God Has the Cure Essay -- Religion, God, The Church

Throughout the ages great thinkers and men with revolutionary ideas have been changing the world of understanding. During the Renaissance men like Vesalius, William Hervey, and Paracelsus revolutionize the understanding of medicine through the use of dissection and constant studying. However these men did not find change easy, the Christian Church was set in their ways and was reluctant to change. People where dying from unknown causes and the church had no answers. The Renaissance was a time for enlightenment and rebirth of new ideas, but the church inability to adapt and adopt the new discoveries and knowledge of medicine left society in the dark ages. The Church was not all prayers and hope when it came to medicine. They did believe in a set of ideas which came into effect, â€Å"3,000 years ago when Hippocrates and Galen created four humors: Blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile† (Dawson 8-9). These humors were what doctors used to diagnose patient’s illness based on the balance of each humor. If the patient felt ill, then the doctor would drain blood from the patient and send them on their way. Now medical science knows that blood is responsible for the curing of ailments and by draining that patient’s blood, they are even less likely to recover. The church agreed with Galen because, â€Å"His view was in line with the Christian belief that God had created human beings and therefore the human body must be a perfect creation† (Dawson 14). The church also agreed with Hippocrates because he had gathered his knowledge of human anatomy from the dissection of animals because, â€Å"The human body was seen as sacrilege and doctors faced legal and censure if dissection was attempted† (Kate 2). With this information patients of the Renaissanc... ... looking for hope and finding nothing from the church. The churches inability to change delayed the new understanding and medical advancements for thousands of years. Many questions arise when thinking about this time period, what would our world be like if the great thinker of the time were allowed to work freely? Would there be more cures for deadly disease? And how many lives could have been saved with this knowledge. Those questions will never be answered but the question still stand. The idea of religious freedom from education has been an issue even to this day. Seeing how it worked out for the Renaissance thinkers it will stay as an issue. When one is told what to believe and not to question, they should stop and ask why. Because faith is based on knowledge and knowledge is something that is acquired thought to constant questioning of old ideas.