Helleboris niger Anhängsel

[Rajan Sankaran]

Helleborus is a plant remedy of the typhoid miasm. It is very closely related to “drug” remedies like Opium but is more acute in its manifestations. Curiously, it is a plant remedy with a completely opposite manifestation than the usual plant characteristic of sensitivity. In fact, Helleborus is the most insensitive of all remedies in Materia Medica.

The main feeling of the Helleborus person is that the outside is so painful, unpleasant, horrifying and shocking that he completely shuts himself from the outside world. He remains completely absorbed. He does not see, even if his eyesight is clear.

He can’t hear though his ears are intact. He is completely indifferent to both pleasure and pain. He takes a lot of time before answering a question. But in my experience such manifestations represent an extreme stage which may be seen in conditions like encephalitis.

In normal circumstances, Helleborus persons live with a tremendous dullness; nothing interests them anymore. They cannot register things in a normal conversation; when they read, it does not register.

One of the “Ailments from” of Helleborus is “head injury”. Here it compares with Arnica. Helleborus has many other peculiar mental symptoms and delusions and needs to be studied and understood better.

    Rubrics:

           • Answers, reflects long.

           • Answers, repeats the question.

           • Answers, slowly.

           • Automatism.

           • Indifference, desire, has no, no action of the will.

           • Indifference, everything, to.

           • Indifference, external impressions, to.

           • Will, muscles refuse to obey the will when attention is turned away.

[Georg Soldner]

Als pflanzliches Arzneimittel in der Medizin seit Jahrtausenden in Gebrauch, S. Hahnemann hat darüber habilitiert. Als winterblühende Ranuncula findet die Christrose

in der Anthroposophischen Medizin besondere Beachtung. Der vorliegende Artikel versucht, die Brücke zu schlagen von den Qualitäten und Substanzen, die sich an Helleborus niger auffinden lassen, zur menschlichen Physiologie und Pathologie. Wie andere Beiträge dieses Merkurstab-Heftes bezieht sich auf ein HelleborusSymposium März 2010 und die Helleborus-niger

Darstellung im Vademecum Anthroposophische Arzneimittel. Mehrere Kasuistiken sollen verschiedene Indikationsbereiche von Helleborus niger in der Anthroposophischen Medizin deutlich werden lassen. Dabei kann erkennbar werden, dass die Anthroposophische Medizin nicht nur traditionell bekanntes Wissen aufgreift, sondern einen eigenständigen Beitrag zum Verständnis und zur therapeutischen Anwendung der Christrose geben kann.

[Jo Evans]

[Culpeper]

„It has some sullenness about it and would be better purified by the alchemist than given raw“.

Keywords: black, white, invisible, no feeling, death, enlightenment

Clinical: Albuminuria. Amenorrhea. Apathy. Aphthae. Brain disorders. Cholera. Coma. Concussion. Convulsions. Cystitis. Depression. Diarrhea. Dropsical swellings.

Dullness. Epilepsy. Fevers.

Headaches. Head injury. Hernia. Home-sickness. Hydrocele. Hydrocephalus. Kidneys, congestion. Melancholy. Meningitis. Night-blindness. Post-partum convulsions. Scarlatina. Strokes. Stupor.

Tetanus. Typhoid fever. Ulcers. Wounds.

Suggestion for addition: autism with suspected link to vaccination syndrome (MMR)

Cause: Effects of suppressed skin eruptions from eruptive fevers (scarlet fever/measles)/blows/injuries (head)/disappointed love.

Black and White

Douglas Gibson, homeopath: „Hell. = Christmas rose an ancient member of the primitive Ranunculaceae. Out of the normal annual plant rhythm of dying and growing,

this plant blooms during winter.

It shows no haste, no panic of growth, but usually takes from 5 - 7 years before it blooms“.

is also known as the ‘snow rose’ and is usually white, though can become streaked with purple or pink. It feels appropriate to start with this description of the beautiful

white flower in the purity of the snow, because to further explore the Black Hellebore (= Hell’ s common name) involves a metaphorical journey into darkness.

Epilepsy, worms and vertigo, Hell. was used for black and yellow jaundice, and ‘ beaten to a powder and strewn upon foul ulcers, it eats away the dead

flesh and instantly heals them. It helps gangrenes in the beginning.

