'Een getuige tegen het kwaad van het materialisme.' De medische faculteit van de Vrije Universiteit en de homeopathie

Abstract

From its start at the end of the nineteenth century, the protestant Free University in Amsterdam had its protagonists of homeopathic medicine. Especially the founder of the university, Abraham Kuyper, was a strong advocate. Homeopathy was seen as an ally in the struggle against materialistic science. But due to lack of money and, later on, the building up of a conventional medical curriculum, for a long time these feelings did not result in the founding of a chair in homeopathic medicine. It was not until the beginning of the 1960s that the board of the university decided that a teacher of homeopathic medicine should be appointed. The (very small) faculty of medicine, however, now objected. Doubts about the scientific status of homeopathy had never been completely silent and by now, its weaknesses appeared too obvious. The faculty would make itself ridiculous in the eyes of other medical faculties - the very faculties that in the beginning of the twentieth century were cursed as hotbeds of irreligion. In spite of these protests, the board insisted and a teacher was appointed. A real chair of homeopathic medicine, however, stood no chance. Kuyper's shadow had faded.