Health Care:
Integrative Practice, Principles and Research, Amsterdam: Homeolinks Publishers, 2010
Nicholas Nossaman, Edward C Whitmont, MD, In Memoriam, JAIH 91:3, Autumn, 1998,
pp.292-293
Nicholas Nossaman, Reflections on my Experiences with Edward C Whitmont, JAIH 92.2,
Summer 1999, pp.63-70
Edward C. Whitmont, The Symbolic Quest: Basic Concepts of Analytical
Psychology. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1969
Edward C. Whitmont, Return of the Goddess, New York: Crossroad Publishing Co.,
1982
Edward C. Whitmont, & Sylvia Brinton Perera, Dreams: A Portal to the Source,
London: Routledge, 1989
Photo: Sarah Schaleger
Categories: General
Keywords: Whitmont
Remedies:
The use of dreams in homeopathic treatment
by Jane Tara Cicchetti
Homeopaths have used dreams since Hahnemann’s time. Our repertories and provings
contain many references to dreams, yet there are many questions about how to
effectively use dreams to help locate the simillimum. I would like to address why we
need to use dreams more than in the past and show some techniques that assist in
using dreams in homeopathic practice. Finally, I will present a case where the remedy is
found through a dream and give some suggestions for developing the ability to use
dreams.
Much of what I have learned about the use of dreams is from my mentor and
supervisor, Jungian analyst, V. Walter Odajnyk. Dr. Odajnyk is an analysand of both
Marie Louise von Franz and Edward Edinger who were well-known colleagues of Carl
Jung. I am very grateful to the four of them, for their research and teaching.
Why use dreams in case analysis?
12
Our predecessors asked about food desires, physical modalities and sensations and
often got clear, straightforward answers. It is rare for a contemporary homeopath to
treat an individual who has not had most of his or her mental, general and physical
symptoms suppressed. We live in a very complex and over-medicated society that is
reluctant to allow any physical symptom to go untreated or any mental symptom
untrained. Most people live a life that is so removed from nature that symptoms are
intellectualized and unreliable, making for a very difficult time finding the correct
prescription.
Fortunately, dreams lie outside our ability to manipulate them. We cannot create a false
reality in our dreams or influence them with our will. Material that is suppressed from
the conscious state moves into the subconscious and is frequently expressed through
the dream state. Because the dream is an attempt on the part of the organism to heal
itself, when used and analyzed accurately, material from dreams can lead to some of
the most reliable symptoms in a case. Although they seem ephemeral, dreams are
actually objective facts about a person’s mental and physical state.
Carl Jung said that the most likely reality is that there is no such thing as body and
mind but rather that they are the same life, subject to the same laws, and what the
body does is happening in the mind. This relationship is already quite clear to
homeopaths on one level, however, we often use dreams in a way that misses this
connection. We use the dream as if it were a separate symptom out of the context of
the entirety of the case.
We need techniques that will help us to use dreams so that they enrich the “red thread
that runs throughout the case”. Used in this way, dreams give a clear picture of
pathology, lead us to the remedy and help us to understand the process that is about to
unfold.
Techniques of dream analysis
Similar to homeopathic case taking, techniques of dream analysis are more like nontechniques, an informed and intelligent “stepping out of the way” and allowing the
process to unfold.
One of the most important approaches to using dreams is to understand that no dream
stands alone. It is meaningful only in relationship to the individual dreamer. Therefore,
even though there are symbols in dreams that frequently have particular meanings,
they are only valid symptoms if it is correct and helpful to the dreamer. The dreamer
must be in agreement with the analysis. If the dreamer disagrees or only just “goes
along” it cannot be reliably used as a homeopathic symptom.
To receive accurate information from a dream, we allow the person to speak about his
dream with only a little question here and there when stuck. It is the dreamer who
makes the associations in the dream, who puts the pieces of the puzzle together. The
equivalent to the case taking “what else” when applied to dream analysis is, I don’t
know what it means, what do you think. Or, what do you associate with (this or that
aspect of the dream). As the process goes on the information will unfold and, if the
homeopath can keep his/her “not knowing” mode long enough, a very surprising and
complete picture may emerge.
Dreams that are given during the homeopathic interview are subtly different than the
dreams that are dreamt for psychotherapy. This is because the dreamer dreams the
dream for himself and for the therapist. In the case of the homeopathic interview the
dreamer’s psyche knows it is working within the symbolic realm of homeopathy, so the
information will often be coded with images about the remedy. Also, the clients
associations will be more likely to be directed towards the remedy. All this goes on from
a level that is beneath the conscious mind, it comes from the center of the psyche of
the client to the receptive psyche of the homeopath. The more receptive the psyche of
the homeopath is to the dynamics and interactions of the dream state, the more this
13
will happen. The psyche has its own intelligence and does not speak to those who will
not or cannot hear what it has to say with an unprejudiced ear.
The symbolic realm
When we work with dreams we are entering into the world of imagery and symbols, a
primary way that human beings experience our inner and outer world. This symbolic
realm is pre-verbal and often points to a greater reality than can be expressed in a
more linear form. Symbols and imagery can lead us to the reality of an individual’s
dilemma because, being so fundamental, they are a connection between the mind and
the body. Symbols are defined by Carl Jung as an expression of a spontaneous
experience which points BEYOND ITSELF – that goes beyond the limitation of rational
thought. It is the best description or formula of an unknown fact.
Very often, that unknown fact is exactly what we need to know to find the simillimum.