Black usually associated with death/necrosis/a dark place/dark feelings - a place where there is no sensation of light or joy. At the same time, people from many different cultures report 'near death experiences' involving an amazing journey towards a white light and a sensation of pure bliss. In the dark is the seed of light, and in the light

the seed of the dark: this is the process of eternal change and becoming. This is represented in the black and white symbol of yin and yang, the circle of eternal beginning

and ending, living and dying, good and evil, and all polarities. The German word 'hell', means 'light'. So while we look at Hell. and it's associations with darkness and death,

it's worth bearing in mind the plant's ability to restore health in some extreme situations such as deep depression, after head injuries, in coma, and pathology of the brain in general. The black and white theme is also an indication of the theme of ‘polarities’, which is found in most remedies, but is particularly marked in the study of Hell.

One piece of folklore about Hell. tells how if you scatter powdered black hellebore root at your feet as you walk, you will become invisible. Desai writes how French prisoners suffering from an epidemic of night blindness took powdered Black Hellebore and were cured within few days, able to see in the dark. Again, the image of the white flower

in powdery snow comes back to the mind's eye, white on white, almost invisible. Nestling in the snow, cold and numb: no colour and no feeling. Yet there is in the story of Hell., the ability to see in the dark. . In this place between dark and light, death and life, we have the essence of Hell. as a homeopathic remedy. This leads us towards the

next theme of Helleboris, enlightenment.

All the 'black and white' related rubrics of Hell. collected for reference:

Hell. characterised by its lack of emotional ‘colour’ - they get to the stage where they don’t feel anything any more for their loved ones, or for anyone. Is it interesting then, that we call Hell. the Christmas Rose? Why rose? It doesn’t look much like a rose, nor is it botanically rose-like. In homeopathy, As well as in life, the Rosacea are the family of ‘love’ and ‘the heart’: The red rose, the opposite of our emotionally ‘dead’ white Christmas Rose, is a symbol of passionate love. Calling Hell. a ‘rose’, emphasises the remedy’s lack of love even further.

White and Light Rubrics in Hell.

[Boeninghausen]

Key symptoms:

Head: < internal

Face: pale

Discoloration pale [with headache/during heat (of head)]/red # pale

Eruptions: vesicles white

Swollen and pale

Mouth: Discoloration white: [tongue (morning)]

Stool: Color white (like jelly/like milk or chyle)

Mucous slimy white

Urine: white clouds (turbid, which becomes more so as the emission continues so that the

last drops look like flocks)/pale

Female ogans: Menses: pale, watery

Skin: pale

Eruptions: white sudamina

Swollen in general: pale

Ulcers discharge whitish

Generalities: Abscesses, suppurations: whitish pus

Discoloration: redness: becoming white/whiteness of parts usually red

Mucous secretions: white

Mind: < daylight

Head: < erect: sitting

Eyes: Pain in general < (day)light

Pupils contracted # dilated in the same light

Insensible to light

Vision: < daylight

Generalities: Complexion: color of eyes, face, hair: fair, blonde, light

Generalities: < (day)light

Black rubrics in Hell.

[Boger]

Hell. a remedy for low states of vitality & serious diseases, when everything around the patient looks dark. Patient's face, lips, hands etc. become dark,

nostrils become sooty, hence dark + dusky remedy“.

[Phatak]

"Parts usually red turn white“.

Mind: < darkness

Delusions: dark/horrible imaginations (in the dark)

Vision: Colors before the eyes: black (rings/circles/spots)/dark (circles/spots)

Nose: Discharge: dark (nostrils)

Face: Discoloration: dark, dusky

Stomach: Vomiting: black/green: blackish

Urine: Color: black/dark (flecks)

Sediment: dark

Generalities: Complexion: color of eyes, face, hair: dark, brunette

> darkness

Discoloration: blackness of external parts, gangrene

Necrosis and gangrene:

Female organs: Gangrene (uterus)

Extremities: Gangrene (moist/from burns or sores)

Generalities: Caries, necrosis: bones/bones: periosteum

Discoloration: blackness of external parts, gangrene

Stillness Of The Mind: Death Or Enlightenment? I think therefore I am?

