Thematic Repertory and Materia Medica of the Mind Symptoms

From the Book

INTRODUCTION
J.A. Mirilli, MD

When I first read a Pure Materia Medica I was amazed by the chaotic organization of the symptoms and so for several years I stayed away from them choosing to study instead the clinical materia medica where the symptoms are organized. During my classes on Kent's and GEHSH's course of studies I could not believe the struggle to study the symptoms, which was something totally unintelligible to me.

By the time I understood the experimental nature of homeopathic symptoms and checked the precise description of the symptoms, a complete change happened on my perception of homeopathy and I became a researcher.

Thinking about how hard it was to study the symptoms that are spread along the several volumes of Materia Medica I wondered if there was not an easier way of organizing the symptoms for the homeopaths. When I discovered Bernal's thematic work I foresaw the possibility of organizing the homeopathic symptoms of the pure materia medica by themes.

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When I started to use a computer for my homeopathic research I began to classify the mental symptoms by themes into the data bank Micro-Isis. Since in 1989 there were no MMs computer programs, the original idea was to make the PMMs symptoms available to homeopaths.

Although today there are many homeopathic programs including several Materia Medica, most homeopaths have no access to computers and for that reason I decided to make a book out of my research.

Initially I attempted on reading the homeopathic symptoms classifying the themes they approached. At the same time I did an analogical research of the key words of the symptoms in English and later on I used those words to create the themes concluding that was the most appropriate method to work with.

I was astonished by the original wealth of the homeopathic symptoms before they are severed and displayed in alphabetical order in the repertories. The living of the homeopathic symptoms expresses itself in the several themes that actually are in the symptom as a whole.

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We may also see the psychodynamic of each medicine in the successive unfolding of the several themes in each symptom, increasing the conviction that new instruments must be created for us to organize and draw out the essence of the PMMs's symptoms.

I have created approximately 300 mental themes using the PMMs's original words attempting to classify more than 4000 symptoms selected amongst the 17000 mental symptoms that are in the PMMs (Hahnemann, Hering, Allen). I published a home made edition of the book in English together with another volume, The Thematic Repertory, with almost 4000 symptoms out of the 8000 of Barthel's Repertory, classified by themes and using the same method.

The Thematic Repertory in both English and Portuguese being broadly accepted has revealed itself much more interesting and gave us the opportunity to see how hard it is for many colleagues to read any English material. Thus I started to translate the PMMs into Portuguese. It took me more than one year to accomplish the task besides another five years I had already spent on researching and organizing the PMMs's symptoms.

The repertories were the main attempt to classify the homeopathic symptoms so they could be used by homeopaths for fast medical advice; but they were limited.

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The first and probably the most important limitation is related to the symptoms being severed and classified in alphabetical order with no connections in the Repertory, loosing their dynamic expression and their live expression with their succeeding details and following changes that for us, homeopaths, expresses the human suffering.

The second limitation is related to the symptoms being classified in alphabetical order, coming from several repertories of different languages and organizations, and thus similar symptoms are in different places and are not related.

The third limitation is related to the fact that the symptoms described on the Pure Materia Medica are not totally represented on the repertorial rubrics.

The symptoms that express helplessness, for example, are represented on the PMMs by a very different medicine than the ones that appear in the helplessness rubric on the Repertory. In my opinion that is due to the fact that the symptoms on the Repertory express the clinical experience of their author or their bibliographical sources with no reference to the experimental PMMs.

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We can see the same phenomenon in many other symptoms. The work of physician Deniza Futuro confirms that conviction.

When she initially tried to realize a bibliographical research over the clinical symptom "Angina pectoris" of Kent's Repertory, comparing its 53 medicines with the symptoms explained on the PMMs and clinical materia medica, she was surprised to see completely contradictory information. Medicines related to classical angina symptoms and explained in clinical healings described on the PMMs were not represented with enough graduation on the Repertory.

And further more, medicines with few or no cardiologic symptoms at all are represented in the Repertory with maximum degree. And this may be a shock for you but even among the clinical materia medica and the pure materia medica there were enormous differences regarding the the content of the cardiologic symptoms for the same medicine.