The following case helps to illustrate how the symbolism found in a childhood dream
points not only to the simillimum but helps us more fully to understand what needs to
be healed in the individual.
This article and case were first published in Simillimum, 1999.
References:
Chevalier, Jean and Gheerbrant, Alain, Dictionary of Symbols, New York, New York,
Penguin Books, 1996
14
Jung, C.G., the Practice of Psychotherapy, Princeton N.J., Princeton University Press.
1985.
Whitmont, M.D., Edward C. The Symbolic Quest, Princeton, N.J., Princeton University
Press. 1991.
Von Franz, Marie- Louise, The Way of the Dream, Boston, Mass. Shambhala
Publications, 1992.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Adam Elsheimer; Jacob's dream
Categories: General
Keywords: dream analysis, symbols, Carl Jung
Remedies:
The Axis Mundi: a case where the remedy is found from a
dream
by Jane Tara Cicchetti
Marie, 53-year-old woman. Artist/photographer. She is married and has three children.
She has very low energy; tired all the time. A general sense of not feeling successful in
life and a great sense of internal emptiness. She has trouble learning and thinks she
may have ADD: “I don’t metabolize information that comes into me. I don’t feel enough
in my body.”
Although she has three grown children, she has not been an active participant in raising
them. Her mother dominated the early training of her children.
Aside from low energy, she presently has no physical pathology. There is a history of
rickets as a baby.
She looks much younger than her age. She is small and has a childlike look and
demeanor. She is very pleasant; she has a beautiful smile.
She does photography, calligraphy, sculpture and installations.
She shows me photos of her installations. Some are beautiful cloth hangings hung from
hemlock trees in a forest. Others are twigs wrapped with colored wire.
Dream from childhood:
“The house that I lived in would never be lived in by anyone else and there were flames
all around it.”
Now, this is indeed a very short dream and we might wonder: What could we do with
this dream. Do we use the symptoms dreams of burning houses? Or dreams of fire? Not
necessarily. The first step is to ask the dreamer what the dream means to her. I now
proceed with the analysis of the dream and ask: “What does this mean? What is the
flame?” Her associations: “A protective flame – slow, steady. I probably needed to do
that because I was terrified out there. When I was little, somebody told me there was a
boogie man in my house; it terrified me. Trust in the world was cut off at that point.”
Now, as often happens in dream analysis, she slips into another association. It relates
to the feeling of not being safe that has been stimulated by the association of being
terrified. Now she tells us why. At times, these associations can be very helpful in
15
finding the remedy. At other times, as in this case, they help us to understand the
underlying emotions.
“At 4 or 5 I wet my pants. Mom was so furious – she set me on the hot radiator. It
wasn’t safe! She was a loose cannon – she would erupt.”
I let her speak and then bring her back to the actual dream by asking again about the
specifics. I ask her to tell me more about the flame because I feel that it is an essential
aspect to understand. Remember that I have very few other symptoms to go on in this
case. The fact that she has remembered this dream is a door that may lead to the
remedy. “It’s the burning bush – the presence of God; the flame that isn’t consumed,
the Axis mundi. I pray a lot that’s how I can bear the situation, particularly with my
youngest child; someone will watch over her. I get relief from prayer. But it’s … I didn’t
finish this job either (with my daughter) and I turned it over to God.”
Analysis
The house represents her psychic structure; it’s empty, the void, surrounded by the
presence of God.The hole or emptiness, however, is also the gap to the other world.
This is why she has this sense of emptiness and as we can see from her associations,
she is very spiritual. The flame of god protected her but she needs human comfort as
well. This sense of emptiness is a very important symptom. The feeling of emptiness is
in a dream that she remembers from her childhood and she tells about this sense of
emptiness in the very beginning of her anamnesis. It is a spiritual issue: she must to
come to grips with the presence of God in her life and with the void or emptiness in a
different way. So, our first symptom is emptiness. Then, she associates the flame of
God with the Axis Mundi. Here, we have something very interesting: an archetypal
symbol. For a symbol to be archetypal means that it has existed in human
consciousness in pretty much the same form for hundreds or thousands of years, and
its meaning is greater than the meaning that can be understood through one individual.
Because of its universal context, we need to understand the universal meaning of this
symbol in order to find its significance in the case. It is my experience that when an
archetypal symbol found in a dream pulls the whole case together, it is very related to
the actual substance of the remedy. Our second symptom is Axis Mundi- a symptom
from the archetypal realm. Finally, she associates all this with her connection to God
and to praying. And what does she say about these prayers? She says she turns her
responsibilities for her children over to God through prayers but she is aware that she
personally needs to finish this job. Using this statement coming from the association in
the dream and adding the fact that even though she has many skills as an artist, she
does not find deep satisfaction and success in her work, I choose the third symptom:
undertakes many things, perseveres in nothing.
Now, we have three symptoms, emptiness, Axis Mundi and undertakes many things,
perseveres in nothing. The first symptom – emptiness – is in the repertory in several
forms: Mind, emptiness, Mind, Delusions, emptiness, and Generalities, emptiness,
hollow sensation.
For Axis Mundi, I look up the universal meaning of this archetypal symbol to see if
anything in it responds to the whole of this woman’s story. I often use The Dictionary of
Symbols by Jean Chevalier because it is a compilation of information from many
traditions. In looking under axis, I find what I am looking for. (If I had not, I would
have resorted to the internet, which has practically become my second repertory.)
