Easter Course IV

Let us try to picture medicine as it was at the Court of Harun al Raschid. On the one side it contained the heritage of the Hippocratic mode of thinking. Those who have read the first course of lectures to physicians given by me here will perhaps remember that I referred to Hippocrates as being the last man who healed on the basis of the medical wisdom of the Ancient Mysteries. Over in Asia, during the transition to Hippocratic medicine, there came, from northeastern Asia, a strong influence from Mongolian methods of healing. Very much was introduced against which not only European thought but the inner nature of the human being himself could not help rebelling. The inner nature of man was not in harmony with the Mongolian-Tartar influence which thus entered into medical thinking. The reason can be found if we can understand the human being from a fundamental, cosmic point of view.