Not all patients who present with the symptoms requiring this remedy will be literally close to death. The remedy has also proven clinically useful in chronic depression,

after ECT treatment (electroconvulsive shocks to the brain) or heavy anti-psychotic drugs, and after head injuries. Ancient philosophers used Hell. Ø in order to go into

a state of deep meditation.

Hell. is the only 'bold type' remedy listed in the rubric, staring, thoughtless. Puls. (Ranunculaceae) is one of only 3 other remedies strongly in this rubric (Merc-c./Hydr-ac.

in italics). The primary action of Hell. is stupefying the brain, causing stillness of the mind, with no sensation or emotion. Those who meditate seek this state: where the

mind stops chattering. The conditions described for deep meditation are seen as a path towards enlightenment. Can enlightenment be a place where we are for a time in

a place between the human and the godlike (=‘godlike’ here as:

pure spirit, pure love, pure universal energy, pure light)? Is it perhaps a place between life and death, where there is only pure spirit/energy and oneness? In that moment

of meditation, one is no longer a human ego, or soul in a body, but whole: connected to oneness. This brings us back to the point about near death experiences, which

have these qualities, as well as always having a journey towards an exquisite white light.

Mind: Absorbed, buried in thought

Meditation in general

Muttering, unintelligible # sensorial apathy and staring at one spot

Thoughts: vanishing, loss of

Staring, thoughtless

Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil.

[Phatak]

Think of the word ‘Hell’ (as in heaven and hell) and you will understand Hell. It suggests a state between life and death, where the patient predicts the time they are going

to die

Mind: Presentiment of death: predicts the time. The main remedy associating with this rubric is Acon. (Ranunculacea). Hell. slowly losing control over their senses and

ability to do anything, (move). Their conscience troubles them as they face death:

Anxious of conscience

Insanity, madness: in females: (from) self accusation

Delusions, imaginations: „As if committed a crime“/salvation lost/neglected his duty/sinned away his day of grace, unpardonable/has done wrong/devils/dark phantoms and images/ghosts and evil spirits.

Despair: religious

Reproaches himself

Speaking in muttering, or they think for what seems like far too much time, before answering…or they don't answer at all. Or they may speak and then fall back into a

stupor. What they say is unlikely to make sense. They don’t wish to speak and they don’t want others to talk either.

Answer/answering/answers: reflects long/stupor returns quickly afterwards/confusedly as if thinking of something else/refuses to talk/talking/talks: of others </in sleep

They are shutting down all their lines of communication: sight, hearing, feeling emotionally, touching, thinking, talking, even their sense of smell:

Hearing: Gets angry when spoken to, preferring to sit silently. Want to be left alone.

Eyes: Photophobia.

Vision: Horrible visions/delusions on closing their eyes, seeing dark visions of devils and dead people.

Dark colours in front of their eyes, and experience blindness and diminishing of their sight as well as night blindness (Puls./Ran-b.)

Smell: Diminished

The Hell. picture: locked inside of nowhere

Invisible has been suggested as a word to describe this remedy. In the extreme stage of this remedy there will be a sense of the patient not really being present - as if there

is a blank space inside them.

In the end stage, the Hell. patient gets cut off from life. They lose their will and lose the ability to feel, move or function.

Mind: loss of will/will loss of muscles

Senses: confused/dullness of, blunted/vanishing of

Indifference/apathy: no desires/no action of the will

(Only 2 listed in that last rubric: Verat./Hell.) Verat. commonly called white hellebore, even though it is not in the family of Hell., but in the Lily family.

Autism

Many of the symptoms of Hell. would indicate its usefulness in certain cases of autism. These are just a few examples:

Mind: automatic behavior

Biting: spoons, other things

Gestures: automatic/grasping or reaching at something

Moaning/groaning: involuntary

Talk/talking/talks: indisposed to, desire to be silent, taciturn

These rubrics may not be wholly representative of all cases of autism, but are familiar to me from the cases I have treated where the condition has been suspected to be

linked to vaccine damage.

Note on post-vaccine MMR/autism link: In the old Materia Medica texts, one of the 'causations' of this remedy is 'ailments from checked exanthemata' which means

ailments from suppressing the skin eruptions of eruptive fevers like measles and scarlet fever. This theoretically strengthens the link between the triple vaccine: measles,

mumps rubella (MMR), autism and Hell. as a remedy for cases where the autism is linked to vaccine damage, although we need some cured or substantially improved

cases to prove this theory. Puls. (same family) one of the commonest remedies indicated for measles symptoms and on close study Puls. and Hell. have many surprising

links.

