Differences between Ayurveda and Modern Medicine (Allopathy
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Descending and Ascending Knowledge
A Philosophical Comparison
From Ayurveda to Allopathy
Why and how has such a great science as ayurveda
been practically lost?
Methodologies
Western approach is based upon three steps
Conceptual Framework and Basic Concepts
Origins
Disease Causation/Cure
The Western medical system lacks a complete
causative theory.
Conclusion
From Ayurveda to Allopathy
It has been said that in the estimation
of the world, India suffers today more through the world's ignorance
of her achievements than from the absence of them. India's achievements
in the field of medicine are a prime example. The ancient medical science
of ayurveda, which is experiencing a renaissance at present, is perhaps
the most sophisticated and comprehensive approach to health care the
world has known. A comparison of ayurveda and allopathy—their
methodologies, origins, curative approaches, and disease causation theories-raises
serious questions. While modern medicine is thought to have replaced
superstition and "folk" medicine, in comparison to ayurvedic
science, allopathy could be viewed as but an extension of the guesswork
and superstition it is thought to have replaced-a mere poking in the
dark, unfortunately, at the expense of our planet and its life forms.
Why and how has such a great
science as ayurveda been practically lost?
The answer lies principally in foreign
domination; a mentality that, incidentally, the allopathic mind-set
gives rise to. The present day revival of ayurvedic treatment can also
be understood to be the result of the conscious mind behind it-"The
meek shall inherit the Earth."
Foreign domination lasted in India
for over 1,000 years, beginning with the Moghul tribes and ending with
the British Raj. At least it has formally ended with the British; but
India has yet to reconstruct its great history, and in the meantime
it continues to suffer from subtle foreign academic domination. While
attempting to piece together the scraps of paper shredded by its foreign
rulers, the world academic community continues to postulate a primarily
Eurocentric view of cultural and scientific evolution. But the current
upsurge of interest in ayurvedic
science is not as much an interest in India and her history as it is
a groping for meaning in a world dominated by atomism, that has left
many unfulfilled at present, and even terrified about our future. When
we speak of this ancient treatment system, we speak of a well thought-out
world view which, if put into practice, can do much to remedy our modern-day
maladies-biological, psychological, social, environmental, and spiritual.
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Conceptual
Framework and Basic Concepts
Ayurvedic science's premise is that the
health of the soul is primary, and everything else revolves around that
ultimate state of well-being. Because it has a clear conception of consciousness,
intellect, mind, and body, understanding them to be distinct hierarchical
realities which evolve from the supreme consciousness to individual
consciousness on down, this science is well-equipped to care for all
states of disease. Physical, mental, emotional, social, and environmental
diseases are all within its scope.
On the level of physical health, which
is the primary if not exclusive concern of allopathy, ayurvedic scientists
were at least as competent as modern allopaths in dealing with any ailment,
including the necessity of surgical operations, which were done under
herbal anesthetic. I mention this only because the accomplishments in
the allopathic surgical field are touted as some of the greatest medical
achievements of our time. Ayurvedic surgical insights are recorded in
the Shushruta Samhita (1000 B.C.). Any number of modern-day operations,
from routine hernia removals to complex organ transplants are mentioned
therein. These, however, were not the pride of Ayurvedic treatments.
They were last resort measures that were necessary only a fraction of
the time in comparison to our modern medical analysis. This was so because
of other advances in ayurvedic treatments and the world view that such
holistic treatments are part of-one in which nonviolence is held as
an esteemed virtute to be cultivated by all.
The Vedic rishis divided sentient beings
into two broad categories: "moving"- humans, animals, birds,
aquatics, etc.-and "non-moving," which included plants, and
stones. This prevented such misconceptions as the "animal-metabolism"
theory of Hippocrates, and the serious Descartian miscalculation that
animals were little more than machines. The rishis understood the nature
of consciousness and biological life processes in such a thorough way
that not only could every substance produced by the animal, mineral,
and plant kingdom be included in the materia medica, but also it allowed
for the development of branches of ayurvedic medicine, which include
the treatment of disease in animals and plants. The sensitivity of the
rishis was such that they discouraged not only the exploitation of the
animal kingdom, but the exploitation of the plant and mineral kingdoms
as well, thus preventing the type of environmental crisis that Western
science has brought upon us.
The basic psychosomatic life processes
are delineated as vata, pitta, and kapha, or tridosha, provide the overall
conceptual framework upon which to build a complete understanding of
the living world.
The doshadhatus are:
1) vata, which involves the breath or vital airs;
2) pitta, the bodily fires; and
3) kapha, which involves the bodily fluids. These were translated into
English hundreds of years ago as wind, bile, and mucous. These three
psycho-biological complexes are present in every living being, and health
is said to be a perfect balance of all three.
