Ayurveda Vision

Like a lotus lily rooted in the darkness and mud, but crowned with an exotic flower holding incredible beauty and radiance, human soul lives in an earthly body with a mind which is orienting heaven. All living beings, each and every moment, through all their actions seek pleasure, according to Ashthanga Hrudaya. We humans are finding imperfection in everything on earth by nature. Like persuaded by the subconscious memories of a lost paradise, dissatisfied of every achievements, we are endlessly working to bring heaven on earth. In this attempt through our civilization, development of science and technology, how much should we follow the rules of Earth and how much of it could be compromised and skipped is the relevant question, thinking of healthcare. Ayurveda is defined as the knowledge system differentiating what is good and what not; what brings well being and pleasure and what causes illness and worries and what promotes healthy long life, etc. considering human life; with its earthly plane of the physical body, heavenly or cosmic plane of mind and Brahmam, the godly plane of Athma or the soul.  

Ayurveda is not insisting a complete go back in to nature. And it is not insisting rigidly its own theories even!  If a poison can save a life in a specific critical situation, it should be considered as amruth or elixir in that situation; Ayurveda advises. And about pathya or do don’ts (food, drinks, activities, etc) for patients, it is advised to give the higher importance to the altered interests of the patient, than the theoretical assessments. Ayurveda understands well, that the truth behind reality always excels human knowledge and our theories are only tracing and approximating it. Vaagbhata, the great author of  the Ayurveda Classical text ‘Ashtaanga Hrudaya’ advices to consider the book only as a guide and believe only in what is found true in the direct experience. According to him, the relevance of such books is only to prevent the not so wise physicians from making big mistakes! Through saying “There is nothing existing on Earth, which cannot be a medicine”, it is emphasised that what we know as medicine is very little, considering what we don’t know. Through time, diseases and properties of medicines change. The ways and the standards of understanding life, health, medicine, food, etc also change. Ayurveda is a dynamic system. It should change along with all the changes happening. What would stay without changes is only the basic principles of Ayurveda. This is the Veda part of Ayurveda which is a part of the eternal knowledge that comes from the inner self.

Contemporary knowledge systems make us feel that knowledge is always something which we have to gather from outside; from books, internet, teachers, etc. Ayurveda and all Vedas are supposed to have had their origin from the inner self. The ancient philosophical and spiritual systems in the background of Ayurveda looked inward for knowledge. When the ancient seers inverted their senses completely and focussed to the innermost, truth spoke to them.  Classical Ayurveda books explain about the origin of Ayurveda as, “Brahma (the God of creation) recollected Ayurveda from his memory.” Knowledge is neither getting created nor destroyed. It is immortal and could be read, looking inward.  The difference it makes is only how much of it is revealed or awake and how much stays in darkness or sleep.

Some scientists assume that, the onset of life on Earth, Evolution, formation of mankind, etc happened somehow through a series of accidental coincidences. Ayurveda does not see world and life as the result of an accidental order happened in the world of chaos through mere ‘accidental coincidences’. Thermodynamics explains that, an isolated physical system tends to loose order continuously and the whole universe itself is an isolated system. But evolution shows continuous upgrading of order. In view of Ayurveda, there exists a force working against disorder in the nature, which is creating, promoting and maintaining order. This force dominates over the force of disintegration which is causing disorder, at the time of manifestation or birth of everything and that leads growth and development. Gradually it is loosing power and the proportional strengthening of its opposite attains dominance in the second part of the lifetime. The same is enhancing health and growth when one is more and more connected with nature. Getting more and more away and detached from the unity of nature, the rate of disorder rises, making one susceptible to diseases and eventually sick. The phenomenon of life, which is creating and maintaining order in Nature should not be assumed independent or separated as different species, races or individuals. All are connected with the singularity of the Cosmic being all the time like a cell with the whole of the living being. Detachment from this system is death and disintegration.

