Talk:Medieval medicine
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(I have added significantly to the article using some of the comments here as a guide.) xandar
It was thought that illnesses were supernatural or spiritual, not organic. The sick relied on priests, not doctors, and constantly prayed to God for cures. The medical practice was slow to be accepted because superstition was so widespread.
The article fails to be NPOV, is a product of purely materialistic thought without any metaphysical knowledge and does not take into account Alternative medicine, Aura, Chakras and Spirituality. Optim 23:24, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)
You should add, then, exactly what the thoughts of medieval practitioners were on alternative medicine, aura, chakras and spirituality. - Nunh-huh 23:31, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)
- I already worked a lot on this, wikified it and pointed to the NPOV problem. Let somebody else turn it into an article (it's an essay right now). Optim 23:39, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Keep in mind that this is just an essay written by an eigth grade student and the views expressed are merely those as interpreted from the resources used to gather the information. I would appreciate it if any biases or incorrect information be corrected. Thank you for your input.
- Considering this, I want to thank you for your contribution. Optim 04:50, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)
[edit] To the person who will rewrite the essay
- Are you interested to rewrite this essay? Great! Have a look at the info I give here, it may help you in your research and rewriting:
- In dark ages medicine and therapy was just awful. People believed in superstition.
- However, according to many, magick, Alternative medicine, Energy theraphy, Chakras, etc are not superstitions.
- In medieval times, Mystics such as Rosicrucians knew how to perform therapy with non-material means. However non-material therapy DOES NOT substitute medicine, and this is emphasised by all serious Rosicrucians today.
- Prayer, meditation, visualisation and herbs have a positive effect on human health and help in therapy.
- According to Alternative medicine, Chakras play a very important role in health and their imbalance may cause illness. Nadis (the energy channels) and Qi energy are important concepts related to health, too.
- Many people, mostly those who support Alternative medicine and mysticism, still believe that illness comes from within the body.
- Chinese traditional medicine has some interesting views.
- However, the views expressed by mystics and alternative medicine practitioners are not accepted by science.
- For some alternative medicine examples, see Edward Bach and Bach flower remedies.
- The role of subconsious mind in health is very important and emphasised in Mysticism. Faith healing can be explained easily with the knowledge of the role of subconscious in human body.
- Many people who are active in Alternative medicine have no mystical-metaphysical knowledge and just take your money. Thus, most alternative medicine practices cannot be trusted easily.
Optim 05:04, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Other thoughts to consider:
- Prayers, herbs, and superstition were certainly medieval: alternative medicine and Bach flower remedies were not. Rosicrucians are largely irrelvant to health care. The modern versions of chakra, qi, and Chinese "traditional" medicine may have their roots in the past but differ considerably from their medieval predecessors. Advances in life expectancy have been due to medical knowledge about sanitation and childbirth as well as scientific validation and invalidation of therapies, with those that do not work being discarded, and those that do work being refined. The medieval period probably should end with the beginning of the Renaissance. - Nunh-huh 05:21, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)
- Rosicrucians are not irrelevant to health care. By tradition, Rosicrucians are therapists, too. Optim 05:26, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)
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- Rosicrucians had no significant impact on health care in the Middle Ages. -- Nunh-huh 05:28, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Medieval medicine was an evolving (perfectly static, until Arabic treatises were made available through translations of documents in Toledo) mixture of the scientific (actually not even "proto-scientific" until the 16th century; disambiguate medieval and Renaissance medicine) and the spiritual (superstition couched as theology is more accurate). In the early middle ages, following the fall of the Roman Empire, standard medical knowledge was based chiefly upon surviving Greek ( no one could even read Greek except a few Irish monks) and Roman texts, (Roman texts = Galen, period) preserved in monasteries and elsewhere (elsewhere? where are the surviving manuscripts from?). Ideas about the origin and cure of disease were not, however, purely secular, but were also based on a spiritual world view (is this NPOV or something? there's almost no information in this phrase), in which factors such as destiny, sin, and astral influences (miasma?) played as great a part as any physical cause. How to begin? with prohibitions of dissection? with medicine as first taught in universities? Wetman 17:20, 18 Mar 2004 (UTC)
The idea that medieval medicine was "static" is outdated. There was continuous change as folk-medicine evolved and interacted with surviving classical influences. The impact of Christianity on Pagan folk-medicine was also considerable. Throughout the period there is a development away from isolated local traditions towards a pan-european tradition. Herbal medicine was developed and codified, hospitals (of sorts) were established. xandar.
[edit] Non-wikified information available.
I have written a six page paper on this, as well as a bunch of notecards that did not make it into the paper, I am willing to take the time to type up the notecards and upload the paper, but am not willing to take the time to wikify these or make them NPOV. I would like the information to be of use for Wikipedia. What would be the appriate place to put this information.
P.S. This paper is for a western civilization class, so does not cover medieval medicine in other places of the world.
