Sea Remedies and the Evolution of the Senses by JO EVANS

Description

This book is a truly excellent and even model homeopathic materia medica!

This book is a full-color, photographic materia medica. As well as being a homeopath and writer, Jo  Evans is a skilled photo editor, working mostly on The Times, and The Times Literary Supplement, which are established, quality English newspapers. She brings these skills, developed over the best part of two decades, to the book, along with more than 90 full color photos and manydrawings. Jo is also a former editor of The Homeopath, journal of the Society of Homeopaths.

It is from the ancient sea creatures that the human senses have evolved; in fact we use less senses than some sea creatures, which also have a keen awareness of electromagnetism and lateral line symmetry. The book traces the evolution of our senses through the natural, biological and evolutionary history of those creatures that dwell in the deep oceans, with appendices on the sensations of the remedies for each of the senses. There are individual chapters on the Senses of Hearing, Smell and Taste, Touch, and Vision.
Jo Evans’ idea is to draw together the sensations of the sea creatures. To this end, each materia medica chapter begins with a summary of the remedy and its sensations, and then opens out to a wider examination of the sensations, functions and pains of the remedy in every aspect. The layout of the materia medica is guided by the senses. Each materia medica chapter is followed by the natural history of each remedy; the uses of the source material in other medicines; and the folklore, symbol and signature surrounding the source substance. The photographs are spectacular!
BOOK REVIEW

This book review is reprinted with the permission from The Homeopath (Spring 2010). The Society of Homeopaths — www.homeopathy-soh.org

Reviewed by Francis Treuherz

With 24 remedies in 653 pages and around 100 full-page colour illustrations, this book has quality and size. It is surprisingly slim, heavy, perfectly bound on high-grade paper with an elegant font and a great aesthetic; the central materia medica section has a shaded marker on the edge of the page so you can find it.

The first 125 pages set the tone with the sensual themes. Will we ever feel at home with these families? In this book I think so, it is an underwater adventure with correspondences, taste, smell, vision, touch, hearing all analysed, indexed and referenced in such an elegant and poetic fashion that I think the author has been writing prose all her life without knowing it. Each remedy is summarised before being described in detail, with some cases from our literature.

Porifera, cnidarians, echinoderms, arthropods, molluscs, gastropods, bivalves, cepaholopds … there is a new unfamiliar vocabulary to help define familiar remedies like Calcarea carbonica and Sepia, and new remedies like Eledone cirrhosa or Pecten jacobaeus. Then there is a spiral journey of homeopathic process, integrated with spiral and shell remedies. There follow glossaries of the unfamiliar terms and a thematic repertory, bibliography and index, as part of these last 100 pages.

It looks good enough to eat – about the only information that seems to be missing is this: the sea creatures so lovingly, carefully and comprehensively described in this book are a forbidden food for observant Jews on a par with pig meat. Oh and there are no recipes. I look forward to the second volume that I hope will deal with real vertebrate fish with fins and scales. Desires fish (3).

This is a superlative book in every way, the sensual medium is the message, not only for look and feel but for quality and integration of the information about the medicines. I have never seen a materia medica with so many sources and so much integration of philosophy with useful material. I have a habit of reading an article from a journal or a remedy from material medica in bed most nights. This one is taking me longer as it is so rich and I look forward to more early nights. Buy it for yourself or ask someone dear to you to give it for your next birthday.

CONTENTS

CORRESPONDENCES

Evolution and the Unity of the Senses

Myth, Mirror and Healing

Alienation and Inner Space

Illustrated timeline of animal evolution

THE CHEMICAL SENSES: TASTE AND SMELL

The Nose Knows

Fantastic Voyage

Smell: A Sense Base or Sublime?

