Chapter One
IT IS NOT the object of this
book to suggest that the art of healing is unnecessary; far be from it any such
intention; but it is humbly hoped that it will be a guide to those who suffer
to seek within themselves the real origin of their maladies, so that they may
assist themselves in their own healing.
本書のねらいは、医術は不要だと述べることではありません。そのような気持ちはまったくなく、病気に苦しむ人々が、病気の真の原因を自分の内側に見出し、それを癒す方法を伝えるためにあります。
Edward Bach《Heal Thyself》
Chapter One p.1
Moreover, it is hoped that it may
stimulate those, both in the medical profession and in religious orders, who
have the welfare of humanity at heart, to redouble their efforts in seeking the
relief of human suffering, and so hasten that day when the victory over disease
wull be complete.
The
main reason for the failure of modern medical science is that it is dealing
with results and not causes. For many centuries the real nature of disease has
been masked by materialism, and thus disease itself has been given every
opportunity of extending its ravages, since it has not been attacked at its
origin. The situation is like to an enemy strongly fortified in the hills,
continually waging guerilla warfare in the country around, while the people,
ignoring the fortified garrison, content themselves with repairing the
damaged houses and burying the dead, which are the result of the raids of the
marauders. So, generally speaking, is the situation in medicine to-day;
nothing more than the patching up of those attacked and the burying of those
who are slain, without a thought being given to the real stronghold.
何世紀もの間、病気の真の原因が物質主義という仮面に覆い隠され、私たち人間が病気の根源に対処しなかったことで、病に猛威をふるわせるあらゆる機会を与えてきたのです。この状況はまるで、国中でゲリラ戦が行なわれ、敵が丘の上に堅牢な要塞を築いているのに、人々がその要塞を無視し、襲撃によって破壊された家を修繕したり死者を葬ったりすることで満足しているようなものです。一般的に言って、これが医学の現状です。 つまり、対処すべき敵の要塞のことを少しも考えず、傷を負った者に手当てを施し、殺された人を葬ったりする以上のことを何もしていないのです。
Disease
will never be cured or eradicated by present materialistic methods, for the
simple reason that disease in its origin is not material. What we know as disease is
an ultimate result produced in the body, the end product of deep and long
acting forces, and even if material treatment alone is apparently successful
this is nothing more than a temporary relief unless the real cause has been
removed. The modern trend of medical science, by misinterpreting the true
nature of disease and concentrating it in materialistic terms in the
physical body, has enormously increased its power, firstly by distracting the
thoughts of people from its true origin and hence from the effective method of
attack, and secondly, by localising it in the body, thus obscuring true hope of
recovery and raising a mighty disease complex of fear, which never should have
existed.
Disease is in essence
the result of conflict between Soul and Mind, and will never be eradicated
except by spiritual and mental effort. Such efforts, if properly made with
understanding as we shall see later, can cure and prevent disease by removing those basic
factors which the are its primary cause. No effort directed to the body alone
can do more than superficially repair damage, and in this there is no cure,
since the cause is still operative and may at any moment again demonstrate its
presence in another form. In fact, in many cases apparent recovery is harmful,
since it hides from the patient the true cause of his trouble, and in the
satisfaction of apparently renewed health the real factor, being unnoticed, may
gain in strength. Contrast these cases with that of the patient who knows, or
who is by some wise physician instructed in, the nature of the adverse
spiritual or mental forces at work, the result of which has precipitated what
we call disease in the physical body. If that patient directly attempts to
neutralise those forces, health improves as soon as this is successfully begun,
and when it is completed the disease will disappear. This is true healing by
attacking the stronghold, the very base of the cause of suffering.
病気とは、本質的に、魂と心が葛藤した結果であり、霊的な面と精神的な面の努力なくして消えることはありません。そのことを理解し適切に努力するなら、後述するように、病気の根本原因を取り除くことで、病を治すことも防ぐことも可能です。肉体だけを扱う治療は、表面上の回復をもたらすだけで、真の治療には至りません。病気は依然として影響を及ぼし、今にも別の形で表れるでしょう。実際に、多くの場合において、うわべだけの回復というのは、問題があることが多いのです。それは、問題の本当の原因を隠し、取り戻したかに見える健康に満足する内側で、真の要因が気づかれずに力を増しているからです。これと対照的なのが、病に作用する有害な、霊的、精神的影響力の本質を理解している患者の場合です。彼らは賢明な医師から、病気に作用する力の本質と、それが肉体に引き起こす病と呼ばれているものの結果について教えられています。このような患者が、直ちに有害な影響力をなくすべく適切な努力を始めるなら、不調はすぐに改善し、最終的には病は消えてなくなります。これが、先の例で言えば、要塞、すなわち病気の原因の、まさに基部を攻撃する本当の治療と言えます。
One of
the exceptions to materialistic methods in modern science is that of the great
Hahnemann, the founder of Homeopathy, who with his realisation of the
beneficent love of the Creator and of the Divinity which resides within man, by
studying the mental attitude of his patients towards life, environment and
their respective diseases, sought to find in the herbs of the field and in the
realms of nature the remedy which would not only heal their bodies but would at the same time uplift their
mental outlook. May his science be extended and developed by those true
physicians who have the love of humanity at heart.