The tridosha are the basic building blocks
of life, and they make up the hierarchical complex called saptadhatu,
or the seven tissues:
1) food nutrients,
2) blood,
3) flesh,
4) fat and connecting tissues,
5) bone,
6) bone marrow and cerebro-spinal fluid, and
7) semen or ovum.
Besides doshadhatu and saptadhatu, a third
dhatu:
rasadhatu is described, the system of rasas or tastes. The rasas, which
are six in number, are derived from foods and the environment. They
nourish the bodily tissues in different ways and form the basis for
ayurvedic dietetics and herbology. These six tastes-sweet, sour, salty,
pungent, bitter, and astringent—determine the nutritional value
of foods and the medicinal effects of herbs, which are considered concentrated
foods. These three systems-doshadhatu, saptadhatu, and rasadhatu are
foundational to all ayurvedic understanding.
The tridosha framework, which determines the individual constitution
of each and every person, causes the medical practitioner to not only
deal with every patient as a unique individual, but every disease as
a unique disturbance.
All these systems are understood within the conception of the triguna,
which views the phenomenal world in terms of its three principal modes
of influence:
sattva (clarity),
rajas (passion),
tamas (darkness).
These trimodal influences—the five gross elements, ether (space),
air, fire, water, and earth—and the subtle elements of mind, intellect,
and material ego comprise our biological and psychic bodies, and the
entire world of material experience.
If there is any conceptual framework in allopathy from which its successes
arise, it is the simplistic idea that all life is reducible to biochemical
and ultimately molecular processes. This is opposed to ayurveda’s
acceptance of a hierarchical structure of realities culminating in the
divine. Although allopathy's view is well formed, it has come about
as a result of experimentation; it does not rest on a secure foundation
of a fixed conceptual framework, but formulates concepts to serve the
conclusions of ongoing experimentation. While ayurvedic understanding
works from a broad base down to specifics, allopathy works backwards,
coming up from the collection of data and phenomenon from which larger
conclusions are then drawn—a clearly speculative, inferior approach.
The problem here is twofold: one, a view based solely on experimentally
derived data is one that is subject to change when new and even contradictory
data arises through subsequent experimentation, which is endless in
this system. This unstable structure can totter at any time, and thus
it would be difficult to build a stable society upon it. Entire schools
of medical education, for example, and funding for all sorts of projects
in a particular direction would be risky ventures. Everything could
change in the instance that conflicting verifiable data arises. Although
it seems laudable theoretically to experiment, go forward, and be prepared
to change direction at any time, it is highly impractical on a societal
level. This brings us to the second problem, which is that consistent
data does arise regularly, challenging the existing paradigm. But due
to the fact that there is so much at stake, it is often ignored, or
experimentation loses its objectivity in as much as it continues with
a view to produce only data that conforms with the existing world view.
In other words speculation, which is what modern medicine is seeded
in, invariably lends to loss of integrity. Ironically, it is often billed
as the noble pursuit of truth.
No doubt experimentation is a valid means of acquiring relative knowledge,
but it must be conducted within a larger framework which includes descending
knowledge in order that it not degenerate into self-deception. Experimentation
conducted within the ayurvedic tradition either rejects or accepts evidence
based on whether it is or is not contradictory to descending knowledge,
the spiritual world view.
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Origins
The intuitive or divine origin of the ayurvedic tradition opposes
the blind prodding of dead matter that makes up experimental Western
medicine. While experimentation is an important part of pramana, in
the ayurvedic tradition it is carried on within a larger conceptual
framework based upon descending knowledge. Again, Western medicine
is just a collection of identified systems, symptoms, and results
lacking any guidance from higher intelligence. The ayurvedic tradition
descends from higher intelligence, and is not subject, at least from
the start, to the faults of conditioned human reason. The allopathic
approach is much more akin to the superstitious medicine of uncivilized
peoples than is the ayurvedic tradition, although modern medicine
men would have it seem otherwise. Here the unbiased will have to ask
themselves: "Is there perfect knowledge?" If the answer
is "no," then we may as well stop there. But Western thinking
assumes that there is perfect knowledge to which we can evolve, while
the questionable means of evolution involves the utilization of imperfect
instruments and human frailties. Vedic science also admits to perfect
knowledge, but being that it is perfect, that knowledge is considered
superior to mankind, and thus human society can attain it only if
it chooses to reveal itself. Although the knowledge of the ayurvedic
tradition is basically secular, dealing with the phenomenal world,
the conception of the material world is one that descends from the
spiritual plane.
