Physical Illness as Disorder in the Activity of Metabolic Processes
After food has been processed in the part of the digestive tract which
encompasses the mouth, the stomach, and the duodenum, it enters into the
small intestine where nutrients become absorbed into lymph and blood
circulation, while the rest continue its path to the large intestine until
is finally excreted. Absorbed nutrients trigger a multitude of metabolic
processes – or metabolic pathways, as science calls them – which are
enabling the functions of our physical organism. Therefore science talks
about "metabolism, the sum total of all chemical reactions in the body that
sustain life." [1]
However, after we enter this inner world things become far more complex
than people usually imagine. "Nutrients generally do not follow a single
predictable path after they enter the trillions of cells in our bodies. In
most cases, the potential route a nutrient can take once it enters the body
branches out, directly or indirectly, into multiple pathways of products of
metabolism, with each pathway possibly branching out into still more
pathways. Furthermore as these pathways develop, they may lead to many
different activities or functions, like mobilization of energy and repair of
damaged cells. The dominant pathways end up determining to a great extent
whether we enjoy health or suffer disease." [2]
Therefore the crucial question is: What is it that determines if
metabolic processes lead to health or illness? Or, in other words:
"Everything that goes on in the human organism is a process of nature.
Illness is, however, also a process of nature. Where does a healthy process
cease? Where does a process of disease begin?" [3]
If we want to obtain a basic understanding of this complex topic, we need
to start with "something called homeostasis, the body's tendency to always
work towards maintaining a stable, functional equilibrium. This is true
within bodily systems, from electrolyte balance to body temperature to pH
balance, as well as between bodily systems. This careful balance is what we
call health." [4]
The maintenance of homeostasis involves all metabolic processes which are
divided into two groups: breaking-down (catabolic) processes, and
building-up (anabolic) processes. These are, as it were, the 'workers' who
are maintaining our 'house' – the physical body – in a suitable condition
for our soul and spirit to dwell inside and use it according to their needs
and aims. According to scientific description, metabolic
pathways are continually switched on and off by the
autonomic nervous system
and by endocrine glands. If this 'control
mechanism' does not work properly then specific metabolic process or group
of processes can become out of order. Consequently our
homeostatic balance
will become unstable and this will manifest in the
form of specific internal physical illness.
If we look more closely we will always find in the case
of any internal disease that a specific process or a group of metabolic
processes has gone somehow astray. For example, if we take the process of
blood clotting, which is necessary for the healing of open wounds, we can
find the following abnormal manifestations:
- The process of coagulation emerges within the
blood vessels, leading to the formation of clots (the process in the
wrong place).
- In the case of haemophilia the blood clotting of open wound is
hindered (the process not functioning in normal time frame).
In the first case the clotting tendency is too strong and expands out of
proper borders; in the second case the process of blood dilution becomes too
strong and suppresses the clotting one. In both cases we are dealing with
disorder caused by the metabolic process that has overstepped the proper
boundaries of its action.
Now we will look at one more complex example, the case of diabetes. In
the maintenance of healthy levels of blood sugar many groups of metabolic
processes are involved, from those which stimulate the production of
insulin, to those which regulate the storage and release of glucose from the
liver, and those which regulate transportation and amount of intake of
glucose by cells of the body, and so on.
If all these processes work well then the quantity of our blood sugar
moves within healthy limits (see the green line in the diagram
[5]). The red line shows the movement in the case of diabetes: the level of blood
sugar lifts out of the healthy boundary and swings up and down in very
dramatic manner. [6] Here
we have an example of internal physical illness which is the result of
disordered actions of one or a few groups of metabolic processes which are
directly or indirectly involved in the maintenance of proper blood sugar
levels. [7]
Thus we can take the red line as a symbol of physical illness due to
disordered metabolic processes – that is, dysfunctional metabolic processes
working in disharmony with the rest of organism. In one case we have in the
human body healthy metabolic processes which work in the proper place and
within a proper time-frame; in another case, in any internal physical
illness, we are confronted with pathological processes – that is, with
the metabolic processes out of proper place and/or time frame.
Innate Metabolic Tendencies towards Development of an Illness
After we have gained an insight about the link between the metabolic
processes and an internal physical illness we need to investigate the
following obvious question: What are the causes of a specific metabolic
process or group of processes overstepping the proper boundaries of their
action? There are, as always, several factors which play a part in this
issue. For the sake of this nutritional principle we will now focus only on
two, on the metabolic processes themselves and on the impact of nutrition on
these processes.
If we start with the metabolic system, we can notice that its main task
is provision of the body with nourishing substances. Indeed, "the metabolic
system is, in the cosmic scheme of things, designed for human nutrition.
