Lobelia | The Intelligent Herb

lobelias flowersThe Amazing Healing Powers of  Lobelia

Lobelia is it a panacea? The term panacea refers to a single remedy that fixes a host of problems or cures all diseases. The word’s roots lie in the Greek word panakes (pan meaning “all” and akos meaning “remedy”). So, if there was such a thing as a panacea in the plant kingdom, it would be an herb that would cure every disease.

While no such herb exists. There are herbs that help so many different diseases that herbalists have dubbed them a panacea. One example is Asian ginseng, which is used in Chinese medicine for so many diseases that it was dubbed a panacea with it’s Latin name, Panax ginseng. The genus Panax being derived from panacea. In traditional American herbalism, the herb that has comes the closesy to being regarded as a panacea is Lobelia inflata.

The Lobelia genus was named for the French botanist, Matthias de Lobel and has over 400 species. Many species of lobelia are grown in gardens because of the beauty of their flowers, but the species Lobelia inflata is best known for it’s amazing healing powers and is the plant we’ll be talking about in this issue of Sunshine Sharing. Throughout this newsletter, when we use the term lobelia, it will be in reference to Lobelia inflata.

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