Definition
One who heals or cures disease or injury. In legal usage, the term carries a specific and narrower meaning: a person who professes to cure bodily illness without medicine or material remedies, acting instead through spiritual or religious means. The term appears most prominently in late nineteenth and early twentieth century legal contexts in connection with Christian Science practitioners, whose healing activities generated questions about licensure, medical practice regulations, and the legal capacity of those who sought or provided such care.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): One who heals, especially through faith; also anything that heals, such as a medicine that remedies a wound, injury, or disease.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): One who, or that which, heals.
The common definition is broad and value-neutral, encompassing physicians, medicines, and spiritual practitioners alike. The legal definition as it developed in the early twentieth century is far narrower: it specifically designates the non-medical, faith-based practitioner. Courts and commentators invoked the term to distinguish this figure from licensed physicians and to assess whether such practice constituted fraud, unauthorized medical practice, or evidence of mental incompetence in those who relied on it.
Common Confusion
Healer is sometimes conflated with physician, surgeon, or practitioner in historical sources. The legal distinction matters: a healer, as Black's defines the term, operates entirely outside the medical profession and makes no claim to material or pharmacological means. The confusion has practical consequences in historical research because statutory prohibitions on "practicing medicine without a license" sometimes expressly excluded or expressly included healers, and the classification determined whether a person was subject to criminal liability. Do not assume that references to "healer" in older statutes or opinions track the same boundaries as modern terms like "healthcare provider" or "alternative medicine practitioner."
Why It Matters in Research
The term's legal significance is almost entirely historical and jurisdictional, concentrated in the period roughly 1880–1940 when Christian Science and similar healing movements grew rapidly and state legislatures scrambled to define the boundaries of medical practice acts. Researchers will encounter the term in three principal contexts:
First, in testamentary and probate litigation. The Black's entry itself cites a New York Surrogate's Court case involving a will, where the question was whether reliance on a Christian Science healer rather than a physician was evidence of insanity or undue influence sufficient to invalidate the testator's will. Courts in this era repeatedly had to decide whether faith healing was a marker of incapacity or simply a protected religious choice.
Second, in criminal and regulatory prosecution. Statutes prohibiting the unlicensed practice of medicine frequently generated litigation over whether a "healer" fell within their scope. Some jurisdictions carved out explicit religious exemptions; others did not. The term "healer" in a statute should be checked against the specific exemption language of that jurisdiction's medical practice act.
Third, in civil liability cases, particularly wrongful death actions arising from the failure to obtain conventional medical care for a child or dependent. The legal status of the healer — licensed, exempt, or simply unregulated — affected both the healer's liability and any parental liability.
Modern legal research will rarely surface this term as a defined category. Contemporary law uses "faith healer," "spiritual healer," "religious practitioner," or specific professional designations. When the term appears in a modern opinion, it is almost always in historical quotation or in the context of statutory interpretation of older provisions.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary (2nd Ed.) provides the only historical legal dictionary entry for this term among the shelf sources. It is concise but informative: it ties the definition directly to Christian Science practice and immediately flags the key legal issue — that such beliefs and practices are "not per se proof of insanity." The single case cited, In re Brush's Will, illustrates the probate context that drove the term into legal usage.
What the historical dictionary misses: Black's (2nd Ed.) reflects a snapshot of the term at the moment when courts were first grappling with organized faith healing movements. It does not address the criminal or regulatory dimensions that became equally significant in the following decades, nor does it capture the jurisdictional variation in how legislatures treated healers under medical practice acts. The definition also reflects a certain cultural framing — treating faith healing as a definable, bounded category associated with a named religious movement — that later legal usage complicated as new healing traditions multiplied.
Jurisdictional Note
Treatment of healers under state law varied substantially. Some states passed explicit statutory exemptions for religious or spiritual healers from medical practice act coverage; others subjected them to full criminal liability for unlicensed practice. New York's courts were among the most active in addressing the probate and competency dimensions. Researchers should not extrapolate from one state's treatment to another, particularly when working with statutes from the 1890–1940 period.