Origin of Naturopathy

Ancient Indian Background

Nature care is not a new science. It is a matter of common observance that animals follow the natural laws by instinct. So was man in his primitive stages. In India, Rishis and Munis have observed the nature very closely and have discovered the laws governing the health and disease. They have therefore, propounded a way of life in accordance with the principles that govern health and which is now termed as nature cure principles. In Ayurveda and other ancient texts, number of references can be found relating to nature cure principles, its procedures, dieting principles, daily routine, observences to be followed and also the abstentions to be observed. The modern health scientists are simply amazed at the deep understanding of our early seers and sages, Rishis and Minis in regard to different aspects of human life whose teachings are true even today, even after passage of thousand of years. They have very finely integrated these principles in the customs and culture, religious observances, daily and seasonal routines, the periodic festivals etc as disease preventive measures. The following quotation from an ancient text illustrate what has been said above:-

One who always regulated in his diet and living habits, considerate in action, detached equanimity, veracity and forgiveness and is given to the service of the saints remains untouched by disease.

Contribution of West Germany

In view of the facts explained above it is not correct to say that nature cure has originated in Germany as has been mentioned in several texts on the subject. However, it is an admitted fact that the way Nature cure is being practiced today comes from Germany. The credit of inaugurating nature cure movement in modern times largely goes to Vincent Priessnitz. In fact nature cure was synonymous with water cure in early days. Although a number of other pioneers in different countries have discovered the values of water as a powerful healing agent and several treatises have been written on the subject, yet the popularity and worldwide recognition of this healing system was initiated due to the success gained by Vincent Priessnitz in treatment of various maladies at Grafenburg, a small village in Silesian mountains. His pharmacopeia consisted of water, plenty of exercises, fresh mountain air, water treatments in the cool sparkling brooks and simple wholesome country food. The idea of drugless healing methods, gradually but rapidly spread all over Germany and other civilized world and many people including several eminent physicians became enthusiastic pupils and followers. Men like father Sebastian Kneipp, Arnold Rikle, Lehmann, Louis Kuhne, Adolf Just were easily pioneers who added heir share to this new science of natural healing.

The name of Johann Schroth also needs a special mention for his contribution towards natural healing methods. Born on 11th February 1798, Johann Schroth was a contemporary of Vincent Priessnitz. In fact they attended the same country school together at Freiwalden in Austrian Silesia.

Priessnitz was destined to have found the water cure bearing his name, but Schroth found himself entering the healing profession by placing emphasis upon food and restricting the use of water internally.

Living within a day’s travel of each other, Johann Schroth and Vincent Priessnitz, each successfully operating an institution of healing, were not at all friendly towards each other. Each pursued his work with little comment on what the other was doing. And so also their followers quarreled. It was not until 1896 when Dr. Benedict Lust in his pilgrimage to the shrines of the masters of Nature Cure arranged for a Joint gathering of representatives of the two schools, and delivered his address to the staff of the institutions and guests, that the common bond of healing brought them closer together. A bronze plaque commemorates this meeting.

Louis Kuhne

Louis Kuhne cured cases by sunshine, steam and sitz bath etc. His slogan was only cleansing can heal. He has laid a foundation of basic concepts of Naturopathy by showing that the disease is in essence something which arose in the system as a result of accumulation of toxins and impurities generated therein through years of wrong habits of living and that the only real basis of cure lay in these habits being rectified and the body thus allowed an opportunity to cleanse itself and put itself right again internally – a procedure it is quite capable of carrying out if only allowed to do so. For diagnosis Kuhne depended entirely upon observing the facial expression. His doctrine of unity of disease form one of the foundations of modern Nature Cure.

Father Sebastian Kneipp

Father Sebastian Kneipp, another follower of Vincent was a great advocate and practitioner of water cure, medicinal herbs and plants. His achievements have helped propagation of water cure a lot.

Judged by the standard of sheer merit and achievement, there are many other practitioners – British, American, Continental and others – who have contributed to the development of the science of nature cure.

In America Dr. Trall, Dr. J.H.Kellogg, Dr. Benedict Lust, Dr. Henry Lindlahr and others caught the infection and crossed the ocean to become students of Priessnitz.