Under axis is found: “The axis around which the world revolves, links the dominions or
hierarchical levels together by their mid-points. If the junction of Heaven and Earth is
taken, then it is the precise center of Earth to the precise center of Heaven, symbolized
by the Pole Star.” Is her remedy the Pole star? Let us not stop just yet and continue to
investigate this archetype. It is very important to use information that we find on
archetypal symbols with the same care that we use when selecting other characteristic
symptoms in a case. The information must fit into the whole case and help connect the
totality of symptoms that will direct us to the choice of a remedy. If we use books that
interpret dreams we can make some big mistakes. The interpretation of the symbol
must make sense in terms of the whole picture.
16
Even if we make a big mistake, however, we are not totally lost; the next dreams will
often tell us that we made a mistake and try to correct us. Of course, we must be
willing to listen! The definition continues: “In space, the Axis Mundi is the polar axis in
time of the solstices. Its symbolic representations are numberless, but it is seen most
often as the tree and the mountain, but also as lance, staff, pillar lingam, a chariot pole
or axle or columns of light or smoke. The idea of the Axis Mundi, the cosmic Pillar,
recurs, from America through Africa and Siberia to Australasia.”
Now that we know a little more about the Axis Mundi, we move to the next symptom:
“undertakes many things, perseveres in nothing,” a symptom found in the repertory.
Finally, we have one more symptom that does not appear in the dream: she had rickets
in childhood. It is especially important because it is a physical symptom and rounds out
the otherwise one-sidedness of the repertorization. We cannot specifically repertorize
Axis Mundi.
Repertory
Undertakes many things, perseveres in nothing
Hurry, haste, desire to do many things at once but cannot finish
Thoughts, vanishing
Mind, dull, unable to think
Rachitis (rickets)
In our repertorization, we see Pinus sylvestris as the ninth remedy. This is very
interesting because suddenly, the case makes sense. Pinus sylvestris or Scotch pine fits
in beautifully with the idea of the world tree – the Axis Mundi. It is a pine tree that is
often used as a Christmas tree, which, incidentally, is often topped by a star – the Pole
star. All trees can symbolize the Axis Mundi but the Christmas tree is a traditional
representative of the tree in relation to the Pole star. Notice that the major symptom,
emptiness, is not covered in the repertorization. In Asa Hershoff and David Warkentin’s
research on tree remedies, we know that the feeling of emptiness is a symptom that
belongs to remedies in the conifer family. Finally, with the exquisite elegance that only
comes from an organizing power greater than ours, the client makes art in conifer trees.
17
Prescription: Pinus sylvestrus 200c split dose (evening and next morning) and 12c 1x
a day
One month after taking the remedy, Marie reported having better energy. The sense of
emptiness as begun to decrease. She says it feels like a thin tube of energy growing
inside. She continues to improve and I have been following her progress through her
dreams for the last five months. So far, Pinus sylvestris has continued to guide her on
her path.
The remedy: Pinus sylvestris
Doctrine of Signatures (from Bach)
Scots pine, native to the Scottish highlands, a land known for high morals and
introversion. It is grown for Christmas trees. The tree’s crown has a tendency to grow in
irregular branches and appears crooked. In the pine state, the personal “crown’ of pride
in oneself is damaged or out of line.
Developing the ability work with dreams
To get reliable information from dreams we need not only to learn technique but
prepare ourselves for the adventure. One way to understand deeply hidden symptoms
found in dreams is to be connected to our own dreams. One can achieve this by keeping
a dream journal. When I teach, I ask my students to keep a journal of their dreams for
several weeks before the seminar begins and we use some of this material during the
course. The journal is a very important part of learning dream analysis because a dream
is a living entity, one that transforms and creates transformation as we work with it. In
order to engage in dream work, we must be open to and prepared for that type of
18
encounter. The dream often shows the relationship that the client has to the
homeopath, positive or negative, and we must be ready to see that.
It is also helpful to have someone to tell your dreams to. A professional who is trained
in dream analysis is the best choice, but if it is not possible, any attentive ear will be
better than doing it on your own. We tend not to be able to see what our own dreams
are telling us because it is “behind our back” and therefore out of sight. Jung did not
have anyone who could analyze his dreams professionally and he would use anyone
who came along. Even though they did not necessarily get it right, it was nevertheless
enough to stimulate his thinking.
Who is dreaming?
I would like to end by telling a story about a dream that was dreamt by the 4th century
philosopher and mystic Chuang Tzu. He once dreamed that he was a butterfly. This
dream left him wondering if he was a man who dreamt that he was a butterfly or
whether he was a butterfly who dreamt that he was a man. Dreams are not static
symptoms; they are living impulses that come from the very center or matrix of the
individual, that inner circle of our psyche that acts as a compass to guide us on our
way. Who is the dream maker?
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Scots Pine Pinus sylvestris, Sgurr na Lapaich, Glen Affric, Scotland; Erik Fitzpatrick
Categories: Cases
Keywords: dream analysis, Axis Mundi, emptiness, archetypal symbol, undertakes
many things, perseveres in nothing
Remedies:
Using Astro-psychology with homeopathy
by Kris Frank
The term astro-psychology (1) denotes how a person’s natal horoscope can help
understand their psychology, including the potential at birth on all levels from a holistic
perspective. Being astrologically literate entails being able to read a birth chart to derive
the meaning of the positions of all the planets in all the signs. Astro-psychology has, of
course, no formal connection with homeopathy nor with psychology but is a very useful
adjunct to both.
19
In a letter to the Hindu astrologer, B.V.
