Homeopathy Papers

Imponderabilia – The Energy Source

Written by Qadeer Unnisa

Dr. Qadeer Unnisa Begum discusses the imponderabilia remedies, including X-ray, Radium bromatum (Radium bromide), Electricitas (electricity), Sol (sunlight), Luna (moonlight) and Magnetis remedies (north, south and combined poles.)

Abstract: Homoeopathic drugs are obtained from various sources like plants, animals, minerals, nosodes, sarcodes, imponderables, and tautopathic drugs. Imponderable remedies are a small group of which are considered to be manufactured from a dynamically, immaterial energetic source. The most well-known of these include X-ray, Radium bromatum (Radium bromide), Electricitas (electricity), Sol (sunlight) and Luna (moonlight), Magnetis poli ambo (magnet). These sources have no mass. Imponderabilia medicines are most powerful and deep acting. They are well represented in Clarke’s Materia Medica and Allen’s Materia Medica of Nosodes and magnets is in Materia Medica Pura. Though these remedies are well proved they are rarely used by homoeopathic professionals and are poorly represented in our repertories. As these drugs were proved long ago there is a need of reproving and clinical verification and there is a need of setting standards regarding their preparation.

Key words: Imponderabilia, Electricitas, Luna, X-ray, Sol, Magnetis poli ambo, Reproving.

Introduction:

The word imponderabilia has come from ‘imponderable’ that means not weighable, i.e. the substances have no perceptible weights [1]. Imponderibilia are immaterial ‘dynamic’ energies that are utilized as potentized homoeopathic medicines. [‘ponder’ signifies contemplating, examining, investigating][2].

Imponderabilia medicines can also be termed direct physical energy medicines as these medicines utilize energy directly, available from natural and physical reactions. Presently available imponderabilia medicines belong to the magnetic, electromagnetic, electrical, nuclear and cosmic category of energies[1].

Dynamic, powerful, physical, energies have been known to influence various living and non-living processes on the earth. The energy utilized may be natural or it may be artificially generated[2].

Natural Source:

E.g.: a. Normal magnet – Magnetis poli ambo.

  1. North pole of magnet – Magnetis polus arcticus.
  2. South pole of magnet- Magnetis polus australis.

Artificial Source:

E.g.: a. Electricity – Electricitas.

  1. Sun’s ray – Sol.
  2. Radium bromide – Radium.
  3. Moon’s Rays – Luna
  4. Artificial magnet – Magnetis artificialis.
  5. X-rays X-ray[3].

Specific instructions and rules for collecting and preparing these medicines are given in the pharmacopoeia.

  • Magnets can be procured from a physical laboratory.
  • For preparing ‘Luna’, full moon is suggested.
  • For preparing ‘X-ray’, a chemical testing laboratory may be contacted.
  • Potentisation of these medicines has to be done very carefully [3,1].

Hahnemann discussed the dynamic power of magnets, electricity and galvanism under aphorisms 286 and 287 of organon of medicine 6th edition.

  • 286 The dynamic powers of mineral magnets, electricity and galvanism act as powerfully and as homeopathically on our life principle as do actual so-called medicines that lift diseases by means of oral ingestion, through the skin, or by olfaction.

They thereby enable the cure of diseases, especially those of sensibility and irritability, of abnormal feeling, and involuntary muscle movements. However, the sure manner of employing electricity and galvanism (as well as the use of the so-called electro-magnetic machine) still lies too much in the dark to make homeopathic use of them.

So far, both electricity and galvanism have been used only for palliation, doing great damage to patients. Up until now, their positive pure actions on the healthy human body have been but little proven[4].

  • 287 One can more surely avail oneself of the curative powers of a powerful magnet. The positive actions of its north and south poles are presented in the Materia Medica Pura. Although both poles are equally powerful, they stand in opposition to one another in the manner of their action.

Doses may be moderated by the amount of time one or the other pole is applied (according to whether more of the symptoms of the north or the South Pole are indicated). A plate of polished zinc can be used as an antidote for an all-too-violent action[4].

Hahnemann says that ‘even imponderable agencies, can produce the most violent medicinal effects upon man’ under § 280 footnote Fifth Edition of Organon[4].

