A brilliant history of healing with light

For centuries, humans had a transparent and reliable source of sunshine – the sun – and we knew that the sun was essential to our survival.

This is why ancient religions – similar to those in Egypt, Greece, The Middle East, India, Asiaand central And South America – Incorporated sun worship.

Early religions were also frequent. Associated with healing. Sick people would turn to a shaman, priest or priestess for help.

Although ancient people used the sun to heal, it might not be what you're thinking that.

Since then, we've used light for healing in some ways. Some you could recognize today, others appear to be magic.

From heating creams to sun baking

There will not be much evidence around today that the ancients believed that sunlight could cure disease. Instead, there's more evidence that they used the sun to heal.

The Ebers Papyrus is an ancient Egyptian medical scroll from around 1500 BC. It accommodates the composition of the salve”Make sinuses […] flexible” The salve was made from wine, onion, soot, fruit and extracts of frankincense and myrrh from the tree. Once applied, the person was “exposed to the sunlight”.

Other recipes, for instance to treat coughs, Involved Put the ingredients in a pot and let it stand in the daylight. This might be to warm it up and help it explode more strongly. Same technique In medical writings attributed to the Greek physician Hippocrates who lived 450-380 BC.

The physician Aretius, who lived around 150 AD in what's now modern Turkey, wrote that Sunlight can be therapeutic His chronic cases of what he called “lethargy” but we might recognize today as depression:

Laziness is to be kept in the sunshine, and exposed to the rays of the sun (for sickness is melancholy); And in a warm place, the explanation is natural heat accumulation.

The classical Islamic scholar Ibn Sina (980-1037 CE) described the health effects of sunbathing (at a time once we didn't know concerning the skin cancer connection). In the book of Canon of Medicine He said the new sun helped the whole lot from flatulence and asthma to hysteria. He also said that the sun “stimulates the mind” and is useful for “cleansing the uterus.”

Sometimes it was hard to inform science from magic.

All the treatment methods described to this point rely more on heat than sunlight. But what about treating yourself with light?

English scientist Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727) knew that you may “split” sunlight. A rainbow spectrum of colors.

These and plenty of other discoveries radically modified ideas about healing over the subsequent 200 years.

But as latest ideas developed, it was sometimes hard to inform. Science from magic.

For example, the German mystic and visionary Jacob Lorber (1800-1864) believed that sunlight was the perfect cure for anything. His 1851 book was The Healing Power of Sunlight. Still in print in 1997.

Public health reformer Florence Nightingale (1820-1910) Agreed too in the ability of sunlight. In his famous book Notes on NursingHe said of his patients:

Their need for fresh air is followed by their need for light. […] Not just light, but direct sunlight.

Nightingale also believed that sunlight was the natural enemy of bacteria and viruses. He seems At least partially true. Sunlight can kill some, but not all, bacteria and viruses.

Chromotherapy – a way of healing based on Color and light – emerged during this era. While some proponents claim that the usage of coloured light for healing predates this. Ancient EgyptEvidence of that is now hard to search out.

Modern chromotherapy owes much to the fertile mind of the American physician Edwin Babbitt (1828-1905). Babbitt's 1878 book Principles of light and color Color was based on experiments with light and his own visions and clear visions. It is still in print..

Babbitt invented a conveyable stained glass window called Chromosomedesigned to revive the body's natural color energy balance. Sitting under the colourful lights from the window for a specified time frame is claimed to revive your health.

Indian entrepreneur Dinshah Ghadyali (1873-1966) examine it, moved to America and invented his own device. Spectro-chromin 1920.

The theory behind Spectro-Chrome was that the human body is made up of 4 elements – oxygen (blue), hydrogen (red), nitrogen (green) and carbon (yellow). When these colours were Out of balancefor this reason disease.

There can be some hour-long sessions with Spectro-Chrome. Restore balance and health. Using its green light, for instance, you'll be able to allegedly help your pituitary gland, while yellow light helps your digestion.

Had made watches till 1946. About a million dollars From the sale of this device within the US.

And today?

Although a few of these treatments could appear strange, we now know that certain coloured lights can cure certain diseases and disorders.

Phototherapy with blue light Used to treat jaundiced newborns within the hospital. People with seasonal affective disorder (sometimes generally known as winter depression) may be treated with regular exposure. White or blue light. And ultraviolet light is used to treat skin conditions, such as psoriasis.

Today, light therapy has found its way into the wonder industry as well. LED face masks, with celebrity endorsements, promise To fight pimples and reduce the signs of aging.

But like all forms of sunshine, its exposure has each risks and advantages. In the case of those LED face masks, they'll disrupt your sleep.

---