Dr. Henry Lindlahr

Dr. Henry Lindlahr was a pillar of strength to the nature cure movement in the United States. He propounded the theory to which every naturopath now subscribes: ‘Every acute disease is a healing effort of nature.’ He was the first nature cure physician to co-ordinate all the different forms of natural treatments into one exact and complete science.

Other Naturopaths

Additions to the methods of natural healing were being made very rapidly. Dr. Still made a valuable addition to nature methods of treatment by the invention of osteopathy, a system of scientific manipulation of the bony structures, muscles, nerves and nerve centers.

The work of Dr. Tilden, on the subject of diet( in conjunction with such dietetic pioneers as Otto Carque, Arnold Ehret, Dr. Kelloggs, Dr. Lindlahr, Bernarr MacFadden and Alfred McCann) considering wrong feeding to be one of the main cause of diseases, is highly commendable.

Dr. Palmer introduced chiropractic a system of spinal manipulation to relax contracted tissues, replace dislocated bones, liberate and stimulate the flow of the blood and of nerve impulses, thereby removing the mechanical cause of disease.

Dr.J.H Kellogg, a physician of high repute, introduced hydrotherapy on a rational and scientific basis.

In fact Hippocrates (460 – 357 BC) the father of medicine also was a believer in the curative powers of natural agents and methods Several early schools of medicines also have recognized these principles and contributed in their own way to ultimately shaping this science in coming into existence with its separate identity. Galen, the School of Salerno, Paracelsus, John Weseley etc are some of the early pioneers whose work has created in shaping new thoughts.

The names of Mrs. Mary Baker Eddy for Christian Science, Dr Arnold Rickli for air and light baths, Dr Emanuel Felke for treatment by earth and diagnosis from eye, Dr Andrew Taylor Still for osteopathy, Dr DD Palmar for chiropractic, Dr. John H Tilden for concept of toxemia, Dr Arnold Ehret for Mucusless diet, Dr Bernar Macfadden for physical culture, Dr Ignatz Peczely for iris diagnosis need special mention in shaping this science.

Story of Vincent Priessnitz

It was not until the attention of the whole civilized world was attracted by the fame and success of an uneducated cold water empiric, that the profession began to give this agent water the serious attention that was its due, for the modern popularity of’ water as a remedy must without doubt be largely credited to the enterprise and ingenuity of a Silesian peasant, Vincent Priessnitz, born in the little village Graefenburg, in Austria on the 4th October 1799.

The system of “water cure” which Prisssnitz made famous throughout the world was more remarkable from the fact that it owed nothing to the work of his predecessors or contemporaries, but resulted entirely from the observations and experiments of this unlettered peasant lad.

Born of hard working country people, Priessnitz led the life of the usual country boy. He had not much education, but was distinguished for thoughtfulness, insight and unusual keenness of observation. Though he was the youngest of six children, he was early obliged to take upon his youthful shoulders the responsibility for most of the work on the farm, because of the blindness of his father and the death or removal of his brothers.

Near the farm was a wood in which was a spring known as the “Priessnitz Spring” because one of his ancestors was slain there in 1642 during the ‘thiry Years” war. In the neighborhood of the spring was a good pusture ground for cattle. On days when he was free from other work, Vincent was accustomed to take a little sack of provisions for the day and drive the cattle into the wood, not returning home until the evening.

Discovery of Water Cure

One day, while the cows were feeding and the boy lay dreaming under the shadow of a bush close to the spring, he saw a wounded deer, injured by hunters come to the spring, wade into the calm backflow waters of the turbulent mountain brook, wash its wound and lap up the water form the spring. The wounded limb was immersed in the water for some time and then deer limped away and disappeared into the forest. That night he decided there must be a reason for a wounded animal to seek water to heal its wounds, perhaps instinct was stronger than reason. He would return the next day. He did sure enough the deer returned to the eddying water at about the same time. It stood silently, without a move, and then after a while limped to the bank and disappeared in the deep foliage of the forest once more. For two weeks the lad Vincent Priessnitz returned daily to his vantage point and watched. For two weeks the wounded stag returned and bathed its injured leg in the brook. Each day the deer walked better and finally, the cure being completely scampered out of the water on the last day to return no more.