Raman, on 6th September, 1947, Carl Jung wrote: "Since you want to know my opinion
about astrology I can tell you that I've been interested in this particular activity of the
human mind since more than 30 years. As I am a psychologist, I am chiefly interested
in the particular light the horoscope sheds on certain complications in the character. In
cases of difficult psychological diagnosis I usually get a horoscope in order to have a
further point of view from an entirely different angle. I must say that I very often found
that the astrological data elucidated certain points which I otherwise would have been
unable to understand. From such experiences I formed the opinion that astrology is of
particular interest to the psychologist.” (2)
Jung, too, wrote about his study of astro-psychology and of particular interest is his
own research on marriage relationships in relation to planetary positions and
astrological signs. He seemed to adopt an objective viewpoint and to be convinced that
here was something worth studying that could be of use to the psychologist (3).
With his immersion in anthroposophy followed by the encounter with Jung, it is not
surprising to learn from his daughter, Sarah Schaleger, that Edward Whitmont drew up
the charts of his patients as a matter of course. He quotes Gauguelin’s study of birth
charts showing possible correlation between planetary positions and a person’s
occupation. He combined psychology with astrology and, as we know, went further by
bringing in homeopathy, being perhaps the first to combine them in his practice as a
triad of disciplines. Sadly, he never wrote about his experience.
Some astrologers think that astro-psychology works not in a causative, but in a
symbolic way. In other words, there is no celestial or cosmic mechanism that causes a
person to have a certain personality at birth but, rather, the birth chart may be viewed
in a slightly similar way to an I Ching or tarot reading, albeit more permanent.
Whitmont’s discussion of non-causality (4) suggests that he may have possibly thought
along these lines although he did not mention astrology specifically in this context.
Jung, on the other hand, raised the possibility of a causal connection and, more
recently, there have even been scientists, swimming against the stream, who have
ventured with their own theories to that effect (5). A scientific explanation may one day
be forthcoming although, most likely, from within a new scientific paradigm. In the
meantime, it must be realised that a causative explanation implies that, alongside
genes and the psycho-physical environment, there are astro-morphic forces which act
as a third factor in determining and shaping our constitutions and personalities. If, as
20
homeopaths, we are prepared to accept that, then awareness of these forces can at
times inform our prescribing and case management.
Astro-psychology and homeopathy
There have been several articles in the homeopathic literature over the last few decades
about using the elements of Fire, Earth, Air and Water to help understand the patient mainly stemming from the map of elements developed by Israeli homeopath Joseph
Reeves, which many teachers call the ‘Circle’ of elements, but which Misha Norland has
renamed the ‘Mappa Mundi’.
There has been almost nothing that looks at how we can use a patient’s birth chart to
help us understand the patient apart from focusing on the elements. An unpublished
final-year dissertation proved to be a step in this direction, attempting to link certain
constitutional types to particular sun-signs (6).
.
Instances of where astro-psychology can be helpful in the homeopathic
context:
~ When our understanding of a case is limited, with no idea of what to give.
This especially applies after several prescriptions have failed. Also, where the person is
obviously sick and suffering but no medical diagnosis is forthcoming, and / or when the
symptoms are all common ones, or there are too few symptoms in the case (the twolegged stool) - then techniques involving the natal chart and transiting planetary
positions may help to elucidate what is going on in the inner psychology of the patient.
(An example of this will be given later.)
~ In case of uncertainty about whether to prescribe for the central dynamic
(expressed by the natal chart) or for a ‘happening’ - an acute or chronic acute,
a ‘side issue’ that seems to manifest as a recent ‘layer’ and often seems
unrelated to the central dynamic, delusion, or sensation.
Sometimes, this can be due to an astrological transit (the positions of particular planets
as they move now in relation to where they were on the birth chart). Jung wrote: “I
have observed many cases where a well-defined psychological phase, or an analogous
event, was accompanied by a transit (particularly when Saturn and Uranus were
affected).” ³
~ The natal chart can be useful, too, in counselling clients about their
relationships with others, or in helping them understand their own ‘stuckness’.
A patient of mine was convinced that her mother-in-law disliked her, and would not
believe her husband when he said this was not the case. In the course of homeopathic
treatment, we spent much of one session focusing on the issue that concerned her.
With the mother-in-law’s date of birth, I was able to ascertain that the she had been
unable to demonstrate affection in a normal way, and her coldness was not directed at
my patient in a personal way but was part of her personality structure. That
transformed my patient’s understanding of her mother-in-law’s behaviour and made her
seeming coldness much easier to deal with for my patient.
An instance of where homeopathy can assist research into the nature of astropsychology:
One criticism incurred by astrologers is their tendency to make the person fit the birth
chart or vice versa. My term for this is ‘automatic convergence'. One way to minimise it
is by attempting to predict which planets one would expect to be involved in the central
dynamic of their natal horoscope. (That is done once the first consultation is over, and
21
from one’s accumulated knowledge of the patient’s story and personality.) This then can
be checked against the actual birth chart on the computer to test the accuracy of the
astro-psychological theory.
A limitation of that method is that, without the time and place of birth, one is unable to
ascertain a person’s rising sign, nor the exact position of their moon. Another, is that
the prediction rate is in proportion to one’s acquired experience.
If the principles of astro-psychology have not just been adopted as received wisdom,
then procedures like this can help the open-minded practitioner to test out the theory of
astro-psychology. According to Karl Popper (7), no theory can be regarded as scientific
unless it is capable of being proved true or false, and this is the philosophical bedrock of
all modern science. To do that is not always an easy task and even some seemingly
scientific theories fail to meet the criterion, String Theory in theoretical physics being a
current example of this.
