Ayurveda: Basics

JAY SHREE POOJYASHREE SHREE AMMA
JAY MAHAN BRAHMASHREE GOPALAVALLIDASAR
JAY SHREE RADHEKRISHNA SATHSANG

Radhekrishna to one and all! We concluded with the topic 'Leech therapy' in our previous article. Let us start with a new topic this time.

History:

Atharva–veda, the youngest of the four Vedas (placed as earlier than 5000 BC), contains hymns on diseases and their treatment. It also talks of the eight branches of Ayurveda. Shilajit (black bitumen), a material used as a drug even today in Ayurveda was found in the Mohenjo Daro excavations (3500 BC). These two are indicative of the scientific handling of diseases in India from a very early date.

In this country, learning and preservation of knowledge has been through an oral tradition which is built on a succession of teacher–mentors and disciple–followers. In the field of medical science, these teacher–disciple lineages are traced to three original teachers:

• Atreya (Internal medicine)
• Dhanvantari (Surgery) and
• Kashyapa (Gynecology and Paediatrics).

Some of these teacher–students had, defying the prevailing practice, chosen to document what they had heard, seen & learnt. The teachers to whom the survival of the ancient knowledge can be owed are:

• Charaka (1^st century BC) of the Atreya school, who codified the precepts and practices in internal medicine.
• Sushruta (6^th century BC) of the Dhanvantari school, who codified surgical practices.
• Vagbhata (6^th century AD) of the Kashyapa school, dealing with Gynecology and Paediatrics.

The names of the authors vouch for their being compilers:

Charaka – the one who had traveled (and learnt);
Sushruta– the one who had heard well (and learnt);
and Vagbhata – the one who is eloquent (in communicating what he has learnt).

The three epochal works (Charaka–samhita, Sushruta–samhita and Ashtanga–hridaya), of these illustrious authors, are referred to as the Brihat–trayi – the Big Three of Ayurvedic literature. Then there is the Laghu Trayi, the Small Three made of Saragadhara–samhita, Madhava–nidana and the Bhava– prakasha.

The periods of the authors only indicate the time of the knowledge being codified and reduced to writing, while the knowledge itself would have endured for several centuries preceeding the compilation.

…to be continued

Radhekrishna