Before his very eyes he had seen a badly injured deer healed with cool sparkling brook water. Vincent Priessnitz never forgot that experience. This circumstance impressed the mind of young observer, who though he had little other schooling was a close student of Nature, with the important place held by water in all the processes of Nature. He had often observed the enlivening effect of water on plants, animals and men, and he now recognized the importance of water as a mean of healing. Later he declared to his friend biographer, Dr. Slinger, that the thought came to him of itself and that his whole system of treatment gradually developed out of it. And so it was that from this little spring at Graefenburg, as has been followed aptly said healing followed out to the world.

Priessnitz learned by experience what conditions were beyond his help and later did not take patients that he did not think could be benefited by his methods. With his limited knowledge he doubtlessly sometimes erred in the diagnosis of disease, and his treatments were necessarily experimental, but it is a noteworthy fact that of the forty thousand persons treated by him in his institution many of them coming to him as a final hope, there were only forty-five deaths.

In his lifetime Priessnitz clearly proved his thorough grasp of the nature and treatment of various diseases. According to him not only is water strengthening, refreshing, invigorating, vivifying, cooling and soothing but it also possesses a purifying power- tending to disperse undesirable matter and to throw off poisonous substances within the system.

Beginning by applying water externally for trifling diseases among the poor in his neighborhood, he gradually undertook an extended range of cases and multiplied the types of administration. He introduced and demonstrated the values of the wet compress, the douche bath, partial baths of all kinds, the sweating process, the wet sheet, and the drinking of large amounts of pure water.

In addition to the use of water in all these forms, he insisted on proper exercise and diet, fresh air, and mental repose in the cure of disease, thus calling to his aid practically all the resources of nature and establishing by a simple yet thoroughly original combination nothing less than new kind of medical treatment. This entirely independent system of water cure he based on natural laws, and founded personal observation of the working of nature and on successful experiments made upon himself and fellow sufferers.

The First Hydropathic Establishment

The money that Priessnitz received for consultations and gift of grateful patients enabled him in 1822 to build a stone addition to the wooden house in which he was born. He worked on the building with his own hands, assisted by his patients. Not for himself did he require more room, but for the many sick who came to him unbidden and refused to leave until he had healed them. On the ground floor he fixed up a room furnished with a great trough, the water for which was supplied from the well. And thus was established, says Philo von walde (from whose biography much of the material for the world). But Priessnitz had no official permission for the establishment of such an institution, and such an irregular and illegal proceeding stirred up the physicians to still greater efforts to put a stop to his work.

A flood of Testimonials

Priessnitz was then accused of charlatanry, so he was completed to let his healed patients furnish him with authoritative certificates (Sworn Statements) for him to exhib. This resulted in a flood of testimony from counts, knights, jurists, officers, priests, teachers, peasants and labourers. These testimonies made it clear that Priessnitz had an extensive and spreading reputation; that his cures were gratuitous; that many of his patients had formerly been treated by physicians for years without results; that his method of cure consisted in theapplication of water to a part or the whole of the body, sweating , water drinking and diet- regulation and that he expressly forbade the publication in the newspapers of testimonials of grateful and enthusiastic patients, No medicine- vegetable or mineral, no tonic, no stimulant, no emetic, no purgative, no bleeding, blistering, or leeching, formed part of-the treatment.

Not the physicians alone, but also some of the clergy, denounced this ‘false prophet and his superstitions. One of them declared that the water could not heal unless he had bewitched it. However, the chief accuser in this class suffered from a disease of the liver which his physician failed to cure and he was forced to seek help from Priessnitz. Being cured, he added his testimonials to the rest, and became his friend

More than a Century ago the Austro-Hungarian government granted this simple farmer, this layman, Priessnitz, the permission to establish a hydrotherapic (water cure) institute at Graefanburg. This official permission came from none other than the chief state health official in Troppal, father of the president of the Association of Medical doctors in Vienna who acted upon instructions from the central government- all of which is a rather remarkable proceeding.