The method of experimentation outlined above, while not without flaws and caveats,
might go some way towards satisfying Popper’s ‘falsifiabilty’ criterion and therefore
partially solve the problem of 'automatic convergence'.
Different ways that the birth chart may be used in homeopathic analysis:
~ Assess what element each planet is in, to find out the overall balance of the
four elements.
This can be for various purposes, one of which is to get an idea of the kingdoms. A
predominance of Water might suggest a sea remedy; if all Earth, then one might think
of the mineral kingdom or certain plants; if all planets and lights (lights is the old word
for the Sun and Moon) are in Air, that might make one consider a gas or certain
imponderables; and I will leave you to consider what might be suggested by having
almost all planets in Fire.
Of course, these are maybes and possibilities. We must always consider the polarity
between Fire and Air, and Earth and Water. I had a client once whose chart was all
Earth but her spoken imagery was all watery. She seemed to be compensating for what
she lacked. Most people, though, are a mixture of elements, which makes the choice of
kingdom less easy. I find in case analysis with students and colleagues that there is a
tendency to rush into a decision on the kingdom too early and with inadequate
information. Only very occasionally do I use the elements as guide towards finding the
kingdom, and only when there is a clear predominance of one.
22
~
Look at the the central dynamic of the chart (the pattern of lines drawn in the
centre circle between planets) and get a feel of the effect.
Very occasionally, the pattern alone can give one an idea for a particular remedy or
family of remedies. This should of course, if at all possible, be borne out by the
symptomatology. Are there one, or two, planets that are controlling everything? What
are they and how do their astrological qualities relate to the symptomatology, dynamic
or story of the patient.
Example: What impression do you get from the central pattern in the chart below? It
belonged to a patient of mine. Ignatia had helped her greatly in 1995 while her husband
was suffering from motor neurone disease, but stopped working soon after he died, and
for several years nothing worked at all. All her symptoms were common symptoms,
such as lassitude and tiredness, with hundreds of remedies listed for each symptom and
with very few modalities. Eventually, I was forced to prescribe on her chart alone.
The pattern we see at the centre looks like a two-dimensional form of what, in
geometry, is called a Five Simplex, or Hexateron.
I immediately thought of a crystal of some kind and, in the days before the internet
could furnish us with instant information, I prescribed Adamas, partly because over
several years, with a dying husband and two wayward and disturbed teenage
daughters, she had coped amazingly under huge emotional pressure without ever
showing the sign of an emotional crack (and the structure on the birth chart appeared
to be a very strong one). The only other minor characteristic of a diamond was that she
always seemed emotionally very flat when arriving for a consultation, but left with
sparkling eyes following some humorous banter at the end of the consultation, (shining
23
from reflected light). I had also heard somewhere that in their natural state, before
being cut, a diamond only has six sides.
Adamas broke the log-jam of ‘no change’ in the patient, improving her energy, mood
and physical symptoms whenever they returned, where no other remedy had acted.
~ Some homeopaths use the principles of traditional medical astrology (8).
Medical astrology is an ancient system that associates the planets and signs with
particular parts of the body and specific tendencies to illness. It is very occasionally
employed by homeopaths, as when choosing herbs and supplements.
~ One can look at the transits of the planets as they are affecting the person
now.
A transit in astro-psychology is a method of interpreting the continuous movements of a
planet in terms of its effects on a person. To do that, a comparison has to be made
between the position of the planet at a given moment and that of other planets fixed in
the natal horoscope (the two-dimensional map of the psycho-physical forces active at
the moment of birth). Specific attention is given to the angles that these transiting
planets make with the natal planetary positions of an individual (called ‘aspects’).
Why has the patient come to consult a homeopath now? In the case of a sudden flareup, what might have caused it, if no other external cause is apparent? When is the
transit due to finish? Might the patient’s chronic flare-up be due to a transit and,
therefore, be self-limiting and, if minor, not needing homeopathic intervention?
Alternatively, with the apparent onset of serious disease, what was the exciting cause
and could a transit be responsible? Should we treat it at all, or prescribe only for the
central dynamic structure of the birth chart? Although the latter is only the potential,
and not a disease, it does reveal much, in depth, about the person and their
constitution.
This brings up the general question of causation. Caution is needed for, if a transiting
planet can sometimes cause a health phenomenon, can we be sure that our
homeopathic prescribing acted curatively, or was it just that the transit had come to an
end? We should remain forever cautious about ascribing credit to a given remedy
prescription.
However, it is still of course possible for a patient suffering from a challenging transit to
derive great benefit from the homeopathic prescription that helps them weather a
period of physical or psychological instability thrown up by such a transit. It can often
help them manage what otherwise might be a frightening and confusing period.
This raises another important point for prescribing astro-psychologists. If a flare-up of
chronic complaint occurs at the start of a major transit and the chosen remedy palliates
well but does not cure, it is not necessarily the wrong remedy, although that is of
course a strong possibility. It maybe that the effect of some transits, whether physical
or psychological, is just too strong even for the simillimum.
For those open to such explanations the fact, too, of being aware of why it is happening
often helps patients cope with their instability during a transit.
~ Provings of planetary light
For homeopaths who use astro-psychology, there exist, too, the provings of Sol, Luna,
Light of Venus, and Light of Saturn with, hopefully, more to come. To skeptics, most of
them will never be more than the reflected light of the sun, however, there are cured
cases suggesting that this light is somehow transformed into a number of different
healing medicines, possibly bringing with it an accumulated memory of the dynamic of
each of the planetary bodies.
