The Structure of the Organon

What is Hahnemann’s Organon:
Hahnemann’s Organon is essentially Homeopathy’s how-to manual. Hahnemann founded the profession in 1796 and wrote his Organon (full title The Organon of Medicine or The Organon of the Medical Art) on how to practice homeopathic medicine (and why it’s the only form of medicine he deems worth practicing :D). He also outlines his philosophy on medicine, health, and disease.

The Tradition of Writing an Organon:
Organon’s are written in the aphoristic style, as Hahnemann’s was, and were commonly used by philosophers or scientists to outline principles on science or philosophy. Aphorisms are short statements that are supposed to reflect a general truth – a cliché example is “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. Now in Hahnemann’s Organon, many aphorisms are indeed short statements, but some are also very long – sometimes multiple pages with multiple paragraphs. There are two famous examples of Organons: Aristotle’s and Francis Bacon’s Organon and Novum Organum respectively. So, we can see that Hahnemann’s Organon is not unusual in title nor in structure; it’s coming out of a tradition. Organon means a tool or instrument, so Aristotle’s Organon is a tool for logic, Francis Bacon’s is a tool for scientific enquiry and Hahnemann’s is a tool for practicing medicine.

Structure of the Organon:
Like most nonfiction books, there is a preface and an introduction before the main text. The purpose of both the preface and the introduction is to better understand Hahnemann’s thinking about medicine of his time, and to understand his discontentment with medical practice during his lifetime. In other words, he outlines what he values and believes about medicine in general by contrasting allopathy and homeopathy. The preface outlines allopathy (a term Hahnemann comes up with that describes the medicine of his time – and ours), and outlines homeopathy and compares the two. He of course concludes allopathy is horrible and homeopathy is the savior of man. The introduction is similar, but much longer (a whopping 50 pages long, compared to a 3 page preface). The introduction is summarized as “a review of the allopathic and palliative medical practice of the old medical school up until now” by Wenda Brewster O’Reilly. However, he does not only focus on allopathic medicine, but compares it to homeopathy again, like in the preface. He also includes a list of old homeopathic cures that have occurred throughout history, which I find fascinating.

The main text is essentially a list of 291 aphorisms. Since it’s structured as a list, it’s easy to get lost in the details. In most books, there are chapters and sometimes subchapters and the author, before moving on to a new chapter, will often end with a summary of where we have been (at least in a nonfiction book). But here we don’t get that. He does take aphorisms to summarize what he’s gone over, to foreshadow what’s to come, etc. But I found it easy to miss the overall structure, despite his inclusion of summary aphorisms and foreshadowing. The structure may even be more difficult to follow because, even though his layout of aphorisms is logical, the “arrangement is not a linear one, but rather a wonderfully woven web of intricate meanings that encompasses the whole of medicine.” (foreward by Jeremy Sherr to Wenda Brewster O’Reilly’s version).

So enter Wenda Brewster O’Reilly. She edited a recent translation of the Organon and included chapters and subchapters in her version. She divides the main text into 12 “chapters”:

1. Principles of Cure (aphorisms 1-71)

2. Understanding Diseases (72-81)

3. Taking a case (82-104)

4. Acquiring a knowledge of medicines (105-145)

5. Homeopathic treatment of diseases (146-203)

6. The chronic miasms (204-209)

7. Mental and Emotional diseases (210-230)

8. Intermittent Diseases (231-244)

9. Case management (245-263)

10. Preparation of medicines (264-271)

11. Administration of Medicines (272-285)

12. Other therapies (286-291)

Each of the chapters also has subchapters.

The first chapter- the Principles of Cure is the section where he outlines his philosophy on health and disease, and how that logically leads to the law of similars. The rest of the book is largely practical.

At the end of the sixth edition of his Organon, he also included a summary for each aphorism (or a section of aphorisms in a couple cases). I combined Wenda Brewster O’Reilly’s structure with Hahnemann’s summaries in one document that you can get here, because I found it an effective way to help further my understanding of whatever section I am reading at the moment. By seeing chapters and subchapters with the summary, you understand how he built to the conclusions he’s gotten to, where he is going to go with it, and the summary shows you what he felt was important in that particular aphorism. If he has a two page aphorism, reading the one sentence summary quickly orients you to what he felt was vital to know, and what he felt was accessory knowledge.

In Summary
You can clearly see that the Organon is at its heart the original instruction manual to all people who are curious about how homeopathy is to be practiced. The majority of the aphorisms are practical, and the first aphorism states that the purpose of a physician is to cure. This sets the philosophical section into a subservient place in relation to the practice of homeopathy. In other words, he starts with the philosophical part but with the understanding that the philosophical part is only important because it allows the physician to cure more effectively, and so what’s important are the physician’s actions.