Alchemy of the Sperm Whale

Smelling and Tasting in the Oceans

Sensations and Symptoms: Smell, Taste, Chemical Messaging

THE SENSE OF VISION

In Darkness

Inner Space: As Above, So Below

Feeling Light

Watercolours and Tricks of the Light

Th e Colour Purple

Ocean Eyes

Cnidarian Vision, Cnidarian Senses

Overwhelmed by the Senses: Tropisms

The Brilliance of Brainless Coral

Th ird Eye: Cnidarians and the Pineal Gland

Powers beyond Seeing

Self-Consciousness in Sea Animal Remedies

Additional sea remedies: sense of self consciousness

An Eye for an Eye

Relevance to the Cnidarian remedy provings (jellyfi sh, coral, anemones)

Spies of Light

Sensations and Symptoms: Vision

THE SENSE OF TOUCH

The Paradox of Touch

Of Life and Limb

Th e Language of the Skin

Sensitivity and Numbness

On Having a Shell

On Being Armoured or Disrobed

Sensations and Symptoms: Touch

THE SENSE OF HEARING

The Dance of the Sea

Dance, Society and Invertebrate Mood Modulators

Notes on the Evolutionary Origins of Music and Language

Singing the World: Homeopathic Poetry

Sensations and Symptoms: Hearing, Singing, Dancing, Movement

Evolutionary Echoes: birds, insect s, spiders

Materia Medica

PORIFERA: marine sponges

Tree of Life

Natural History

Spongia tosta (roasted sea sponge)

CNIDARIANS: coral, sea anemones and jellyfish

Tree of Life

Cnidarian Remedies

Natural History

The sea anemone remedies

Corallium rubrum (red gorgonian coral) Anthozoa

Anthopleura xanthogrammica (giant green sea anemone) Anthozoa

Stichodactyla haddoni (Haddon’s sea anemone) Anthozoa

Physalia pelagica (Portuguese man of war) Hydrozoa

Medusa or Aurelia Aurita (moon jellyfish)

ScyphozoaChironex fl eckeri (box jellyfish) Cubozoa

ECHINODERMS: starfish and sea urchins

Tree of Life

Echinoderm Remedies

Natural History

Acanthaster planci (crown of thorns starfi sh) Asteroidea

Asterias rubens (red starfi sh) Asteroidea

Toxopneustes pileolus (fl ower urchin) Echinoidea

MARINE ARTHROPODS: lobster and horseshoe crab

Tree of Life

Natural History

Limulus cyclops (horseshoe crab) Cheliceramorpha

Homarus gammarus (European lobster) Crustacea

MARINE MOLLUSCS, GASTROPODS AND BIVALVES: sea shells

Tree of Life

Natural History

Introduction

OPODS & SHELLS

Marine Mollusc Remedies: the shells

Gastropods Natural History

Cypraea eglantina (dog rose cowrie ) Gastropod

Murex (Tyrian purple dye) Gastropod

Bivalves Natural History

Pecten jacobaeus (scallop) Bivalve

Venus mercenaria (clam) Bivalve

Calcarea carbonica (oyster shell) Bivalve

Conchiolinum (mother of pearl)

Pearl Remedies

Mytilus edulis pearl (pearl of blue mussel) Bivalve

Pearl (pearl of oyster) Bivalve

Pearl in Medicine

Pearl in Nature

Pearl Signature and Symbol

MARINE MOLLUSCS, CEPHALOPODS: nautilus, octopus, squid, cuttlefish

Tree of Life

Cephalopod Remedies

Natural History

Nautilus (nautilus) Nautilida

Sepia officinalis (sepia/cuttlefi sh ink) Sepiida

Eledone cirrhosa (lesser oct opus) Oct opoda

Onychoteuthis banksii (clubhook squid) Teuthida

SPIRAL JOURNEY: Part I: The Homeopathic Process

Spiral as Symbol

Non-Dual Duality

Spirit and Sensibility

A Remembered Present

SPIRAL JOURNEY: Part II: Spirals and Shell remedies

The Spiral and the Goddess

Left and Right Handed Shells

Which Way to Turn?

Sexuality and the Shell Remedies

Anima and Animus: Reciprocal Spirals

Uroboros: Cycles and Spirals

Three in One

I Rise Again

Polarity and Duality

Darkness and Light

Into the Labyrinth

Shadow and Sex

Shells and Moon

The Sinistral Way: Th e Copper Breathers

Life Breath: From Gills to Lungs

Air and Soul

The Shell in the Desert: Assigning Value

Summary of Shell Symbolism

Material to Spiritual: The Journey

Spiral Chambers

Conclusion