The Rudolf Steiner Archive

22. The Medical Faculty and Theosophy

[ 1 ] It is a preparatory task of Theosophy to shed light in a comprehensive way on all areas of our contemporary spiritual life and to point out how Theosophical ideas and concepts, when embraced, can have a preparatory effect in every area of this modern spiritual life, so that in the days to come there may be an ever-increasing full understanding of what Theosophy has to say in every sphere of our intellectual life. People today live, after all, amidst the ideas and influences of public life, which naturally exert a strong influence on them—ideas that run directly counter to our views and would gradually undermine them if the ideas of Theosophy were not to flow into these views. Fichte says that ideals cannot be directly applied in life, but ideals should be the driving forces of life. That is the aim of Theosophy.

[ 2 ] The physician who has set himself the task of healing is freer than the lawyer. He is not so constrained by prejudices and authorities, and this may well be why there are some physicians who work alongside us. However, we do not wish to involve ourselves in the disputes between the parties; that would be a subjective stance. We wish only to present, in a completely objective manner, what Theosophy has to say regarding medical science. And we must remain mindful that Theosophy is difficult—very difficult—to understand for those who have lived under the compulsion of academic study. Only those who stand free will find no conflict between true science and what Theosophy seeks. Theosophy fully acknowledges the tremendous progress that natural science has made in recent centuries and especially in recent decades.

[ 3 ] There are, in fact, great cyclical laws at work in all areas of culture, laws that apply equally to the dark and the light sides of culture. Even though so much in medical science today is uncertain, we must be clear that the root cause of this uncertainty is deeply, deeply rooted in our habits of thought. These habits of thought are, after all, more deeply rooted than any theories one acquires within a science. And they cannot simply be changed, but only gradually replaced by others. The materialistic, mechanistic thinking of our time influences all these habits of thought among people today. What contempt does the modern physician have for the medical science of the Middle Ages and antiquity; and yet the aspiring physician could learn much from the history of medicine of those ancient times. He could learn many views different from those prevailing in contemporary medicine. The theories of Galen, for example, from two to three centuries after Christ, and the medical scholasticism of the Middle Ages are known to very few doctors today. It is wrong to look down on this ancient medical science today. If today’s doctors were willing to learn about it, they could discover many valuable insights. The Hippocratic doctrine, which describes the composition of the human being as consisting of the four elements—earth, water, air, and fire—elicits derisive smiles today. When they speak of black and white bile, phlegm, blood, and their relationships to the planets of our solar system, these are not theories as we formulate them today; rather, these theories have enriched medical intuition, which gave ancient physicians the ability to practice medicine in a completely different way than today’s doctors can.

[ 4 ] The medicine men of primitive peoples follow a principle that is recognized by only a few discerning individuals. It is the same principle that also underlies the art of medicine in the Orient, namely, that the physician who wishes to heal must have acquired qualities that enable him to perceive life from a completely different perspective.

[ 5 ] An example of what I mean might be found if we look at a people who do not belong to the current civilized nations: the Hindus. Hindu doctors apply a principle that underlies immunization—vaccination, as we know it, with a healing serum. It involves combating a certain form of disease by using the pathogen itself as a remedy. Hindu doctors treat snake bites by applying the snake’s saliva to the wound. Through training, the saliva is prepared; the doctors have made themselves immune to snake bites and snake venom by allowing snakes to bite their own bodies. It is their belief that the doctor can also bring about physical effects through something he develops within himself. All healing effects from person to person are based on this principle. Among the Hindus, this principle is grounded in a certain initiation. They know that a person becomes someone else through specific training. Powers that another person does not possess are developed in them, just as iron develops its power when coated with a magnet.

[ 6 ] The young doctor would develop a completely different attitude toward healing if he immersed himself in the true history of medicine. Words that make no sense to him today actually contain a profound meaning, even if he scoffs at them and denies it.

[ 7 ] It is regrettable that our entire scientific field is permeated by materialistic abstractions; thus, it is hardly conceivable that anyone could free themselves from them and learn to think independently. Our entire modern scientific foundation for anatomy and physiology is built upon this materialistic way of thinking. In the 16th century, Vesalius presented the first treatise on anatomy, and Harvey presented the theory of blood circulation in a materialistic sense; teaching continued according to this system throughout the 17th and 18th centuries. People had to think materialistically for several centuries in order to make all the great discoveries and inventions to which we owe these times. This way of thinking taught us to produce certain substances in the laboratory—we owe Liebig’s epoch-making discoveries to it—but it also led to viewing the human body as the only reality. Life, what we call life, is difficult to reconcile with the concept that the materialistic physician has of it. Only the one who knows through intuition what life is can truly penetrate to an understanding of life. And such a person also knows that the operation of chemical and physical laws in the human body is subject to the rule of something for which we lack even the word, something that can be recognized only through intuition. Only when the physician himself has become a different kind of person can he see this. Through a certain training, he must first acquire the concepts and then the insight into the mode of operation of what we call our etheric body. The ordinary mind, the ordinary human intellect, is incapable of grasping the spiritual; as soon as it is called upon to ascend to higher realms, it fails. That is why, in the medical field, without intuition everything is merely empty talk; one does not touch reality. Higher, finer forces are necessary, which must be developed by the physician; only then is a thorough healing of certain ailments possible.

