Eternal India Encyclopedia

Ancient Concepts, Sciences & Systems

Eternal India

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AYURVEDA

“We cannot cheat Nature or fool life. Short cuts, easy fixes, quick cures, wishful

thinking, magic remedies and panaceas are not part of Ayurveda. Life demands

tremendous integrity, self-discipline and self-awareness to take us beyond disease

and sorrow. Ayurveda may not make things easier for us in the short term but in the

long run it allows us to open up to the real energy of the cosmic life within us and to

assume responsibility for our own existence. There is a magic in Ayurveda, but it is

the magic of consciousness and moment by moment right action. Its magic is not that

it takes us off the hook by solving our problems for us but that it gives us the right tools

to effectively and finally dissolve them. ”

from :

‘From the River of Heaven’

by David Frawley.

According to the

Bhagavata Parana,

it was Bhagavan Dhan-

vantari who revealed.Ayurveda or the science of life, to the world.

This Dhanvantari, who was the original or the first, is known as

Adi-Dhanvantari. He is worshipped even today as the presiding

deity of medical science, the celebrated physician of the gods who

first propounded the art of healing to the world.

In ancient and medieval India, outstanding authorities on Ayur-

veda, especially surgeons and experts in the treatment of the eye,

ear, nose and throat, were honoured with the honorific Dhanvantari.

The term Dhanvantari thus refers not only to the progenitor of

Ayurveda but is associated with outstanding practitioners of Ayur-

veda.

Kashiraja Divadasa Dhanvantari, the King of Kashi (Varanasi)

was believed to be the incarnation of Adi-Dhanvantari. He is a pre-

historic figure who founded the famous school of surgeons.

Sushruta, the famous surgeon, studied surgery under him. He is

stated to have divided the entire range of Ayurveda into eight

divisions (the Astangas) or specialities : 1)

Kayacikitsa

(Internal

Medicine), 2)

Kaumarabhrtya

Balacikitsa

(Paediatrics), 3)

Bhu-

tavidya

Grahacikitsa

(psychiatry), 4)

Salakyatantra

(Otto-

Rhino-Laryngology and Ophthalmology), 5)

Salyatantra

(Surgery),

Vishatantra

(Toxicology), 7)

Rasayanatantra

(Geriatrics), and

Vajikaranhatantra

(The therapy for male sterility, impotency and

the promotion of virility).

It is not known if Kashiraja Divadasa Dhanvantari himself

wrote any treatise on Ayurveda but his teachings were compiled in

the work of his foremost pupil, the

Sushruta Samhita.

Sushruta

quotes Kashiraja Divadasa Dhanvantari as telling his pupils :

“Ayurveda originally formed one of the subsections of the

Athar-

vaveda

and even before the creation of mankind the self-begotten

Brahma strung it together. Together into a hundred thousand

slokas, divided into a thousand chapters. But then he thought of the

small duration of life on earth and the failing character of human

memory and found it best to divide the entire Ayurveda into eight

different branches”.

The separation of

Salyatantra

(including

Salakyatantra

and

other related disciplines of surgery) from the main body of knowl-

edge under Ayurveda was due largely to Kashiraja Divadasa Dhan-

vantari. He is quoted as having told Sushruta and his other dis-

ciples who approached him in his hermitage in the Himalayas where

he had retired after relinquishing his kingship and entering the third

stage of life,

Vanaprasthashrama,

with the request that they be

taught surgery:” Be it so. Hear me discourse on the Science of

Surgery (Salyatantra) which is the oldest of the branches of Ayur-

veda.... All hold this tantra to be the most important of all the

branches of Ayurveda in as much as instantaneous effects can be

produced with the help of such measures as surgical operations,

external applications of

Ksharas

(alkalies/caustics), cauterisation

etc and in as much as it contains all that can be found in other

branches of Ayurveda as well. Hence it is eternal; is a source of

infinite piety, imparts fame and opens the gates of heaven to its

votaries, increases the duration of human existence on earth and

helps men in successfully fulfilling their mission and earning a

decent competence in life.”

The vast variety of Indian surgical instruments that were in use

in the first millennium A.D. testify to the advanced stage which

surgery had attained in ancient India. The field of surgery covered

by Kashiraja Divadasa Dhanvantari in his lectures includes among

others pre-operative measures, operative techniques and proce-

dures, post-operative measures and care, the use of different kinds

of sutures and needles; measures for the prevention of sepsis,

different kinds of bandages and the art of bandaging, the use of

alcohol to produce insensitiveness to pain during operations and

amputations, the setting up of dislocations and fractures and the

use of different kinds of splints. Among the various surgical

measures taught by Kashiraja, mention may be made of lithotomy

(surgery of the bladder to remove stone) and rhinoplasty (skin

grafting to repair the nose, the cutting off of which was inflicted as

a form of punishment for adultery. The skin grafting technique has

since formed the basis for the development of plastic surgery in

modern times.

The basic textbooks of Indian medicine were compiled by phy-

sician Charaka and the surgeon, Sushruta, the

Charaka Samhita

and

the

Sushruta Samhita.

They could have been written only after

Indian medicine had reached a highly developed stage. The

Charaka

Samhita

is an exhaustive work on therapeutic medicine. The

Sushruta Samhita

in 184 chapters deals with pathology, embryology

and anatomy, therapeutic and surgical treatment and medicinal

herbs. The treatises deal with over 600 drug compositions of plants

and even of animal and mineral origin.

Some scholars believe that Charaka lived in the 8th century B .C.

since there is no mention of the Buddha (6th century B.C.) and his

philosophy in his work. Others refer to a physician by name

Charaka who was in the court of the Indo-Scythian king Kanishka

(100 A.D.). There is no way by which the period in which Charaka

lived can be established with certainty. What is undeniable is that

the

Charaka Samhita

is a work of great antiquity which was put

together and brought up to date by Charaka in his role as a redactor.

There were earlier versions of the

Charaka Samhita

but in its

present form it is taken as dating from the 1st Century A.D. The

period in which Sushruta lived has been placed from 1000 B.C. to 4th

Century A.D. The compilation of the

Sushruta Samhita

probably

began in the last centuries before the Christian era but in its present

form it dates from the 7th century A.D. That this

Samhita

in its

present shape is the outcome of the efforts of more than one person

is generally accepted

It was in surgery that the ancient Hindus excelled. The

Sushruta

Samhita

describes more than 300 different operations and 121

surgical instruments and tongs, forceps, scalpels, catheters, syr-

inges, needles, saws, lances, hooks, scissors and probes. The

surgeons conducted laparotomy, lithotomy and plastic operations.

The book is the earliest document which gives a detailed account of

rhinoplasty (surgery of the nose). Yet another feat was the precise