IMPONDERABILIA DRUGS

 ELECTRICITAS – Source: Electricity

History

The effects of atmospheric electricity and static electricity.

Caspari is the authority for the symptoms caused by electricity, but everyone knows the powerful effect exercised on some persons by the approach of a thunderstorm and the influence of an electric current[5].  In those which have been electrified, are found shaking of the whole body, commencing in the maxillary bones, tingling in the parts electrified, violent burning [6].

Preparation

Trituration 1x- Saccharum lactis is exposed to high intensity static electricity for 10 minutes[7].  Caution: The product should be freshly prepared and used [7].

GALVANISMUS (Galvanism) Galvanism. (“Z” signifies zinc, “S” silver, and “C” the copper pole.)[5].

History

Caspari is the authority for this medicine [5].  Farrington gives: “benumbed feeling at the back of the head in brain-fag, the positive pole being applied to the cervical region, the negative to the vertex”[5,6].

Preparation

Attenuations are made by triturating sugar of milk which has been subjected to the influence of either electric pole[5,6,8].

LUNA

Source: The moon’s rays

History

Goullon of Weismer contributed to the Rev. Hom. Belge, January, 1897, a notable article: “The Influence of the Moon on the Human Organism,” in which he mentions, among other interesting facts, that sleepwalking is a lunar effect, that worm disorders are most troublesome at the full noon and that goiter changes, more or less with the moon[5,6]

Preparation

Sugar of milk is exposed on a glass plate to the moon’s rays and stirred with a glass rod. The sugar of milk so charged is dynamized in the usual way, (Fincke). Higgins made a preparation by exposing pure water to the moon’s rays for three or four hours in South America and then dynamizing the water so charged [5,6,8].

MAGNETIS POLI AMBO (Magnet) Source: The Magnet

History

The effect of the Magnet as a whole and of each pole separately was tested by Hahnemann and the symptoms are mainly from his pathogenesis.  In his preface he says he does not expect “ordinary mechanical, materialistic and atomistic heads” to be able to regard diseases as “immaterial alternations of the vitality or pure dynamic derangements of our state of health and medicinal powers as merely virtual, almost spiritual, forces.”

Hahnemann asks how they can reconcile with their materialistic notions the fact that “a single imponderable spark from a Leyden jar gives a shock to the strongest man and yet no ascertainable ponderable substance is communicated to his body”[5,6]. Of the symptoms of the schema he says they “occurred from various powerful magnets brought in contact with various sensitive individuals, without distinction of the poles.

They were observed in experiments conducted for half a year for the purpose of ascertaining the proper and most efficacious mode of stroking the steel with magnets, in which a horse-shoe magnet, capable of lifting a weight of twelve pounds, was held in the hands, which were held in contact with both poles for an hour at a time, with additional symptoms from Andry, Thouret, Unzer, and De Harsu[5].

Sensations of coldness are marked. There is coldness where the magnet is applied. The eyeball feels cold, as if there were a lump of ice in the socket. On the other hand there is a sensation as if the blood was rushing towards the point touched by the magnet[6].

Preparation

Trituration of sugar of milk after exposure of whole magnet (horseshoe shaped capable of lifting 5.5kg weight of iron). Exposure time 1 hour. Trituration time 1 hour[7]. Trituration of Sugar of Milk after exposure of the influence of both poles of the magnet. Dilution of distilled water similarly exposed[6].

MAGNETIS POLUS ARCTICUS (NORTH POLE OF MAGNET)

History

The symptoms of Mag-arct were obtained by applying it in the region of the 4th to 6th thoracic vertebra, at a distance of four or five finger’s breadth from the body[6,9].

Preparation:                                                                    

Trituration of sugar of milk after exposure of north pole of magnet (horse shoe shaped capable of lifting 5.5kg of iron). Exposure time 1 hour. Trituration time 1 hour[7].