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They may sometimes be indicated as remedies in patients where a particular planet is
central to the dynamic inherent in their natal horoscope. They might, too, sometimes be
effective when prescribed for the effects of a specific planetary transit. However, as yet,
there is a paucity of recorded cases.
Conclusion
Homeopathy, astrology and psychology are two of the most fascinating humanistic
disciplines. They can be an invaluable combination. For finding the simillimum, astrology
is not needed every time, yet it remains in our toolbox for when needed and as a
constant support.
On this hundredth anniversary of Whitmont’s birth, perhaps it is a fitting time to form a
group of like-minded, astrologically literate, astro-psychologists who practise
homeopathy. Those interested may contact me via astrohoms@gmail.com.
References
1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_astrology
2
http://elizabethspring.com/Jung_and_Astrology.html
3 G.C. Jung - Collected Works, Vol. 8, pp 459-483 edited by Sir Herbert Read
(Routeledge & Kegan Paul).
4 Edward Whitmont - Psyche and Substance, 1980 (North Atlantic Books).
5 Dr Percy Seymour (Astronomer) - The Scientific Proof of Astrology, 1997, St Martins
Press, New York (and 2004, Quantum).
6 Lyn Ringuet - Comparing Homeopathy and Astrology (Arsenicum and Virgo), London
School of Classical Homeopathy, 1997 (Not Published)
7 Karl Popper - Logik der Forschung, 1934; ‘The Logic of Research’, 1959.
8
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_astrology
Photos: Wikimedia Commons
C.G.Jung; public domain
Categories: General
Keywords: Astro-psychology, homeopathy, Carl Jung, Mappa Mundi, astrological
transit
Remedies:
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Comments:
Dr.K.C.Muraleedharan
Posts: 1
Astropsychology
Reply #1 on : Fri September 28, 2012, 18:11:22
Are we going backwards?One side, our scientists are struggling to prove
the materialism in homoeopathic potencies,but in other hand we are
publishing such articles where hypothesizing to combine astrology &
homoeopathy. Combining both this (homoeopathy and Astrology)will
25
definitely damage the system than any allopathic propaganda.It is my
humble request to all homoeopaths that please abstain from such
misguiding informations.
Write a comment
Sabina : Mysterium - A dream teaching
by Rachel Koenig
We have not thereby explained the law of similars. Like every fact of life and nature, we
have simply to accept it as basic, indeed axiomatic, not subject to any further
explanation. Any further questions as to “why” are as unanswerable as questions about
the why of gravitation. The absolute and ultimate mystery of being does not reveal itself
to the human mind. [P&S, p. 40]
Whenever I reflect upon Edward Whitmont, I am immediately brought into a timeless
sensation, as if our contact cannot be recalled without recalling the dreaming-ness his
very being exuded, for to leave that dimension would be to exit the only realm that can
contain relationship in its dynamism, in its wholeness. This may be a way of saying the
obvious, that Dr Whitmont himself, his presence, was extraordinary, and that for many
– his students, his patients, his colleagues, and his readers – he emanated a tangible
force, or “Self-field” as he called it. That is to say, he was a living remedy.
I heard of his passing through fellow students who had, like me, sat in a simple circle,
season upon season, in a tiny room off his main house in the woods of Connecticut, or
out upon redwood picnic benches on the generous porch when weather permitted. I
attended his moving memorial, feeling a spiritual necessity to face his death, but I was
not alone that night in sensing a light and a vibrancy still among us.
I was greatly saddened. Having no real way to process the loss in a familial or
communal sense, I was left with my hand-scribbled notes, his generous photocopied
materia medica (which I still consult), and my precious cassettes. Despite my Buddhist
grounding in the Truth of Impermanence, I missed Dr Whitmont. Perhaps because my
experience of Whitmont was one of sharing in the presence of a seemingly timeless
being – an “old soul”, a master – his bodily non-eternity was harder for me to accept.
So, it was indeed among the most remarkable experiences of my life to receive, nearly
a year after his death, the gift of a dream – a luminous dream teaching, whose
recollection has ever since been a source of healing relief. The Tibetans say one can
make a fine distinction between an ordinary karmic dream, one that simply discharges
our mundane existential stress, and a dream of clarity, that is, a dream which brings us
into the state of luminosity and awareness.
I am sitting at a long and marvelous table, the wood is of fine, old world quality, and
there is plenty of space. The room is full of light. At the head of the table is Ron
Whitmont, and to his left, his father, Dr Whitmont. I am seated across from them, at
the far end of the table but facing Dr Whitmont directly. I am aware that I am taking
notes with my favorite writing pen, an emerald green and black and gold Pelican. We
are discussing the case, filling in Dr Whitmont, and, though I am dreaming, all of the
case details are real.
It is my patient, Eve. She has suffered years upon years of miscarriage. Ron has sent
her to me, although she is also his patient. I am remembering how surprised I was that
Ron had referred her, because it is rather like sending her to the village healer. He and
his wife are MDs, after all. And besides, I feel the remedy Ron has given her was
correct. Ron is her homeopath, and my role is to give her acupuncture, and perhaps,
some herbs.
I am secretly wondering if she might need, however, something else? I am recalling as
Ron presents her case to us, that after many sessions with me, on a recent visit, Eve
had sobbingly confessed that she felt her infertility was connected to an abortion which
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she had kept hidden from her husband, and her doctors, including Ron. Rivers of tears
flowed during that session while I mirrored for her how many women of her generation
had freely made the same choice, and still conceived. There was nothing to be ashamed
of. It had not been the right time, or the right partner for her.
