Dr. Edward Bach & Flower Therapy
by Safih Choat

"Flower essences teach us to be observers of ourselves, because we will evaluate our change and perceive new aspects that we did not perceive before." (Carmen Monari)

 

Dr. Edward Bach was born at Moseley, near Birmingham, in 1886 and trained as a doctor in London. For several years he worked investigating the role of bacteriology in chronic disease. He was a doctor of great courage and human sensitivity, who, believing in his intuition, despite all scientific support, broke secular paradigms sufficiently, proving the responsibility of the emotional character in the physical imbalance and concomitant emergence of diseases, marking a new stage in the history of medicine.

 

Therefore, to understand scientific ideas and their applicability, such as Bach's, which I will discuss below, it is necessary to see beyond the cause and effect relationship of their applicability. We must read with feeling, rid ourselves of prejudices and common sense, perceive the subtlety of details, which provide this work with a deeper harmony in the issue of diagnosis. To do so, it is necessary to understand the history of medicine.

 

Until the emergence of holistic medicine in modern times, it went through different processes: From a scientific-spiritual vision, over time it split between the technical-experimental and the philosophical. Later and currently, after Hanneman and Bach, this initial vision began to be revived from a new perspective, as per the chronology below.

Initially, medieval medicine based its ideas on the origin and cure of diseases on a scientific-spiritual vision, where factors such as destiny, sin, and astral influences were considered as much as physical causes. Few effective drugs existed, other than opium and quinine, spiritual cures, poisons, and metal compounds.

 

Still under the influence of spiritual-emotional philosophy, in ancient Greece, Hippocrates (377 BC) developed a humoral medical system where treatment should restore the balance between the classical elements and humors within the body, and a similar vision was also adopted in China and India.

 

Over time, the idea of ​​personalized medicine was challenged in Europe by the rise of experimental research.

 

Here, a split between body and soul begins to emerge in the issue of diagnostic analysis of disease.

 

Although Ayurvedic medicine dates back 5,000 years and is known as the mother of medicine, as its principles and studies were the basis for the later development of traditional Chinese, Arabic, Roman and Greek medicine, with the emergence of many other contributors in the field such as Galen (131-201 AD), Galileo, Darwin, as well as philosophers, among them Descartes (1596-1650) in his definition of “I think, therefore I am”, the rationalism of the Modern Age was inaugurated and the course of medicine took on a more technical-traditional connotation, where the importance of emotions as relevant factors for the emergence of disease was gradually losing its value.

 

Like every cycle, duration, possible saturation and need for expansion, in the Contemporary Age, Samuel Hahanemann (1755-1843), a doctor with a doctorate from the University of Erlandgen, was upset about not being able to truly cure his patients, due to the inefficiency of the medicine of most doctors at the time (read here that practical teaching in medical schools at the time was despised and even considered unnecessary and humiliating), when translating a work by Dr. Cullen, a doctor who had successfully cured malaria using cinchona bark, it came to his attention that the abuse of quinine caused symptoms similar to those that occurred spontaneously in the natural disease.

 

Although it was (and still is) an adequate treatment for the disease, he was not convinced by the author's explanation, which attributed the effectiveness of the medicine to its possible tonic effects on the stomach, reasoning that there must be another mechanism for the interaction of this substance with the organism, since so many powerful "tonics" had no effect on malaria.

 

To prove his ideas, following his conviction in the experience, he medicated himself with quinine for several days and, as a result, he began to have the symptoms of malaria.

In the following years, Hahnemann returned to medical practice, experimenting on himself, his family and friends with different substances to study the symptoms they produced when taken by healthy people.

​

Combining his medical knowledge with the results of his research, Hahnemann, in 1810, published his book Organum Therapeuticum ("Organon of the Art of Healing"), which established the ideas of homeopathic medicine by formulating the Principles of Homeopathy, where the basic idea is “like is cured by like”.

 

Edward Bach (1886-1936), highly respected in the medical field and also influenced by Hahnemann's Doctrine, began to highlight, in his work with accident patients, the importance of the patient's character and its influence on the treatment to be administered.

​

A new period of medicine began here, with the resumption of the body-soul, physical-emotional union in the interpretation of the diagnosis of diseases.

​

Faced with this new perspective, Edward Bach (1928) began to dedicate his goals to the search for healing plants and the study of different human personalities as a preponderant factor in the outcome of medicinal prescriptions according to the principles of Hanneman's homeopathy, leaving behind his office and laboratory.

 

Upon arriving in Wales, he discovered that he had mistakenly taken a suitcase with shoes instead of one with the material needed to prepare homeopathic medicines (Jung would explain this coincidence as synchronicity).

 

This ended up propelling him more quickly towards the discovery of a new system of extracting medicinal components from plants.

 

Between June and July 1930, he discovered the solar method and between June and July 1930 he wrote his book “The Flower Remedies of Dr. Bach: Heal Thyself”.

 

From 1931 to 1936, together with his assistant Nora Weeks, Bach found and prepared the first nine of the so-called Twelve Healers. Later, he discovered the last three remedies in the Twelve Healers series and, three years later, he discovered and prepared four more remedies, which were called Four Helpers.

 

In 1934 – he discovered the last three flower remedies that completed the first series, forming the “seven helpers”. He formulated his first aid remedy, Rescue, and, in quick succession, he discovered nineteen more remedies and created the Boiling method in six months.

 

Believing that his system was complete, through the 38 flower essences obtained from the extraction of subtle elements from plants, proving their effectiveness in curing diseases, at the end of the same year, he died of cardiac arrest, and, along with his discovery, he left behind the possibility of a new direction in the field of medicine: the resumption of ancient medical theories, under a reinterpretation of the scientific-spiritual character, where emotions once again became principles of equal importance to physiology for the emergence, interpretation and cure of diseases.

 

In a deeper analysis, his contribution goes beyond the importance of emotions in the interpretation and cure of diseases. Bach shows us a new perspective on how to observe the world and our daily lives. By understanding the true value of the emotional aspect in healing, we begin to apply it intrinsically to all situations in our lives.

 

Therefore, in order to work with flower essences, it is necessary, in addition to technical knowledge, to delve into the historical evolutionary aspect, the intrinsic spiritual aspect, and the knowledge of emotions in their entirety.

 

How can we see the benefits of this therapy without going beyond the omnipotent view of the human being, who is believed to be of greater value to the detriment of animals and plants simply because of the presence of our intelligence and reasoning?

 

By understanding the process that medicine had been undergoing up until then, and through the interpretation of Edward Bach's discovery of flower essences, nature itself and its elements begin to receive a new qualification and meaning from the human perspective in relation to its environment/terrestrial habitat. It ceases to be merely “decorative” and begins to be seen with greater respect for its reason for existing.

 

Now we must add to this new vision of the plurality of the original components of the disease the issue of spirituality, which, although still controversial and much discussed, undoubtedly brings a lot of collaboration in the mind-body/emotions-energy aspect, in the sense of a better harmony between all living beings, including within the professional issue and especially when this issue involves healing in any area.

 

Before he died, Bach burned everything he had written up until then and left the rest of the work to be completed by his colleagues and assistants who worked with him. In other words, his contribution remains open to new discoveries and contributions.

 

Who will have the sensitivity and pioneering, the philosophical and altruistic character sufficient to perhaps add more complexities to his research?

 

In Mount Vernon, Great Britain, where he lived and carried out all his floral research, today the Bach Centre operates, where the flowers are collected and the essences prepared.

 

Finally, given this panorama, it is possible to believe that in the future, many other contributions may emerge, inspired by his dedication to the health of humanity.

 

​

References:  source: http://pt.wikipedia.org