Hildegard’s hermeneutics were anagogical and eschatological. Hildegard took cosmology to its ultimate extension. In the 12th century, cosmology was the study of the whole of creation to ascertain its inherent order. Today, cosmology is a branch of astrophysics. Hildegard of Bingen could conceptualize in a cosmological fashion. For that we turn to the extensive works of Hildegard of Bingen, a 12th century nun who was one of the brightest stars in the mediaeval firmament. The philosophy is there but there was no room for the protocols to address the totality of one’s being in a cosmological context. The principles of ecology applied to physiomedical herbalism buttressed with biomedical sciences and infused with spiritual intuition were channeled through David’s holistic herbal texts. A notable example of this can be found in the writings of David Hoffmann. The results did influence the nascent herbal renaissance. In the 1960’s and 1970’s at Findhorn, the integration of the individual with the whole of creation and its Creator was explored in a living laboratory by the community and documented in their literature and, of course, etched in the lives of the participants. Practitioners do not tend to address the patient’s level of integration into society, the whole nature kingdom, the universe at large, or their Creator. Holism in health, as it is practiced today, still falls short of the mediaeval concept of cosmology. The more complex a system, the more it lends itself to holistic thinking. Holistic thinking is being applied to other pursuits and meets its greatest resistance when it is juxtaposed to linear mental rationalizations. Some may consider that herbalist to be labeled “holistic”. Suppose a herbal clinician, in the course of the consultation, burned incense, offered counseling, gave a massage, and the patient left the office with an armload of dried herbs, tinctures, flower remedies, and instruction sheets for meditation exercises. Each different component may have a different modality to treat it or they can be part of a multilayered treatment protocol. We say someone is a holistic practitioner when he addresses the patient’s physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual components of life. Holistic health is usually the way the terms appear in context. It was coined to describe an integrated form of perceiving and acting in a way that was generally associated with the subject of health. The word “holistic” is relatively new to the lexicon of medical science. Cosmological Vision of Hildegard Van Bingen John Redden, Main Hildegard / Reflective Essays

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