‘Women have always had ways
of dissolving conceptions that were ill-timed,’ I assured her, listing the many ancient
herbs that had been utilized, such as wild carrot, Peruvian Bark, pennyroyal, and
juniper. Juniper, I think to myself, inside the dream, as Ron is reciting the symptoms
that led him to give Eve Sabina (Juniperus), 200c.
His father is nodding, “yes yes yes” to each of the physicals Ron enumerates. ‘Her flow
is liquid, bright red, pains extending from sacrum to pubes, stabbing, aching, as if the
bones would separate… and she cannot tolerate music…’ I keep thinking about how
Sabina was used as an abortificant by ancient women, and how beautiful it is,
alchemically, that what can abort in Galenic herbal form can cure miscarriage in
homeopathic potency. I am silent. Lost in time. Somehow I cannot break her
confidentiality.
Suddenly Dr Whitmont thunders, “Yes, yes, Ron has given the Simillimum, but YOU!”
His gaze pierces my soul, ‘YOU gave her the ~~~.” A word is said in the dream that I
cannot bring out… something outside of my vocabulary… What did I give her? I am
aching to know! I am staring into Whitmont’s gaze trying to place the word. Something
occurs that I must say,“Dr Whitmont, aren’t you dead?” I ask, still staring into his eyes,
mesmerized. A golden luminosity surrounds him, and he breaks into a Cheshire Cat
smile, chuckling on and on in that biting, ironic way he had, “Vat do you zink, darlink?”
he asks me, reverting comically to his Viennese accent, eyes beaming with vitality.
I know, now, that there is no such thing, really, as death. I understand from him, as if
in a mind-to-mind transmission, full of heart and humor and light, that reality is totally
27
fluid, and that he has not, through his death, ceased to be a guide, a teacher, a being of
light.
When I awaken, I am suffused with healing sensation. And yet, the word I could not
decipher in the dream still plagues me. I share the dream with my partner, telling him
that it had the sound, nearly, of the word albino, but with a long “e”, al-bee-no.
Although intimately shared, the mysterious word remained veiled, left to obscurity
amidst the lost tongues of dreamtime.
Some months later, I happen to meet Alex Grey, the visionary painter. We are old
acquaintances, and I feel easy telling him the dream, as he has worked deeply in his art
on altered states of consciousness. "What could he have meant when he said in the
dream, ‘You have given her the albino/al/bee/no?'” I ask Alex.
After some time, Alex cocked his head and asked, “Could Whitmont have said ‘albedo’?”
“’Albedo!’ Why yes, Alex, that word is even closer in sound to the dream word! My God,
I think that is it! What on earth does it mean?”
“Well, wasn’t Whitmont an alchemist?” Alex queried.
“Yes,” I responded, “He even wrote a book called the Alchemy of Healing…”
Alex explained how the albedo was one of several important stages in Alchemy, one
which represented the process of washing clean, of purification.
Marie-Louise von Franz in her lectures on Alchemy has characterized the albedo as the
process of taking back our projections:
“In alchemical literature it is generally said that the great effort and trouble continues
from the nigredo to the albedo; that is said to be the hard part, and afterwards
everything becomes easier…” [MvF, p. 220]
“Alex, that’s astonishing. Because the patient in the dream had confessed to me
something she was very ashamed of, and I had worked with her to come to terms with
it – yes, to purify it, in fact.” I remembered and shared now with Alex, “this patient did
once again become pregnant. And this time, she carried to term.”
Von Franz continues, “The negredo – the blackness, the terrible depression and state of
dissolution – has to be compensated for by the hard work of the alchemist and that
hard work consists, among other things, in constant washing; therefore even the work
of the washerwoman is often mentioned in the text, or constant distilling, which is also
done with the object of purification, for the metal is evaporated and then precipitated
into another vessel, thus removing the heavier substances… through this hard work the
matter becomes white. Whiteness suggests purification, no longer being contaminated
with matter, which would mean what we analysts call technically, and so lightly, 'taking
back our projections'. That is not an easy thing to do; it is something very complicated
and difficult, for it is not as though one understood that one was projecting and would
therefore not do it any more. It needs a long process of inner development and
realization for a projection to come back. When it has been withdrawn, the disturbing
emotional factor vanishes.
“As soon as the projection is really withdrawn a sort of peace establishes itself - one
becomes quiet and can look at the thing from an objective angle. One can look at the
specific problem or factor in an objective and quiet way and perhaps do some active
imagination about it without constantly becoming emotional, or falling back into the
emotional tangle. That corresponds to the albedo… what the alchemist symbolized with
the idea of whitening was that the material they had been working on had now reached
a form of purity and oneness… the experience is consolidated, and finally the work
holds.” [MvF, 222, 223]
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“So, Whitmont was saying that his son gave the patient the right remedy. What did you
call it?” Alex asked, sincerely curious.
“Sabina! Yes, it was what we call her simillimum.”
“But,” Alex continued, “Whitmont seems to have wanted you both to know that she also
needed, and you had given her, the albedo.”
The Simillimum: Sabina
Sabina, Juniperus Sabina, a conifer, a cypress, a small tree or shrub that is found all
over Europe. An ancient plant that traces all the way back to antiquity, “Gossip records
a miracle,” states Pliny the Elder, “that to rub the crushed berries all over the male part
before coition prevents conception.” Another source of the same era advises the woman
to place the crushed berries on the vulva prior to insertion. “One way or the other,”
John Riddle notes, “juniper is inserted in the woman’s vagina and there it will act either
as a contraceptive or an abortificant. Juniper was also taken orally… The abortive
qualities of juniper generally are attributed to [the major component of]… its essential
oil… sabinyl acetate.”