MAGNETIS POLUS AUSTRALIS (SOUTH POLE OF MAGNET)

History

South pole of magnet is useful for ingrown toe nails. Clarke has cured so many cases of ingrown toenail with Mag-aust. 2,000c., that he invariably gave it in the first place when there are no symptoms plainly indicating another remedy. Here are the symptoms from Hahnemann which led to this use:

Sore pain on the inner side of the nail of the big toe when walking, as if the nail had grown into the flesh on the side, very painful on being slightly touched and the shoe presses on the toes and on the nail of the big toe when walking, as from corns.

The accurate response to these symptoms on the part of the attenuated Mag-aust. proved to Clarke the possibility of attenuating and so fixing this “energy” for use as an ordinary homeopathic remedy[6].

Preparation

Trituration of sugar of milk after exposure of north pole of magnet (horse shoe shaped capable of lifting 5.5kg of iron). Exposure time 1 hour. Trituration time 1 hour[7]. Potencies of alcohol saturated with emanations of the south pole[9].

RADIUM BROMATUM (Radium Bromide)

Rad-br. Ra br2, 2H2O. Radium bromatum.

History

An important addition to the Materia Medica especially since the provings by Diffenbach have précisionized its use. Radium brom of 1,000,000 radio-activity was employed[10]. Pure Radium is a white metal which “oxidizes in water, burns paper, turns black on exposure to air and has the property of adhering firmly to iron.”

This last quality is not without significance and shows a close affinity with Ferrum. Its atomic weight is 225. It is found in the ore pitchblende.  The discovery of Radium and its properties in 1898 by Pierre and Marie Curie set many persons thinking and among them, naturally, those who are engaged in the healing of the sick. Pierre Curie himself made the first “proving.”

He put a tiny bit of Radium salt in an India rubber capsule and fastened it to his arm, leaving it there for ten hours. When he took it off the skin was red, the place turned into a wound, which took four months to heal, leaving a white scar the size of a shilling surrounded by discolored puckered skin.

On another occasion he left it for half an hour. A wound appeared at the end of a fortnight and took another fortnight to heal. On a third occasion, he left it for eight minutes only. Two months later the skin became red and a bit sore, but it soon passed off[6].

Preparation: Trituration 3x, Drug strength 1/1000

Radium bromide 1gm

Saccharum lactis 999gms to make 1 kilogram of trituration[11].

SOL (sunlight)

History

Thanks to Dr. Finsen of Copenhagen, the place of light in therapeutics was defined so far as its direct properties are concerned, though Finsen was reviving and confirming, the ancient light-therapy. O. V. Thayer published in 1893 a series of cases in which he had used concentrated rays of sun-light (solar cautery) including cases of skin cancer, rodent ulcer, parasitic diseases, moles, small wens, birth-marks, etc. H. T.

Webster gives details of a case of epithelioma in which the growth was removed by solar cautery and a scarcely perceptible scar left. Faintness, prostration, general stiffening up of the system, the bodily strength seems more equalized[6,12].

Preparation

Sol, sunlight. Milk sugar is exposed to concentrated sun’s rays and stirred with a glass rod until saturated. Potencies made by Fincke[6,12].

X-RAY History and preparation

The proving on X-rays was undertaken by B. Fincke in 1897, on ten provers, using 6x and was published in the proceedings of the International Hahnemannian Association pages 47-76.

A re-experimentation was done by W. B. Griggs on two men and one woman prover and published in the Homeopathic Recorder in 1952 using the 30c and 200c potencies[13].

A very able description of the discovery of the x-ray by professor Roentgen was given in the Homoeopathic Physician (march 1896)by Dwalber M. James and concluded   with the words: “

Why should not the homoeopathist seek to procure a proving of the effects of X-ray upon the animal economy of the human being :An inviting field is there opened up to the experimenters of our school. May it soon be cultivated”. March 27, 1897.

A drachm vial filled with absolute alcohol was exposed to a Crookes tube in operation for half an hour and then brought up to the sixth centesimal potency. The globules were moistened and the vials containing them presented to the Brooklyn Hahnemann Union, which met the same evening in regular session.

Like Magnetis Poli Australis and other imponderabilia, electricity and the X-ray are both capable of potentization, and the potentized dynamic remedy is just as superior to the crude drug as Aurum, Lyco, Silicea or Sulphur[14].