Allopathy's rational methodology, it must be remembered, arose as
a reaction to irrational European reliance on incantations and superstition
that could be considered pre-rational spiritual sentiments, or a vitiated
form of the rational spirituality of ancient India. It is an overreaction
to unscientific medicine and pseudo-spirituality, neither of which
are elements of ayurvedic teachings. It sprang not from the spiritual
platform, but the speculative mental fabric of "religious"
men of the time. Although the founding fathers of the new European
era of reason "believed in God," their spiritual premise
was so weak that they could not foresee that the new concepts they
introduced would develop into the greatest nemesis of their ill-conceived
spirituality. Not so for rational Vedic spirituality, however, which
even today is having an impact on many of the world's greatest scientific
minds, as is its subsidiary, the ayurvedic teachings.
Such teachings are paradigmatically different from the neo-Aristotelean
paradigm reigning in Europe before the reactionary advent of modern
medicine. While modern medicine's votaries sought to secure an experimentally
testable method to replace ad hoc medicine, ayurvedic vaidyas (physicians)
were employing their own scientific, experimentally testable methodology
and divine insight within the dhatudosha framework.
Although modern medicine is credited with "successfully"
treating infectious disease, it may really only have succeeded in
causing what is now called chronic disease, which in turn it does
not know how to treat. Because it arises as a reaction to another
form of ignorance, it is only a half-ruth at best. Reactionary solutions
are never complete solutions. A Hegelian synthesis has yet to appear
to balance the antithetical movement of modern medicine and science.
Many persons in the West are now attempting to resurrect Eastern healing
systems and interface them with allopathy in such a synthesis. Although
I will explore this idea in my conclusion, Eastern medicine is foundationally
different from modern medicine, which makes such a synthesis almost
impossible. Of the two foundations, the structural composition of
conventional medical knowledge in the West rests on an enormous yet
flimsy infrastructure of experimental achievements. Thus it lacks
the comprehensive aura of true medical wisdom.
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Disease
Causation/Cure
Fundamentally different from each other are the Eastern
and Western approaches to disease causation, and for that matter, as
to what actually constitutes disease. In the Charaka Samhita, an authoritative
ayurvedic text, we find the following: "As the age of truth declines,
some people find themselves in possession of too much adana (greed),
which leads to gaurava (heaviness in the body and mind). This condition
leads to shrama (lethargy), which leads to alasya (laziness). Laziness
leads to sanchaya or hoarding, which leads to parigraha or capturing
what belongs to others. Parigraha leads to further greed and avarice
(lobha). This chain of demoralized actions continues through treachery,
falsehood, uncurbed desires, anger and wrath, vanity, hatred, cruelty,
shock, fear, distress, sorrow, and anxiety. Then the bodies and the
minds of the people deteriorate and become easy prey to disease. Thus
even the span of life is shortened."
Further, Charaka describes an interesting condition he calls the epidemic
of arms: "When greed, anger, avarice, pride, and vanity hold sway
over people's minds, they, despising the weak and irrespective of the
victim being their own kith and kin, take to invading and destroying
each other." Thus the impact of immoral and improper action on
disease causation is clearly indicated in the ayurvedic tradition. Charaka
goes on to describe other causative factors, linking the overall mental,
physical, and moral health of the people with the moral integrity of
the heads of the family, village, city, state, and nation.
The Western medical system lacks a complete
causative theory
Ayurvedas doctrine of karma, a well-developed and reasonable
concept, which, simply put, extends the atomic notion that each action
has an equal and opposite reaction into the moral realm, deserves to
be distanced with dignity from the popular simplistic understanding
of its principles often appearing on the lips of T.V. hosts in jest.
This is especially so when at the same time biomedicine is now at an
impasse on account of its primitive causation dogma, a theory that if
really thought out could certainly bring a few laughs. Obvious causative
influences—psychological, social, environmental, etc.—can
not be admitted as such due to the reductionist world view of allopathy.
But can any sane person continue to insist that the mind, the environment,
and social circumstances do not directly influence our physiology or,
worse still, insist that a hierarchical reality above the physical plane
does not exist at all?
According to allopathy, disease is a result of invading
organisms, metabolic imbalances, tissue degeneration, etc. In the model
of infectious disease, for example, the invading agent is to be tracked
down and killed. This approach is genocidal; it attempts to annihilate
entire species of the vast microscopic world. According to the ayurvedic
tradition, disease is an imbalance in nature, there is no question of
killing. Free from the folly of attempting to kill everything, the ayurvedic
tradition recognizes the inscrutable will of the Supreme, and the right
to life of even the microrganisms. The attack-and-destroy methods of
modern medicine are as foreign to the rishis of India as the modern
battlefield is to their peaceful hermitages. What is the chance of allopathy
achieving its goal of a germ-proof world, anyway? At present modern
science is creating new germs, or the conditions which give rise to
the appearance of increasingly resistant strains of viruses and bacteria.