Orphan/Refugee

Another image that comes up on reading the rubrics of Hell. in the mind section, is that of the orphan or refugee child, sitting alone in an orphanage cot, avoiding contact

after the shock of abandonment and neglect, rolling their head back and forth on the mattress, moaning. This combines the causations: disappointed love and homesickness.

Mind: Forsaken feeling

Homesickness

Ailments from: being looked at

Aversion: of being approached/to everything

Helpless: feels like an infant

Indifferent/apathic to joy/and suffering

Sitting: still, silent

Head: Motions: rolling head with moaning

The Hell. polarity

Though the deadened sensation and invisibility of presence are most charcteristic of Hell., the initial stage involves acute perception and functioning of the senses (see Vision: ACUTE and see below

for the mental polarities). In this remedy of life and death/back and white, it is not surprising that there are marked polarities. Before they get to the‘absent’ stage, the Hell. patient is unlikely to come

across as a bland or 'average' type (if there is such a thing), indeed they are far from invisible, drawing attention to themselves particularly by their clothing. These rubrics provide some examples:

Mind: Delusions: everything is new

„As if could do great deeds“

Delusions/imaginations: body (parts) „As if to big“./cannot walk, must run or hop

Dress/dresses: indecently

Eccentricity: dressing

Foolish behavior

Strange: crank

Tasteless in dressing

And at the extreme end:

Mania/madness: demoniacal

Hahnemann describes how Hell. is saddest when seeing a happy person, which is the stage where they are able to at least recognise joy in others, if not actually feel it for themselves.

Mind: Envy to see others happy/< seeing others happy

And at this stage they will probably be talkative, but may not make a lot of sense.

Eventually the brain can't process anything: there is no communication, the senses fail, and instructions from the brain to move muscles go unheard by the body:

Mind: Acts automatic

Senses vanishing

Aversion to everything

Desires nothing

The Will of Hell.

A comparison of the relative states of the 'will' in Ranunculaceae: Acon. Puls. Staph. with Hell.

Acon.: will is in an intense state, reacting suddenly, acute state, demanding and feeling with intensity.

Staph.: suppresses their will, often out of false politeness or to save their dignity. They are aware of the suppression and suffer for it - internalising their objections.

Puls.: usually known for their weak will, yielding to anyone stronger or more opinionated. They may not be aware how easily others are manipulating them.

(Puls. can be a highly manipulative person, using their apparently ‘weak’ will to their own ends).

Hell. at the extreme end of the spectrum has no will, it is a chronic state, in which Hell. desires nothing.

Puls. Staph. and Acon. are all low type in the rubric 'desire death', but Hell. is not listed: the remedy does not even have the will for that.

Under the rubric 'Desires Nothing': Puls. and Hell. are listed (low type).

Under the rubric: Weakness of will: Puls 2, Staph 1. Hell. Fails/it doesn't have a weak will, it has no will. The repertory is quite specific about this.

Mind: Will lost (muscles refuse to obey the will when attention is turned away)

Doing things wrong

Indifferent/apathic: desires nothing/no action of the will (Verat.)

When the word desire appears in relation to this remedy, then surely it needs special attention. What do they desire?

A word search of the Complete Millennium Repertory in relation to Hell. finds the following rubrics. Most of the rubrics, with the odd exception, are about negation

of desire rather than pure desire: not feeling something, rather than feeling it.

Rubrics containing the word ‘desire’

Mind: Desires to climb (out of the window, to go to the river)/nothing/to hide delirium/to go home)

Indifferent/apatic: desires nothing, no action of the will

Sympathy/compassion: desire this

Talk/talking/talks: indisposed to this/desire to be silent, taciturn (after typhoid)

Nose: Picking nose: constant desire for (brain complaints)

Rectum: Urging/desire (> rising from seat/< before stool (> after stool)

Bladder: Full without desire to urinate

Urging to urinate, in a morbid way: apyrexia/during fever/during perspiration/thinking of it/constant/frequent/and ineffectual, fruitless/painful/absent/with distended bladder

Vorwort/Suchen Zeichen/Abkürzungen Impressum