Water, as we have already seen, was not a new means of healing in Priessnitz’s time, for it had been used since the dawn of life. Still, it would be interesting to discover why a government should give such a distinction to an unschooled healer. The distinction, however was vindicated, for it is a historical fact that of 7500 patients who had gone to Graefenburg for advice and treatment up to the year 1841, or within the space of about 20 years, there were only 39 that died. The number of patients that visited Priessnitz’s humble farm rose and soared high year by year, and included thousands of persons of high and low degree, nobles and paupers.

In 1842, twelve hundred patients from all over the world visited and were cared for at his institution at Graefenburg, During the years 1849, 1850, 1851, the number of patients rose to as high as fourteen hundred, and come from as many as thirty different countries, such was his fame.

The emperor became interested enough to send a personal representative to investigate the black deeds of Priessnitz. The people who had been healed were evidence against any wrong doing he was accused of. The investigator looked things over. Somehow an impulse from the devil must have grasped him too, for he came back and. told. the emperor, it is reported, that Priessnitz “was endowed and appointed by God and nature to heal the sick”. The Emperor stroked his Whiskers, and then remarked. “If that is the case, I will make Priessnitz a doctor by imperial Decree.

To end all persecution, Pressnitz was granted a diploma by the Austrian government, decreeing that no one should ever molest him, that he be permitted to heal the sick as he had been doing. In a matter of months his fame spread to every corner of the globe, Graefenburg became a shrine for the ill. People traveled to it from the all over the world. Priessnltz treated prince and pauper alike. Some of the best records, we have came across from the pen of Americans, Who crossed the ocean to take “Cure”.

The French government sent the head of the medical department of the army to study the methods of Priessnitz, and by this means hydrotherapy was introduced into the military service of France. The governments of other countries did likewise. Thus the principles and methods developed by this Nature taught physician were rapidly diffused.

Priessnitz lived a life of intense and tireless activity. On account of many demands upon him he seldom had sufficient rest and a full night sleep. He was accustomed to rise at four o’Clock in the Summer and five in the Winter and work the whole day’. His strenuous labours for lengthening of the lives of others seemed to have resulted in shortening of his own. Possibly the accident suffered in his youth, inspite of his apparent recovery might have helped shorten his life. The marvel is that he lived so long after it.

Vincent Priessnitz passed away on 28th November 1851.

LAND MARKS IN NATURE CURE

3000 B.C (approx): Hindus, Chinese and Egyptians used water, sunlight, fasting, massage and exercise for curative purposes,

2500 B.C.: That, the healer of Horus, revealed the enema, the Divine Clyster.

600 B.C: Empedocles of Sicily suggested that the bodies of men were composed of earth, air, fire and water and that health was equilibrium of these elements, disease as their imbalance (Compare with the Ancient Indian Doctrine of PANCH MAHA BHOOTAS)

550 B.C: Fasts were enjoined as a religious observance among the Hindus on fortnightly days, viz, the eleventh day after the full or new moon Called Ekadasi), and the new moon day (Amavasya)

529 B.C: Pythagoras founded school of physician – naturalists.

400 B.C: Hippocrates used cold water bath in treating fevers and advocated use of friction massages. He extolled the vis medicatrix naturae, the healing power of Nature.

340 B.C: The vapour bath came into use for healing purposes under the Greek Physician Chrysippus, who used Steam for the cure of dropsy.

300 B.C: Antyllos practiced ’sunlight cure’ for diseases.

15 B.C: Celsus classified several foods and described the dietary of disease

1 AD: Charak described several basic principles relating to regulation of way of life, dietary and disease processes which are similar to Nature Cure Principles recognized today. He also described 13 different methods of giving steam baths for the cure of diseases.

1100: The famous school of Salerno produced the Regimen Sanitatis which maintained that ‘vain is your healing art if you cannot impart relief or cure by means of diet which is the strongest cornerstone of physics~’ The compact handbook ran to almost 300 editions

1500: Theophrastus Paracelsus combined science with Nature for the cure of diseases

1591: Captain James Lancastor used lemon Juice for the prevention of scurvy in his voyage to the East Indies.

