“Let thy food be thy medicine and thy medicine be thy food” -Hippocrates
An image showing a healthy salad
Hippocrates was one of the most important figures in establishing medicine as a profession. He lived around 300-400 years BC. He founded the Hippocratic School of Medicine and is thought of as the Father of Western Medicine. It is also thought that he or a student of his wrote the Hippocratic Oath in which our modern physicians swear to uphold certain ethical standards.
Because I was curious about the oath and you may be also, I’m including it below:
“I swear by Apollo The Healer, by Asclepius, by Hygieia, by Panacea, and by all the Gods and Goddesses, making them my witnesses, that I will carry out, according to my ability and judgment, this oath and this indenture.
To hold my teacher in this art equal to my own parents; to make him partner in my livelihood; when he is in need of money to share mine with him; to consider his family as my own brothers, and to teach them this art, if they want to learn it, without fee or indenture; to impart precept, oral instruction, and all other instruction to my own sons, the sons of my teacher, and to indentured pupils who have taken the physician’s oath, but to nobody else.
I will use treatment to help the sick according to my ability and judgment, but never with a view to injury and wrong-doing. Neither will I administer a poison to anybody when asked to do so, nor will I suggest such a course. Similarly I will not give to a woman a pessary to cause abortion. But I will keep pure and holy both my life and my art. I will not use the knife, not even, verily, on sufferers from stone, but I will give place to such as are craftsmen therein.
Into whatsoever houses I enter, I will enter to help the sick, and I will abstain from all intentional wrong-doing and harm, especially from abusing the bodies of man or woman, bond or free. And whatsoever I shall see or hear in the course of my profession, as well as outside my profession in my intercourse with men, if it be what should not be published abroad, I will never divulge, holding such things to be holy secrets.
Now if I carry out this oath, and break it not, may I gain for ever reputation among all men for my life and for my art; but if I transgress it and forswear myself, may the opposite befall me”.
I’ve decided that Hippocrates was a very wise man and I plan on taking his advice about food being my medicine. I’m eating whole food and food that has not been processed to help my body heal itself. This is also helping with my chronic pain by reducing the inflammation in my body and helping me lose a little weight. I have lost 24 pounds since before Christmas last year and I’m hoping to continue to lose as I eat this way.
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