I performed a research in the computer of the word "asthma" on the PMMs and I found in Hering dozens of modalities not recorded in the repertories. I think new methodologies should be created to ensure that such great differences among homeopathic sources do not occur.

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I am not saying the information on the repertories is worthless but we should consider the PMMs sources of experiment and compare them with the clinical symptoms of the repertories to assure that one source may contribute to the other and there may be coherence between the concepts and contents of the MMs and repertories.

The fourth limit is due to the fact that there are great differences of vocabulary between the Repertory and the classical materia medica. On the materia medica the symptoms are described in a simple language, neither organized nor classified.

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On the Repertory the symptoms are organized according to an arrangement that I call "cultural" and not by description, meaning that is the form the author can use to organize the symptoms according to the boundaries of his perception and awareness of reality.

Those boundaries are imposed by his cultural background and are tied up to the values of his time. The idea that the description and understanding of the symptoms should be free of values seems artificial to me.

Thus I prefer to think that man can only understand reality from an explanation based on his cultural values. We can not just accept to be guided by the concepts of understanding the repertorial rubrics without a critical view about the way we consider them as they occur in time and space.

That is why I believe the classical classification of the Repertory does not consider the demands of modern man's mentality. It is not enough just to add new medicines in the rubrics but we have to review its concepts and create new rubrics expressing human suffering in modern language.

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In a modern approach I created the term "repressed", for example, which to me represents the intentional expression of a group of symptoms; the concept did not exist until its creation by psychoanalysis, while in the classic texts that behavior is described as "suppressed" with no equivalent in the Repertory. It is not necessary to support the concept since it has become a popular fashion on describing and explaining a certain behavior and part of the popular expressions so highly considered by classical homeopaths.

I am not saying that psychoanalysis should guide homeopathic classifications but we must be aware of its influence in our understanding of modern man. Classical symptoms such as "anxiety of conscience " are explained nowadays as the "guilt" psychoanalytic concept, even if often unconsciously.

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Nowadays it is obvious that any classification of the symptoms must be consciously influenced by the cultural concepts that are part of the expression of modern man's suffering.

We have used several dictionaries. "The American Heritage" gave us the opportunity to know the etymology of the words, while "Webster's" (the old unabridged edition, 1939, 3 volumes - the most complete Webster's) gave us the meaning of obscure words such as "Philoprogenitiveness" (a symptom related to the medicine Ox-ac. - Allen,19), a term not found in modern dictionaries meaning "desire to procreate".

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We also used the "Aurelio" Portuguese Dictionary, the "Houaiss" English-Portuguese Dictionary, and the CD-ROM "Microsoft Bookshelf" which includes the third edition of "The American Heritage", the "Roget's Thesaurus" a Dictionary of synonyms, and the "Columbia Dictionary of Quotations" where you may find samples of words as they appear in classical English textbooks.

And finally the "Webster's Collegiate Thesaurus", a Dictionary of synonymous. The thematic research is only beginning and each time I classify the symptoms new themes appear which gives way to classifying them into new themes.

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That is the reason why I ask for suggestions related to new themes and evaluations of the actual themes, which would make it possible to improve the quality of the book in future editions. I really hope the book may be a new source of research and that your evaluations and suggestions will be useful to the development of homeopathy.

Just in time to explain the nomenclature of the bibliographical references; ever after the abbreviation of the medicine there comes its source.

Ha on the numbering below 200 for the Chronic Diseases' symptoms and above 200 for the Hahnemann's Pure Materia Medica symptoms;

Al for the T.F.Allen's Encyclopedia, "Al-S" for the supplementary symptoms of the tenth volume;

Al-N for the symptoms of the H.C.Allen's Materia Medica of the Nosodes;

He for the symptoms taken from Hering's Guiding Symptoms). Thus when in doubt we may compare the symptom with the original one.

And we may also consult the source to know what is the origin of the symptom (experimental, toxic, or clinical cure). After the symptoms there are the themes they motivated so we may observe its possible intentionalities. After the list of the thematic classification there is the list of symptoms for each medicine thus representing their Materia Medica.