However, the process of nutrition cannot function independently. Nutrition
is necessary to man, but it cannot exist on its own. If we study the human
metabolic system in isolation we find it constantly imbued with every kind
of tendency towards illness. The origin of internal
diseases – not those caused by external injury –
must always be looked for in the metabolic system.
A rational observation of diseases must therefore start with the
metabolic system, and every metabolic phenomenon needs to be addressed with
the question: Which route are you taking? When we consider all the
phenomena, from taking food into the mouth, the processes to which the food
is subjected in the mouth, with certain substances converted into starch,
sugar and so on, and the way the salivary amylase enzyme envelops the food
in the mouth; when we go on and consider the addition of pepsin in the
stomach and then what happens to the products of metabolism as they pass
into the lymph vessels and into the blood, we have to look for every
individual process that is involved, and their number is legion.
In another process the substances are mixed with the secretion from the
pancreas, in yet another with the secretions from the gall-bladder, and so
on. To each individual process the question must be put: What is it that you
really want? And it will answer: On my own I am a process that always makes
man ill. Not one metabolic process may be carried to its conclusion in the
human constitution, for carried to its conclusion it will make man ill. The
human constitution is only healthy when its metabolic processes are checked
at a certain stage.
It might at first seem a folly that something should begin in man which,
if not checked halfway, would make him ill." [8]
However, after we gain with the help of spiritual science a deeper and more
extended understanding of whole human constitution, we will be capable of
finding that there are good reasons for the existence of this surprising
characteristic of the metabolic system. Until then it can help if we use
again the comparison of the body with the house where metabolic processes
serve as maintenance workers. We can imagine each single metabolic process
as a highly specialised worker who is so enthusiastic with his work that he
can't stop. If we take into account that the metabolic system is the seat of
our Will, and that the key characteristic of pure Will is boundless energy,
then it is not so surprising that each group of "separate metabolic
processes would, if we were to question their inner nature, answer: We are
always on the way to making the whole organism ill. Every metabolic process,
if unchecked, causes illness in the organism." [9]
This fact is also confirmed by the conclusion of medical science that
metabolic pathways need to be switched on and off with the help of the
autonomous nervous system and by endocrine glands.
Thus we have inside us something that constantly leads towards the
emergence of an illness if it is not regulated by something else. These are
the activities of our metabolic system. For that reason we can designate
this part of our organism as 'inner patient'.
With this explanation we have arrived at the crucial insight with the
help of which the modern medical science can be radically transformed. "The
metabolic processes must first of all be studied in such a way in a rational
system of medicine that one always perceives the tendency in them that goes
towards inducing illness. A modern system of medicine must always take the
metabolic system, that is to say the normal metabolic processes, as its
point of departure; starting from there one must come to realize the
potential that exist for internal diseases to arise from metabolism in the
widest sense. A modern system of medicine must therefore be founded on a
study of the metabolic processes and go on from there to everything that can
occur in the sphere of the rhythmical processes in man. A kind of crowning
of the whole will be attained in that one shows how a sound development of
man's mental and spiritual potential presupposes knowledge of what arises
from the healing forces." [10]
The role of the rhythmical and nervous processes is presented in other
texts. For the sake of this principle it is important to recognise that
there exists a direct relationship between the intake of food and the
stimulation of metabolic processes with their tendencies towards illness. Of
course, this does not mean that each intake of food will instantly bring
metabolic processes to such a degree of disorder that it will cause a
disease. This is prevented by the regulation of metabolic processes by the
higher entities of the human being – by the etheric body, and the astral
body and the ego-organization.
Nevertheless it is clear that because of the intrinsic tendency of
metabolic processes towards irregularities, one needs to be very careful to
nourish oneself in a way which will prevent any of them from getting into a
disordered state. This is necessary "because the human being is continually
becoming ill. Eating and drinking, especially, are processes that
continually create illness. We cannot avoid continually injuring our health
through eating and drinking. Eating and drinking to excess merely injure us
more seriously, but we are always injuring ourselves to a slight degree." [11]
This means that each intake of food or drink is causing a temporal imbalance
in the metabolic system which needs to be restored to the normal state by
other activities of the human being. This is possible due to the fact that
"everything in the human body is related to everything else in it." [12]
Thus we can understand that "there exists no real borderline between what
today is called 'eating oneself well' and 'eating oneself ill'. Just think
how easily things can be disrupted within by eating. Something that normally
can be overcome quickly passes over into something that can no longer be
overcome. Then one becomes ill. But the borderline
between these two states really cannot be drawn at all." [13]
To avoid any one-sided materialistic view on the origin of metabolic
disorder we need to keep in mind that "in a disease becomes manifest the
abnormal working, whether heightened or weakened, of that which must always
be active in man to maintain him in his spiritual nature." [14] One
manifestation of this abnormal working is the gradual progression of an
unsuitable nutrition into metabolic disorder, and then – if other factors
support this development – into an internal physical disease. [15]
