With his recently published Guide To Kent’s Repertory, Dr. Currim offers a detailed overview of Kent’s Repertory. This guide consists of twenty sections of which the first 12 serve as an introduction to Kent’s massive work which has served countless homeopaths the world over. In these dozen essays (25 pages) Ahmed discusses ‘Kent’s Original Plan’, ‘Problems with Existing Repertories’, ‘The Classification of Symptoms’, ‘Modifications of Symptoms’, ‘Construction of Rubrics,’ and offers a number of ‘Notes and Examples.’
The thirteenth section, consists of one hundred pages and concentrates on pain. This chapter, ‘Descriptions of Pain,’ is the major portion of the book, and is of great value. Pain, admittedly one of the most frequent complaints homeopaths hear about, is examined in all the repertory sections. This should certainly help one get a better understanding of pain as handled by the repertory. As the headache modalities of heat and cold are scattered throughout the HEAD section, Ahmed has skillfully assembled them together on one page (p. 30).
In the remaining chapters Dr. Currim offers essays on ‘Special Rubrics and Cross References’, ‘History and Case Taking-Basic Rules’, ‘Repertorization’, ‘Advantages of Using the Repertory,’ and one of Kent’s published papers ‘The Development and Formation of the Repertory.’ A number of diagrams are included, 18 in all, to assist the homeopath in understanding the anatomy as contained in the repertory. There is an error in the order of rubrics as found in Kent’s Repertory on pages 166-168. Currim has corrected this and included those corrections. Just another gem which this book possesses. The sections on ‘Taking the Case’, ‘History and Case Taking,’ ‘Questionnaire,’ and ‘Repertorization’ are particularly interesting and useful for the beginning student. Currim offers material gleaned from Pierre Schmidt’s articles, ‘L’Examen du Malade.’ Next, in Appendix I, ‘Advantages of Using the Repertory,’ Currim puts forth more than 30 numbered reasons for the use of the repertory. Each of these is followed by an explanatory paragraph. Some reasons are ‘deeper’ than others but all contain truth. Take No. 15 for instance: “15.2 There are certain rubrics in “Kent’s Repertory” which are constant repertorial reminders in case taking. Among them are the rubrics concerning the trinity of loves of man, pertaining to his Will, Food and Sex; also the rubrics concerning his reactions to climate, weather and position, etc.
Dr. Dienst of the USA once had difficulty in comprehending a young lady who was suffering from malarial fever. When he called to see her, she attempted to make love and in the midst of her chattering, divulged that she had a date with a doctor in Pennsylvania to attend the theatre, and that she believed Dr. Dienst to be this doctor. With the help of the repertory, he recognized Stramonium in her symptoms, and within half an hour of receiving a dose of Stramonium, she presented a rational aspect and her malarial fever had ceased. Dr. Dienst said that although Stramonium probably has no intermittent fever in its proving, yet the patient had intermittent fever and by prescribing for her, he freed her of the fever.
Love in a treble form incites man to action: The sick and even the healthy, are known by the manifestations of love in the treble form; upon the three manifestations of love, as upon a tripod, rest this repertory:
15.2.1 Intellect or reason is the flaming beacon casting a blaze afar upon the sea of passions and in the darkness of errors while the Will pilots the ship of the Ego. The light illumines the way and signals the dangers, but the pilot holds the life of the ship in his hands; hence the Will is the master of our destiny. 15.2.2 Loves and hates regarding food relate to the preservation of the entire body. 15.2.3 Loves and hates pertaining to the sexual sphere including woman’s menstruation, etc., are the exponents of the love of the species.
They are related to the entire individual seen as the propagator of his species. Take away this tripod and this repertory falls. Similarly, exclude the three manifestations of love from the study of a patient, and we lose the power of healing as described in the first article of the “Organon” and only hasten the progress of the chronic miasmatic sickness by deceiving our patient (KHP xxxvii paragraph 3) through the ten methods of hybrid prescribing which we shall mention later, Dr. Dienst had a case of a lady of 68 who had drawing down of the corners of mouth and habit of shrugging shoulders. She told a long story of nervousness. Finally it was discovered that she did not love her husband, and never had. Of what did she think? Could not bear to see a sharp knife, without an impulse to cut her throat (85 R); nor to see a rope without the desire to hang herself. These revealed suicidal tendencies. Alumina straightened the case, entirely. Grimmer, p. 214,5. A
Another important aspect of understanding Kent’s Repertory is the logic by which he grouped rubrics. Currim explains this in great detail (it is tough going here) in the section on ‘Modification of Symptoms.’ This is the first time I have seen this material in print, and it has certainly helped me gain a deeper understanding of the construction of the Repertory. For this alone, Currim should be thanked. Currim obtained much of this material during his many visits to Pierre Schmidt, M.D. in the late 60s and early 70s. Schmidt was in the line of Kent’s descendants having learned from Frederica Gladwin and Alonzo Austin. Much, more could be said about this, the second golden egg which Ahmed has recently produced, the first being The Collected Works of A.H. Grimmer.
The repertory expert and student alike will find this a most useful book. It contains information for all -history (there is a marvelous letter on repertorization Kent wrote to Margaret Tyler), repertory schematics, descriptions of pain, case taking, anatomical charts (they are small), etc. The book suffers from the lack of an Index which could’ve been easily included. There is no ‘Key Word/Abbreviation List’. One can find the meaning of abbreviations (NR, NSW, MVA, CV, C, P, KR, KHP, JTK, etc.) by hunting, but that is so time consuming. A concise listing could have been easily included.
The physical aspects of the book, binding, paper, font selection, etc., are excellent. Simply put, this book is useful to learn Kent’s Repertory. It is meant to be read and studied. Ahmed maintains that you will get the most from it if you sit at your desk and read it with the repertory open. He is right. This is not light reading. A bedroom book, or a commutebook it is not. This book should help deepen ones understanding of this and for that matter any repertory.