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Example from the book:

ACCUSED

Delirium tremens; voices, heard continually on right side of occiput a loud voice, scolding, vituperating and accusing him of ungodliness, and also personifies voices: stram.54

Delirium; accused of theft, after being harshly: hyos.54

Delusions; accused, she is: laur. zinc.
· obscene, actions of which she had not been guilty, accuses herself of.: phos.
· thieves, accused of robbing, he has been: kali-br.
· witches, denies having anything to do with them, in delirium after being accused of theft: hyos.54

Dreams; accusations: clem.10 lach.10 nat-m.10 thuj.10
· accusations, crime, wrongful of: choc.222 clem.10 hydrog.222 sil.58
· defamatory: mosch.
· theft, accused of, of being: choc.222 lach.

GERM. Sh,153- Thought nobody understood me and cared for what I felt. Felt it was unfair. I was presented with complaints about something others had done. Felt I was standing between two fighting parts. Felt awkward about it, embarrassed. Difficult to argue about such strong outburst. Thoughts about the day's arguing milling in my head all evening and night. 21, 12C, 32:XX.XX.

HYOS. He,79 - After being harshly (severe) accused of theft (crime), continual delirium; fancies surrounded by objects of a terrifying nature; not a moment quiet, continual calling out that she saw the devil; denies herself guilty of theft (innocent, injustice), or that she has any concern with witches; ...

KALI-BR. Al,4- He imagined that he had been specially singled out (select) for divine vengeance... deploring his sad fate (destiny),...he informed me that he had been accused of robbing a friend, and that the officers were in search of him...

STRAM. He,107-...heard continually ,on r. side of occiput, a loud voice, scolding, vituperating and accusing him of ungodliness (impious, sinful, irreligious, godless, profane); ....prayed expecting, with great anxiety, the flash of lightning which was to kill him;...(redemption, regeneration, salvation)

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Details

This way of presenting symptoms, organized by themes, makes it possible to select the closest and most similar specific rubric to treat each individual patient. It also provides an effective way to study pure materia medica.

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Heritage

In the introduction the author raises four points:

1. Symptoms being severed and classified in alphabetical order, lose their dynamic expression.

2. Symptoms come from several sources of different languages and organizations, and are, thus, not related.

3. Symptoms taken from Pure Materia Medica are not totally represented in rubrics.

4. There is a great difference in vocabulary between the repertory and the materia medica. In compiling the work, the author attempted to satisfy these points by referencing the symptoms in the repertory back to the original source in the provings.

Although called a "Repertory" and "Materia Medica" this book is similar to the work of Dockx and Kokelenberg, in that the prime aim is to show the exact differentiation of remedies that appear in the same rubric.

Each symptom, as seen through the repertory rubric, is annotated as to its source, Each major theme (i.e. Anger, Conscience, etc) is followed by a listing of the remedies, giving the source of the proving, and the exact symptom as reported. A very useful work to establish the fine distinctions between rubrics as well as a work from which one can study pure materia medica.

From:
The Heritage of Homoeopathic Literature
copyright 2001 by Julian Winston
Reprinted with the permission of the author

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Contents

Foreword -- vii

Aldo Farias Dias -- viii
Henning Droege -- ix
Frederik Schroyens -- xi
Ian Townsend -- xi
Maurizio Castellini -- xi
Roger van Zandvoort -- xiii

Introduction -- xv
Thematic Repertory Index- Alphabetical List of Themes -- xix
Analogical Index of Themes and Synonyms -- xxiii
Index of Remedies of the Alphabetical
List of Pure Materia Medica Symptoms - xxxvii

Thematic Repertory
Symptoms of Repertory and Pure
Materia Medica ordered by Themes -- 1

The Study of Words -- 815

Pure Materia Medica Word Index -- 819

Alphabetic List of Pure Materia Medica Symptoms -- 875

Remedies and Abbreviations -- 1087

Abbreviations and Remedies -- 1111

Author identification and frequency list -- 1135

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