Medicine For Your Body

Nowadays, due to the overarching power of pharmaceutical companies we live in cultures saturated with pills and various forms of medicine to help our bodies feel good.  Even worse, now that our latest scientific research is indicating the power of mind over body, a whole new set of cognitive enhancing drugs are beginning to infiltrate the market in order to so-called help our minds and cognition perform optimally. Day after day, more and more, we are being bombarded and deluded by various forms of advertisements telling us that so and so drug will make us feel better, physically and mentally.  This constant bombardment of misleading information imprints in our minds the false notion that pills are good and we should be quick to self-diagnose and consume various pills.  

            However, how many of us actually take the time to investigate each medication that we choose to consume? How many of us read the labels and look deeper into the possible side effects of each medicine that we take?  How many of us think past the  short-term relief and about the long-term disaster?  

            Many of us have mistakenly placed our trusts in pharmaceutical companies, and forget to realize that each company, especially multi-billion dollar companies, aim solely to maximize their annual profits.  

            There are numerous documentaries and books and articles written about the dangers of blindly and passively becoming a victim of the current pill culture.  The documentary “Big Bucks, Big Pharma” byRonit Ridberg is one of the many eye-opening documentaries that sheds light into the business world of drug making. Another documentary that is worth watching is “Pill Poppers.”  A third documentary that helps to raise some serious questions is “The Marketing of Madness: Are We All Mad?”  Lastly an interesting article that highlights this issue, which I recently stumbled upon, is the “Pill Culture Pops.”

 

            Another important point that I would like to raise, related to the upcoming tradition, is about the false old mechanistic view of the body.  For many years, falsely it was assumed that healing our bodies is similar to fixing a machine, whichever part is “broken” we should take a pill to fix that part.  However, this false mechanistic approach is, fortunately, beginning to fade away.  Unlike machines, our bodies are not merely made of parts.  We are not the sum of our parts.  We are a whole, and changing one part of the whole affects the other parts as well.  This is very important and we must always keep this in mind.  Amazingly, yet not surprisingly, our beloved Imams (as) knew this fact very well, as you will see in the following tradition. In short, and concisely, every pill that we take affects our body as a whole and not a mere part of our body.  For example, a pill that may help your headache may be very harmful to your liver. 

            Now with all that said, I am not suggesting that we must stay away from all forms of medicine and all pills.  As decades of scientific research have shown, medicinal pills do indeed help in some cases.  I would like to emphasize that the main issue is about taking medicine carelessly.  Again, I will emphasize this one more time, if you’re ill, speak with your trustworthy doctor and properly follow his or her directions. DO NOT  take this post to mean that you should stop consuming any and every pill that your trustworthy doctor has prescribed for you.  Read the tradition carefully. If your body needs a certain medicine, then take it.

 

            The bottom line is this; know your medicine, know your pills, know exactly why you’re taking them and ask yourself whether it’s necessary or not.  Always be in touch with your (or a) trustworthy doctor, who could be honest and who is not under the influence of any big pharmaceutical company. 

            After reading my long initial note, you may now wonder, what the best approach towards medicine would be.  Our Imam (as) has provided us with a simple yet significant answer. 

            Now, without any further ado, here is an important tradition.

           

Arabic Text:

مُحَمَّدُ بْنُ يَحْيَى عَنْ مُحَمَّدِ بْنِ الْحَسَنِ عَنْ مُعَاوِيَةَ بْنِ حُكَيْمٍ قَالَ سَمِعْتُ عُثْمَانَ الْأَحْوَالِ يَقُولُ سَمِعْتُ أَبَا الْحَسَنِ ع يَقُولُ لَيْسَ مِنْ دَوَاءٍ إِلَّا وَ هُوَ يُهَيِّجُ دَاءً وَ لَيْسَ شَيْ‏ءٌ فِي الْبَدَنِ أَنْفَعَ مِنْ إِمْسَاكِ الْيَدِ إِلَّا عَمَّا يُحْتَاجُ إِلَيْهِ

Farsi Translation:

عثمان احول ميگويد: از امام ابو الحسن عليه السّلام شنيدم كه مي‏فرمود: هيچ دارويى نيست مگر آنكه دردى را به جنبش درميآورد، و هيچ دارويى براى بدن بهتر از آن نيست كه آدمى امساك كند جز از آنچه بدن به آن نياز دارد

English Translation:

Narrated by Mohamed Ibn Yehya from Mohamed Ibn Al-Hassan from Mo’awiya Ibn Hukaim who said: I heard Osman Al-Ahwal say: I heard Abu Al-Hassan (pbuh) say:

“There is no medicine but which excites another ailment. Nothing is better for the body than to abstain from all which it does not require.”

Source:

Al-Kafi, Volume 8, Page 273, Tradition #409