Thus the greatest causal factor of disease in allopathy may well be
itself.
Conclusion
At the risk of sharp criticism This article had highlighted
several of the shortcomings of modern medicine. But if we consider the
treatment of the ayurvedic tradition by modern medical advocates, it
seems justifiable. Yet what the world needs is something more than that,
although it is a necessary beginning. Modern medicine has fed the modern
world the pill of propaganda to the point of mass addiction. Thus many
of us need to be jolted from our firm faith in a system of medicine
that is far from perfect. At the same time my criticism of allopathy
comes on the heels of considerable discontent with modern medicine,
both from the ranks of alternative medicine and allopathic quarters
as well. That modern medicine needs help is no secret to the informed.
The last decade has seen a tremendous interest in
alternative medicine, and recently the ayurvedic tradition in particular
is receiving attention. The reasons for this are varied, from the economics
of costly research involved in allopathy, including the necessity of
importation driving communities away from desirable self sufficiency,
to the side effects of drugs, which in turn require more drugs ad infinitum.
The doctor/patient relationship is also at a low ebb in allopathy, and
many people are seeking more personal care and participation in cure.
Unknown to many is the fact that modern medicine has
paid considerable attention to the ayurvedic tradition in search of
medicinal plants from which to extract new and effective drugs. A number
of world agencies have pinned their faith in traditional medicine including
the ayurvedic tradition. WHO, UNIDO, and UNESCO all have recognized
the importance of medicinal plants, encouraging research so that herbal
medicines can be put to more efficient use. A convincing statistical
presentation could be put forward such that one would think that the
ayurvedic tradition and other traditional medicines are having a major
impact on modern medicine. Yet almost all of the interest in the ayurvedic
tradition in the allopathic medical community is aimed at finding herbal
remedies, and the soul does not rest in herbal formulas. Its value is
being determined today in allopathic quarters largely, if not entirely,
through the measured effectiveness of its recommended medicinal plants,
which allopathy uses in suppressing the "findings" of disease.
Little if any consideration is being given to the philosophy of the
ayurvedic tradition. But it is in the investigation of it's conceptual
framework, its philosophical underpinnings, that hope for an improved
medical care system for our modern world lies, not in adding herbal
formulas to the edifice of allopathy. If there is to be any merger of
these two medical traditions, it can only be one in which the broader
foundation of the ayurvedic tradition is complimented by various experimental
findings of allopathy, not vice versa.
It is no longer permissible to ignore the diseased
condition of our environment, social conditions, and mental states,
and continue to extol the virtues of our system of medicine. Modern
medicine is shortsighted and narrow in its focus. In the long run, now
some 200 years down the road, the scales are tipping; modern medicine
may ultimately do more harm than good. Although concerns for conditions
which lay outside the sphere of allopathy—but which allopathy
contributes to negatively nonetheless-are being mobilized, it is questionable
just how much of a change they can effect. The comprehensive world view
of which the ayurvedic tradition is a part—a rationally spiritual
one—may therefore be worth attempting to resurrect. This is especially
so when at the same time interest in Eastern medicine and philosophy
is surfacing in many Western scientific circles. If one questions just
how much of this ancient science can be revived, the answer lies in
the fact that it is descending knowledge. It can be revived in proportion
to our realization of our utter necessity for higher guidance, to which
Divinity is so sympathetic, lost as we are in a maze of guesswork.
An exhaustive comparison of these two medical traditions
is a study well worth undertaking. From its methodology to its conceptual
framework, consideration of origins, disease causation theory, and approaches
to cure, the ayurvedic tradition has much to offer. The broader scope
of Eastern medicine is hard to deny, and the ayurvedic tradition is
clearly the mother of all Eastern medical disciplines, including Chinese
and Tibetan medicine. If it appears to fall short on account of the
advances in specialized fields of allopathy, that may in fact be to
its credit. Implementation of the world view of the ayurvedic tradition
could very well diminish the need for many of the "advancements"
of allopathy.
The ayurvedic tradition is not on the same level as
pre-industrial revolution medical developments in Europe, as many would
like us to think. In fact, all of Europe owes an intellectual debt to
India. Had this been recognized long ago, the development of European
medicine, and science in general could perhaps have avoided the long
detour they have taken in the form of modern science and medicine.
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