1592: Sir Richard Hawkins discovered the value of orange and lemon juice in the prevention of scurvy

1725: Hoffmann demonstrated blood pressure.

1747: Captain James Lind, a British Naval Surgeon, performed his classic experiment of curing scurvy with two oranges and a lemon daily He later published his treatise on scurvy in 1754.

1750: J.H.Hahn of Schweidnitz introduced ‘enforced’ water cure.

1760: Franz Anton Mesmer used hypnotism (known as mesmerism and applied the principle of ’suggestibility ‘ for curing diseases.

1774: Faure treated chronic ulcers with sunlight and applied hot ‘ bricks in the treatment of rheumatic pains.

1786: Galvani reported on his famous experiments on the twitchings of frog’s legs when they came into contact with a conductor during thunderstorms. (From Galvani we derive the name Galvanic current and Galvanism.)

1795: The British Admiralty published an order making use of citrus fruit juice compulsory.

1800: Sir Wm. Herschel showed that red rays heated three times as much as violet light, and found that there were radiations beyond the red end of the spectrum which caused heat though they were not visible He named them ‘infrared’ rays.

1801: Ritter and Wallaston working independently, noticed that the invisible radiations beyond the violet end of the spectrum caused chemical reaction in silver chloride. These were called ‘Ultra-Violet’ rays.

1806: Dr. Willian Lambed a physician of London, gave up meat in all its forms, and become a vegetarian. He promoted Natura1 dietetics, and published in 1811 a book entitled “The Return to Nature”.

1813: Pehr Henrik Ling founded the Swedish system of massage and gymnastics.

1816: Roebereiner discussed the use of light baths in treatment.

1821: Thomas Southwood Smith originated the idea of public health sanitation.

1826: Vincent Prisessnitz built the first water cure establishment on the Grafenberg in Austrian Silesia.

1828: Johannes Schroth of Lindewiese introduced his ‘privation ‘ treatment of regenerative dietetics.

1830: Dot. Joel Shew developed his systematic water cure at 47 Bond street, New York City, where the wet sheet was the main stay of therapy.

1838: Magnus reported that venous blood contained more carbon dioxide and less oxygen than arterial blood.

1842: R. T. Trall came to the conclusion that only Nature heals”

1844: Jonathan Pereira described the chemical elements of food for the first time.

1847: The vegetarian Society of Great Britain was founded.

1848: Arnold Rickli of Veldes introduced air baths and sun baths in the cure of diseases.

1852: The American Vegetarian Society came into being.

1854: Sebastian Kneipp of Worishofen (Bavaria) combined herbal treatment with water cure. His book ‘My Water Cure’, first published in 1886, went through more than sixty editions of 6000 each in less than ten years.

1858: Charcot proved that skin erythema was due to biochemical reaction of ultra-violet rays exist in light.

1874: Andrew Taylor Still founded the Osteopathic system of treatment’.

1874: Letheby published analysis of foods and laid the foundation for quantitative approach to dietetics

1877: Dounes and Blunt discovered that light could kill bacteria, and. described the bactericidal properties of ultra-violet rays.

1877: Dr. John Harvey Kellogg began the use of incandescent lamps in the treatment of disease, and put hydrotherapy on a rational basis by very extensive experimentation at his Battle Creek Sanitarium.

1880: Ignaz Peczely, a native of Hungary,’ propounded the Science of diagnosing diseases from the eye,’ now known as Iridology or Iridiagnosis.

1881: Carl molt, a German physiologist, formulated for the first time a dietary standard stating nutrient requirements quantitatively.

1882: Takaki conquered beri-beri through diet in his experiments with Japanese naval vessels.

1883: Louis Kuhne of Leipzing presented his famous foreign matter theory of unity of disease, expounded the science of facial diagnosis and devised simplified Nature Cure methods of treating diseases. His memorable book ‘The New Science of Healing’ has had extensive circulation through out the world.