現代医学における物質主義的な方法論の例外のひとつは、ホメオパシーの創始者である偉大なるハーネマンの功績です。彼は、人間の内に備わっている神性と創造主の慈悲深い愛を理解していました。そして、患者の人生、おかれている環境、患っている病気に対する気持ちを詳しく調べることによって、体を治すだけでなく、精神面でのものの見方や考え方を高めるレメディを、ハーブや自然界から探し出そうと模索しました。ハーネマンの研究が、真の医師によって社会に広まり、発展していくことを祈ります。真の医師とは、人々に対する慈愛を心に抱いている人です。
Five hundred years before
Christ some physicians of ancient India, working under the influence of the
Lord Buddha, advanced the art of healing to so perfect a state that they able
to abolish surgery, although the surgery of their time was as efficient, or
more so, than that of the present day. Such men as Hippocrates with his mighty
ideals of healing, Paracelsus with his certainty of the divinity in man, and
Hahnemann who realised that disease originated in a plane above the physical -
all these knew much of the real nature and remedy of suffering. What untold
misery would have been spared during the last twenty or twenty-five centuries
had the teaching of these great masters of their art been followed, but, as in
other things, materialism has appealed too strongly to the Western world, and
for so long a time, that the voices of the practical obstructors have risen
above the advice of those who knew the truth.
紀元前500年の古代インドでは、現在に劣らぬほど外科手術が進んでいましたが、ブッダの教えを受けた医師たちは、その外科手術を必要としないほど完全な治療技術を持っていました。ヒポクラテスは治療に対する素晴らしい理想を持っていましたし、パラケルススは人間の中に確かに神を見ていました。ハーネマンは肉体と異なるところに病気の原因となるものがあることを認識していました。これらの人々は、病気の本質と治療法を熟知していました。もしこれらの素晴らしい技術を持った偉大な先人の教えに私たちがきちんと耳を傾けていたなら、過去2000年、いや2500年の間、きわめて多くの苦痛を人間が経験する必要はなかったのですが、他のことと同様、物質主義が西洋人に非常に強い影響を与えました。そのため、とても長い間、真理を知る人の忠告は実用主義の妨害者の声に抑えつけられてきたのです。
Let it be briefly stated
that disease, though apparently so cruel, is in itself beneficent and for our
good and, if rightly interpreted, it will guide us to our essential faults. If
properly treated it will be the cause of the removal of those faults and leave
us better and greater than before. Suffering is a corrective to point out a
lesson which by other means we have failed to grasp, and never can it be eradicated until
that lesson is learnt. Let it also be known that in those who understand and
are able to read the significance of premonitory symptoms disease may be prevented before its onset or aborted in its earlier stages if the proper
corrective spiritual and mental efforts be undertaken. Nor need any case
despair, however severe, for the fact that the individual is still granted
physical life indicates that the Soul who rules is not without hope.
さて、簡単に言うなら、病気はたいへん残酷に見えますが、その反面、有益で人間の役に立つところがあります。病気が正しく解釈されれば、それによって、私たちの非常に重要な欠点を知ることができるのです。もし的確に治療をしたなら、その欠点をも取り除くことになり、前にも増して健康になれます。病気は、学ぶべき課題を指摘する矯正手段です。それは私たちがこれまで別の方法で与えられながら、機会を逃してきたものです。人はその課題を学ぶまで、病気をなくすことはできません。病気に至るまでの状況を理解し、その本質を見抜くことのできる人が、霊的な面と精神的な面で努力を重ねたなら、病気を未然に防ぐことができます。また、病気の始まりで進行を阻止することも可能です。どんなに状況が絶望的に見えても、生きることを許されている間は、人を支配している魂が、希望を捨てていないことを示しています。
Edward Bach《Heal Thyself》
Chapter One p.1
Bach Flower Counsel
バッチフラワーカウンセル