Conclusion: Imponderables though they are a small group of drugs, are most powerful and deep acting. As we are living in world where there is lot of radiation from different sources there is a scope of research and proving of new imponderabilia drugs and their incorporation into our materia medica will enrich it. Reproving must be done of existing imponderables.

References:

  1. Dr. PARTHA MANDAL and Dr. BIMAN MANDAL, A Text Book of Homoeopathic Pharmacy, Thoroughly Revised and Enlarged 3rd Edition- 2012, New Central Book Agency, Kolkata.
  2. Dr. SUMIT GOEL, Art and science of Homeopathic Pharmacy-3rd edition-2014, Indian Books & Periodicals Publishers, New Delhi -110005(India).
  3. Dr. Banerjee D.D., Augmented Textbook Of Homoeopathic Pharmacy- 2nd edition-2006, B. Jain Publishers (P) Ltd. New Delhi 110 055 (INDIA)
  4. Singh, Mahendra & Singh Subhas. (2004). – Organon of Medicine 5th and 6th  Editions by Samuel Hahnemann. Kolkata: Homoeopathic Publications.
  5. Clarke, John. Henry. (2006). A Dictionary of Practical Materia Medica (Vol.1). New Delhi : B.Jains Publishers (P)Ltd.
  6. Robin Murphy-. 2000. Homeopathic Remedy Guide
  7. Varma,P.N, Vaid, Indu. (2007). Encyclopedia Of Homoeopathic Pharmacopoeia & Drug Index (Vol. 2). New Delhi: B.Jains Publishers (P)Ltd.
  8. Saxena, R. 2003. Imponderabilia Homoeopathic Direct Energy Medicines. New Delhi : B.Jains Publishers (P)Ltd. ISBN : 81-8056-401-0
  9. Clarke, John. Henry. (2006). A Dictionary of Practical Materia Medica (Vol.2). New Delhi : B.Jains Publishers (P)Ltd.
  10. Boericke, William. (2011). Pocket manual of homoeopathic materia medica. New Delhi: Indian Books & Periodicals Publishers.
  11. Varma,P.N, Vaid, Indu. (2007). Encyclopedia Of Homoeopathic Pharmacopoeia & Drug Index (Vol. 3). New Delhi: B.Jains Publishers (P)Ltd.
  12. Clarke, John. Henry. (2006). A Dictionary of Practical Materia Medica (Vol.3). New Delhi : B.Jains Publishers (P)Ltd.
  13. Julian, O.A. (2003). Dictionary of Homoeopathic Materia Medica. New Delhi: B.Jains Publishers (P) Ltd.
  14. Allen, H.C. (2006). The Material Medica Of the Nosodes with Provings of the X-RAY. New Delhi: B.Jains Publishers (P) Ltd.

About the author

Qadeer Unnisa

Dr. Qadeer Unnisa Begum, PG Scholar, Department of Homoeopathic Pharmacy, JSPS Govt. Homoeopathic Medical College, Ramanthapur, Hyderabad.

6 Comments

  • Very insightful and enlightening on the Imponderibilia, a lesser known aspect. There is a greater need to understand and apply them in our clinical practice.

  • Really useful one. Most of the Homoeopaths usually ignore this group medicines. Thanks for sharing this! 🙂

  • DEAR DR
    NO DOUBT THAT HOMEOPATHY CAN DO WONDERS . YOUR ARTICLE IS ALSO WONDERFUL IT SHOWS YOUR INTEREST IN IMPONDERABLES AS WELL ENHANCING THE INTEREST OF HOMEOPATHS IN PROVING IMPONDERABLES. WE ALL KNOW THAT SUN HAS THE POWER OF DESTROYING BACTERIA AND VIRUSES. WHY NOT HOMEOPATHS WHILE KNOWING THE ENRGY OF SUN HAVE BEEN ABLE TO DESTROY BACTERIA AND VIRUS, SPECIALLY CORONA VIRUS. IF ANY REMEDY FROM ENERGY HAS BEEN INVENTED SO FAR AGAINST CORONA VIRUS. PL LET US KNOW AND THE WORLD AT LARGE
    THANKS

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