A plant demonized in the witch-hunting era, savin (sabina or juniper) was said to
provoke “the courses”, “cause miscarriage” and to have the capacity to expel a “dead
child.” For this reason, Oxford physician John Peachey, who well knew the medicinal
aspects of plants, wrote in his 1694 Compleat Herbal of Physical Plants that savin was “
too well known and too much used by Wenches.” As recently as 1852 the Assize of
Cornwall, Dr Pascoe was indicted for a criminal abortion by giving oil of savin (juniper,
sabina) to a woman “with intent to procure miscarriage.” [Riddle].
Whitmont writes, in Psyche and Substance,“Complementation of two entities means
that only both together represent the whole; the same road is travelled, the same ends
are accomplished by what on the surface may appear as different or even opposite
means and ways.” Sabina, healer and capacitor of miscarriage. Clearly, Ron Whitmont
had identified the simillimum, regardless of what the patient, Eve, had left unrevealed.
The Albedo
And what of the albedo and the alchemical purification? What happened in the
therapeutic encounter the day that Eve was able to reveal her grief, her shame, her
shadow? In the Alchemy of Healing, Whitmont wrote about the ways in which the healer
as field, is catalytic: “… by virtue of his attunement to the Self-field and to the
implicate-order essences hidden in outer-world substance dynamics… [the healer] also
serves as transmitter and mediator of the symbolic similie of the new pattern. Through
this the renewing consciousness of the entelechy, the Guiding Self, may emerge.”
This, Whitmont concludes, is what has been: “concretized in myth and alchemy as the
process of creating or refining gold and the lapis, the philosopher’s stone.” [AH, 214]
“The alchemists held that the transformation of base substances into gold constituted
the bringing forth and purifying of an innermost divine essence that lies dormant in
earthly existence. This process was considered tantamount to a ‘healing’ of a ‘diseased’
substance… Transformation, purification, and generation of this Lapis or eternal Self on
a psyche-substance level was a quasi-cosmic healing. [AH, 48]
“By analogy to the “purification” rites that restore the “gold” to its divine source, the
status-quo resistance submits itself to the essence of the entelchy. It allows itself to be
‘shaken up’ by therapeutic modalities that mediate an influx that is ‘similar’ and
corresponding to the nature of the impasse-provoking intruder on vital, emotional or
spiritual levels.
“In this category belong also the approaches of ‘specifics’: homeopathic medicine,
acupuncture, and the insight method of depth-psychotherapy, as well as the activity of
29
the shaman who calls upon the ‘helping spirits’ or ‘extracts’ the illness from the body…
all restore the vital flow and can also ‘unfreeze’ and bring to awareness emotional
tensions and memories that were ‘buried’ in the physical body and modified the vital
field.” [AH, 214]
Had, then, the field itself sent Eve to be “shaken up”, to be witnessed and administered
the albedo by the very witchly healer, the alchemical “washerwoman,” in whose Selffield Sabina, the plant so long demonized for its abortive qualities, or revered for its
contraception, could mystically complete its homeopathic dynamic, bringing to bear its
secretively fertile, generating, life-sustaining action?
“It is an awesome feeling to realize that in this way, disturbed, conflict-trapped organic
or psychic functioning is, by virtue of the resonance of similarity, connected
instantaneously (or at least atemporarily) to macrocosmic form analogues in some other
person or in some plant, animal or mineral substance.” [AH, 215]
The dream gift
Whitmont’s dream wisdom transmission, his directive, was to consider how both the
simillimum and the albedo (or the alchemical principle) were necessary for healing.
Anima/Animus, Yin & Yang, Substance & Healer, One without the Other is simply not
effective. “Alchemy ostensibly concerned itself with the transformation of substance.
But it held that for the work to be effective, there must be no separation between soul,
spirit, substance and body… any transformation depends upon and includes the
interaction of body, soul and spirit of both subject and object. Even for substance to be
transformed, its body, soul and spirit must be interacted with the body, soul and spirit
of the laborant.” [AH, 49]
This dream was, indeed, a Portal to the Source – a potent, metaphysical encounter with
the energetic, lapis-golden-brilliant sage-presence of Whitmont, whom the alchemical
Taoists would surely call Immortal.
References
John Berger, ‘Twelve Theses on the Economy of the Dead,’ Hold Everything Dear:
Dispatches on Survival and Resistance, Pantheon, 2007.
30
Ione, Listening In Dreams, I Universe, 2005.
Marie-Louise von Franz, Alchemy, An Introduction to the Symbolism and the
Psychology, Studies in Jungian Psychology, 1980.
Namkai Norbu, Dream Yoga and the Practice of Natural Light, Snow Lion Publications,
1992.
John Riddle, Eve’s Herbs, A History of Contraception and Abortion in the West, Harvard
University Press, 1997.
Edward C. Whitmont M.D., The Alchemy of Healing: Psyche and Soma, North Atlantic
Books & Homeopathic Educational Services, 1993.
Edward C. Whitmont M.D., Psyche and Substance: Essays on Homeopathy in the Light
of Jungian Psychology, North Atlantic Books & Homeopathic Educational Services, 1980.
Sylvia Brinton Perera & Edward C. Whitmont, Dreams, A Portal to the Source,
Routledge, 1989.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Juniperus sabina; H.Zell
Splendor Solis; Women washing; public domain