1883: Metchnikoff proved that the fixed tissue cells of the body and the wandering white blood corpuscles played an important part in combating infection by absorbing and digesting attacking bacteria’

1883: Dr. E.D.Babbitt founded the college of Sunlight Cure in America, and demonstrated the curative effects of the various colours of the spectrum on the body

1885: Rosenfeld coined a new familiar sentence: “Fat burns in the flame of carbohydrates”

1886: Sigmund Freud presented his theory of Psycho-analysis

1890: Dr. W.H.Bates introduced methods of curing myopia and other eye diseases without glasses.

1893: Finsen established the first ray-therapy institute of the world at Copenhagen by using the carbon arc.

1894: D.Venkatachalpatty Sharma, a close associate of Louis Kuhne, propagated Kuhne’s treatment in South India by translating Kuhne’s book in Telgu.

1898: Bernarr Macfadden started his physical culture magazine through which he launched a crusade against prudery, weakness and sickness by propagating his ‘physicultopathy’

1902: Adolf Just published his memorable book ‘Return to Nature’.

1903: Rollier opened his first Heliotherapy Clinic at Leysin where he made a systematized use of natural sunlight and effected many dramatic cures in surgical tuberculosis without the use of a knife.

1904: Shrotriya Krishna Swaroop published Hindi and Urdu transitions of Kuhne’s books, and thus helped to spread Kuhne’ s treatment in the Northern India.

1908: Hereward Carrington produced a new theory on the relation of food to human nutrition, and presented for the first time a physiological study of the creative power of fasting in his classical book ‘Vitality, Fasting and Nutrition ‘ an extensive work of over 700 pages dealing will all phases of fasting.

1927: E.J.Stevens opened his institution at California for the treatment of disease by colours and the finer forces of Nature.

1928: Dr. S.J.Singh compiled all the scattered germs of Nature under One banner in his book My Nature Cure or Practical Naturo-therapy.

1934: Dr. Saidman designed and constructed the Solarium at Jamnagar, now the only one of its kind in the world, the other in Paris having been destroyed in the World War II

1946: Mahatma Gandhi opened his Nature Cure Centre at Urlikanchan (Poona) and himself acted as the physician in-charger. He added Ram-Nam as a method of faith healing to the already existing methods of Nature Cure.

1950: Faber Birren collected for the first time a full array of scientific data on chromotherapy in his book Color Psychology and Color Therapy.

1956: Akhil Bharatiya prakritik chikitsa Parishad (All India Nature Cure Federation) came into being through the efforts of Sri Dnaram Chand Sarawgi.

1963: The first regular teaching and training College of Naturopathy was started at Diamond Harbour Road, 24 Parganas, Calcutta under the name of ‘Bhartiya Prakritik Chikitsa Vidyapeeth with Dr. S.J.Singh as its first principal.

1970: Ghandhi Nature Cure College, Hyderabad started imparting regular training Course in Nature Cure. It was later affiliated with Osmania University Hyderabad and 4 1/2 years Diploma Course leading to Diploma in Naturopathy (N.D) was run. Subsequently after establishment of A.P.University of Health Sciences in Vijayawada, an Inspection Commission was constituted under the Chairmanship of Dr.S.N.Pandey to change Diploma Course into Degree, vide proceedings of Vice Chancellor (No.14050/Aa/88 dated 09-05-1988). After submission of report by said Inspection Commission, the University changed Diploma course into Degree Course. This was a mile stone in the history of Naturopathy in India. It is now imparting 5 1/2 Years regular course leading to degree of B.N.Y.S and is affiliated with A.P. University of Health Sciences, Vijayawada.

1973: Indian Nature Cure Practitioners’ Association was formed during the 13th All India Nature Cure Conference held in Lucknow.

1978: National College of Naturopathy, Lucknow under principal ship of Dr. K.R.Dilkash started imparting 4 year regular course in Nature Cure.

1978: Central Council f or Research in Yoga and Naturopathy (CCRYN) was established by bifurcating Central Council for Research in Indian Medicine and Homeopathy (C.C.R.I.M.H.) under Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Govt. of India.

1980: The first Naturopath (Dr. S.N.Pandey) appointed in CCRYN on 21.8.1980.

1989: National Institute of Naturopathy, Poona was established under-Ministry of Health and Family Welfares, Govt. of India.