Peter Holmes

[Guest guest]

> As I mentioned to Todd a few months ago, I've been curious to hear CHA

> members' opinions on such works. (I avoided bringing it up for a while

> because I was a little concerned about bruising egos, but I've decided there

> can't be anything wrong with people submitting their honest opinions.) In

> particular I wonder what people think of Peter Holmes' works.

 

My opinion, (although not very popular among other practitioners) is that Peter

is brilliant and that his book " The Energetics of Western Herbs " is arguably the

best book on Western herbs written in the last 100 years. I think his book and

work is largely misunderstood, although

Peter himself is to blame for much of the misunderstanding.

 

> I

> haven't seen convincing evidence that Holmes has done much more than match

> Chinese actions with Western ones.

 

Perhaps I shouldn't speak for him, but these at least are my perceptions:

 

Peter and I were friends for many years and (although we are no longer friends)

I'm very familiar with his approach and thoughts regarding his system of herbal

categorization. My personal opinion is that the man is a genius.

 

Peter attempted to accomplish two very different things by writing his first

book. The two desired outcomes were at odds with each other and that's why his

book remains in its own sort of limbo to this day.

 

The first thing that he wanted to do was to categorize Western herbs into a form

that could be understood and used by TCM practitioners. If he had just stuck to

accepted TCM terms and physiology, I believe that his book would be much more

widely used and accepted. But it also

wouldn't have made the leap that it did.

 

He also wanted to create a system of Western energetics that was designed for

Westerners that did not have the culturally bound limitations of TCM. (I come up

with this sort of cultural clash every day in my practice.) So he ventured off

into that no-mans-land of fusing

clinically relevent Western concepts and practices with TCM. Of course, in doing

so, he came up with such concepts as " Kidney Qi Stagnation " and " Liver Qi

Deficiency " to describe certain observable clinical signs and symptoms. There is

no history of energetic physiology in place

yet to have a useful context for such things, so they just sort of hung there

like a fart at a TCM cocktail party. They are useful concepts in view of the

history and tradition of Western herbalism, but to make the leap between the two

systems he had to create a new language.

 

Of course, all this did was to piss people off.

 

Most (heck, ALL) the practitioners I know viewed it as " merely " MSU. I don't see

it that way, but I certainly understand their perceptions.

 

Peter himself always said that it was just a start, the beginning of a long

dialogue (just like this one) to create an energetic medicine for ourselves that

serves us as Westerners. Michael Moore has also done an enviable job of trying

to accomplish the same thing from a very

different angle.

 

> And though this sort of translation may

> be somewhat applicable when it comes to actions, it hardly begins to guide

> us with regard to determination of nature, flavor, and channels entered (I'm

> convinced that, in the Chinese pharmacopeia, many of these factors were

> determined by truly visionary ancients).

 

I have to disagree with this. The energetics of our pharmecopia didn't fall out

of the sky, it was created by practitioners JUST LIKE US. It's our JOB to do

such things. It's just not all that mystifying to determine if an herb is warm

or cold. It's a combination of observation

and a solid conceptual framework that makes it all accesible.

 

I open Peter's book almost every day and I use it as an invaluable resource both

for including Western herbs in my TCM formulas and as a teaching tool for my

students. Of course I have to take Peter's material and " retranslate " it into

TCM, but that is a small price to pay for

such a large volume of research, and it's not nearly as time consuming as

translating a text from the Chinese.

 

Aloha,

 

David

 

*************************

David Leonard, L.Ac.

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[Guest guest]

, David Leonard <drkitsch@m...>

wrote:

 

>

> Peter himself always said that it was just a start, the beginning of a long

dialogue (just like this one) to create an energetic medicine for ourselves that

serves us as Westerners. Michael Moore has also done an enviable job of trying

to accomplish the same thing from a very

> different angle.

 

Unfortunately, some folks consider this work gospel. A few words

before this thread goes further. Lets be very careful not to defame

anyone. Everyone has been civil so far but a prior discussion on this

topic degenerated into a battle royale about 15 months ago. Also, my

main interest in this matter is in understanding the " energetic " impact

of substances our patients self prescribe or which they receive from

another healthcare px. I do not want this list to stray too far into

describing western herbs for use in our own practices. Last time that

happened, the topic dominated the list for weeks and I got a lot of

complaints. thanks.

 

[Guest guest]

David Leonard wrote:

 

> My opinion, (although not very popular among other practitioners) is that

Peter is brilliant and that his book " The Energetics of Western Herbs " is

arguably the best book on Western herbs written in the last 100 years. I think

his book and work is largely misunderstood, although

> Peter himself is to blame for much of the misunderstanding.

 

I think it tries to do too much and in the process kind of alienates the

reader. Peter is an incredible researcher with a slow, meticulous,

detail oriented way of doing things. I spent many hours with him

working on Jade Remedies. While it is a bit nerve-wracking for me to

work at that pace, there is no doubt in my mind that he is in the right

business in his attempts to amass the information that he has.

 

I think that if he were more clear in the different paradigms that he

uses in his energetics book, that would have helped. It really isn't

just OM or TCM, it is many different paradigms from Zang fu to Five

Elements to six biotypes to four element Greek to Ayurvedic and so on.

I'm not sure if that is the strength of this book, or its weakness.

 

--

Al Stone L.Ac.

<AlStone

http://www.BeyondWellBeing.com

 

Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional.

 

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