[ 8 ] We Theosophists know, for example, from occult research that what is called vivisection has a profoundly harmful effect in certain respects. What is happening in this field is profoundly harmful. We Theosophists cannot bring ourselves to acknowledge the apparent merits of those who practice vivisection. We would not be understood, however, if we were to explain the reasons for our rejection of vivisection; without engaging with theosophical concepts, one would simply not understand these very reasons. Vivisection has grown out of a materialistic way of thinking that is devoid of any intuition, that cannot look into the workings of life. This way of thinking must view the body as a mechanical interplay of its individual parts. It is therefore natural to resort to animal experimentation where one believes that the same interplay occurs as in humans, in order to identify and combat certain pathological processes. Only those who know nothing of real life can practice vivisection.

[ 9 ] There will come a time when people will come to understand the individual life of a creature in the context of the life of the entire universe. And then people will come to revere life. Then they will come to realize: Every life taken, every suffering inflicted upon a living being, works through the connection that exists between life and life to diminish the noblest forces of our own human nature. Just as a sum of mechanical work can be converted into heat, so too does the killing of a living being transform something within a person, making it impossible for them to have a healing and beneficial effect on their fellow human beings. This is an unbreakable law. Here, all vagueness and ambiguity are strictly excluded. Here, mathematical clarity reigns.

[ 10 ] If people were to engage with what underlies this, they would also see the influences that must be exerted in order to heal, in order to be a healer as well as a doctor. For this, a person who wishes to be a doctor, who wishes to be a healer, must first refine and purify their humanity. They must develop it to a level where certain sensations and feelings can first become accessible to us. This is where experimentation comes into play! And one must first learn to recognize that the ordinary mind can be expanded and spiritualized. It is a triviality to say: here and there are the limits of our methods of knowledge. There are simply other methods of cognition besides those used by the intellect. But unfortunately, few people realize this. And here it is essential to be willing to engage with the theosophical mindset. Only then, when not only the sensory facts of anatomy and physiology are taught, only when one approaches them with the “eyes of the spirit,” as Goethe says, only then will a different study of the human body begin. And only then will all the discoveries of the last decades in the field of medical science be cast in the proper light, so that, for example, certain connections between the thyroid gland and other functions can be recognized.

[ 11 ] Only when one approaches a subject with theosophical insights will one see every thing in its true light and perceive entirely different values. What is still lacking in the quest for knowledge in this field is an understanding of the spiritual realm in which the facts are woven. Certain concepts that have been arrived at may well be correct, but the methods of application may be wrong. Often, two of the greatest authorities in a field say exactly the opposite about one and the same topic, one and the same fact. Where do such things come from? From the fact that the thinking of each of these authorities has been forced into a certain one-sided direction.

[ 12 ] Now one might ask: Would it not be possible that, if a person always lives a healthy life in the right way, they develop within themselves the qualities that make them immune to disease, and could they not train their organism to withstand illness? One must shift one’s thinking in a different direction; then truths in this field will emerge, and a new direction for research will be established. Contemporary thinking has something absolute and definitive about it, and it is permeated by a belief in its own infallibility; there is a tendency toward something papal in such concepts, as some people adopt them. Research is determined by the way questions are posed to nature. If one asks them incorrectly, nature also gives incorrect answers. The experiments—the questions posed to nature—bear a peculiar stamp in the 19th and 20th centuries: that of chance. In this field, there is often a downright grotesque juxtaposition of all manner of experimentation. This stems from a lack of intuition. Particularly in medical science, there are many things that result from this deficiency. Yet it is indeed possible to arrive at a free, beautiful way of thinking within medical science.

[ 13 ] Today’s physician, having graduated from university and been set loose upon suffering humanity, often finds himself in a less-than-enviable state. His medical studies have plunged him into a jumble of concepts where he is unable to form his own judgment. Then he encounters a mindset among his patients that is unwilling to engage in thoroughness; they regard as gospel truth whatever appeals to some authority. Thus, the physician often suffers greatly from the prejudices of his patients. The physician can only be effective if he studies the subtle processes taking place in a diseased body, guided by life itself; but the patient must also cooperate in this effort.

[ 14 ] Certain diseases are associated with specific cyclical developments and conditions; certain diseases are based on [gap in the transcript] and occur according to specific laws of nature. This becomes evident to those who investigate certain forms of disease from a theosophical perspective. In such thinking, broad principles are developed that are the very guidelines of life itself. And they provide the certainty that is linked to tireless striving and fills one with confidence. To the thinker, lawful cosmic connections are revealed that simultaneously fill the soul with deeply religious feelings. The Tübingen physician Schlegel is typical and symptomatic of all those who seek a way out of today’s labyrinth in the medical field. This physician is at the beginning of a great career; he has flashes of insight pointing toward a natural method of healing, and he dares to combine religion and healing power.

[ 15 ] A person whose thinking is spiritualistic cannot possibly go along with the medical experiments that are so characteristic of our time. For he knows: all individual efforts are truly effective only if one tackles the evil at its root, grasping the very core of the matter. No amount of polemics can bring about a radical reversal; only a completely different way of thinking is capable of this.

[ 16 ] Someone trained in materialism cannot understand this. But we human beings need not misunderstand one another in this world. The theosophically minded person understands that the materialistically minded person does not understand him, because he is incapable of doing so. Goethe expresses what is meant here when he says: “A false doctrine cannot be refuted, for it is based on the conviction that the false is true.” The habits of thought of our time must undergo a radical reversal; then a refinement of feelings and sensations, rising all the way to intuition, will follow quite naturally. Only when medical science achieves this will it once again possess something that has a healing effect; only then will a religious impulse once again inspire it; and only then will the physician be what he is meant to be: the noblest humanitarian, who feels compelled to elevate himself to such a high standard that, through his own perfection, he raises his profession as high as is possible.