Matter by itself cannot create and develop order. Assuming that, human intelligence developed because of the development of the brain through evolution, is just like an alien visiting Earth interpreting, because there evolved flights, humans are flying! Consciousness is leading all changes which create order in matter. In other words, through the course of evolution, consciousness is expressing itself through matter. In view of Ayurveda, like the instruments are designed, developed and reformed for the purpose of its creator, everything on Earth is created by a higher consciousness by its will and power of imagination. The whole sensible universe is the body of this consciousness and that in its macro and micro levels creates and maintains order against the tendency of disorder exerted by the physical world. Nothing happened until now is accidental; but the gradual unfolding of a cosmic play. This great ocean of consciousness is a singularity which could be called as the cosmic mind and that is represented by ‘Brahma’. All knowledge about the manifested world stays there forever. At times, it goes in to sleep, and after a while awakens again. The one, who knows the ultimate meaning of each and every detail of life must be its creator and hence, will be the ultimate healer also; just like the manufacturer of a car being its best mechanic. Truth is only to be discovered; not to be invented.  ‘Bruhadaaranyaka Upanishath’ says:

“‘Sathyam’ (Truth) is with three letters; ‘Sa’, ‘Th’ and ‘Yam’. Among these, the first and the last are true; while the one in the middle is untrue. This untruth in the middle is held by truth from both sides. Hence this is dominated by Truth. One who realise this will not be killed by Untruth”. (5/5/1)
Truth in its absolute form does not exist in anything manifested. The absolute truth in its completenes, stays only in the state before the manifestation of the universe and in the state which will be left after the dissolution of the manifested world. It is the same fact making us now build the huge particle accelerators and try to find out the state of the universe in its very beginning, to come in to a final ‘Grand Unified Theory’ which could predict the future of the universe as well. Everything existing in between these ends of time is not complete by their own. Certain degrees of imbalance and imperfection is a characteristic feature of everything universal and that makes each entity depend on others for balance and altogether such interdependence connect everything in the universe in to a great dynamic web, which is always in interactions. Basic principles of Ayurveda have incorporated a cosmic vision in it and that makes Ayurveda an eternal knowledge system with the dignity of Veda. One should go deep in to Ayurveda’s philosophical background to answer questions like: How did the concept of doshas evolve? Why the doshas are three in number? Why the gunas stay as pairs always? There are many possible questions existing, which are not directly answered in Ayurveda. To answer such questions, we should realise the real vision of Ayurveda and start seeing the world through an ‘Ayurvedic view’.    
Ayurveda is not an independent knowledge system. It was an integral part of the ancient Indian systems of knowledge. Nobody was learning only Ayurveda in the olden times. This is just like how we learn Science, Maths, etc as a base for any further higher studies. Of all those ancient branches of knowledge, the spiritual sciences were given the highest importance and it was considered as a basic necessity for all. A drawback of today’s Ayurveda education is that, we are putting the modern basic knowledge in place of the ancient knowledge systems. With a brief study of the philosophical base, we get in to Ayurveda, which is not sufficient. And researches almost completely go around the practical utilities of Ayurveda. Contemporary Ayurveda is thus separated from its roots and that is causing difficulties in understanding.
Any knowledge system, religion, culture, language, etc persist in our times only in case if it is still vital and functioning meaningfully. Anything loosing its necessity and relevance will be wiped out by the nature. This is a universal fact. Through millennia, Ayurveda survived. It is giving new scopes for the future as well. Meantime there is a big necessity to read Ayurveda in the lights of contemporary knowledge systems. There will be a lot for Ayurveda and other systems to exchange with each other. Such a dialogue is almost completely blocked at the moment because of Ayurveda’s different basics. This isolation from the contemporary intellectual world is a major challenge in front of the Ayurveda society.
Ayurveda is presented as the eternal science of life; a system for all the time. Our task is to recover the links which lead us to its roots lying in the past; bridging it with the contemporary world and facilitating its future development.

Dr. Sajan Kumar Somarajan
Pappelweg 33
63741-Aschaffenburg

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