Ashtangasamgraha 24

English (machine translation) 24

Language: English

24.1

Now we shall explain the chapter named "The Two Kinds of Treatment." / Thus spoke Ātreya and the other great seers. / Thus spoke Ātreya and the other great seers. / Thus spoke Ātreya and the other great seers.

24.2

Because the person to be treated is of two kinds, treatment is regarded as twofold: / one therein is santarpaṇa (nourishing), and the second is apatarpaṇa (depleting); / bṛṃhaṇa (stoutening) and laṅghana (lightening) are cited as their synonyms.

24.3

That which leads to stoutness of the body is bṛṃhaṇa; that which leads to lightness is laṅghana; / the former mostly consists of earth and water, while the other [consists of the remaining elements].
And fainting and the like, as stated under venesection [may occur].
Nor should one let blood in case of body exhaustion, dryness, or when vāta is predominant.
And then one should repeatedly administer unctuous or dry purgatives and the procedure of enema.

24.4

The procedures of snehana (oleation), rūkṣaṇa (roughening), svedana (sudation), and stambhana (checking)— / these also, by virtue of the twofold nature of the elements, do not exceed the two.
Having placed roasted grain flour smeared with ghee between two shallow earthenware vessels, one should inhale the smoke.

24.5

Laṅghana also is twofold therein: śodhana (purification) and śamana (pacification); / that which expels the doṣas outward is śodhana, and that is fivefold.
When reduced to a quarter, having added equal parts individually of goat's meat, āmalaka juice, sugarcane juice, ghee, and milk, and the paste of pippalī, marica, kāśmarya fruit, utpala, the two medās, the two śrāvaṇīs, vīrā, punarnavā, nāgara, samaṅgā, tugākṣīrī, kṣīrakākolī, drākṣā, akṣoḍa, lotus seeds, śṛṅgāṭaka, nikocaka, bhavya, urumāṇa, dates, almonds, muñjāta, and abhiṣuka, one should cook again.
This ghee named Jīvanīya removes vāta disorders, especially jaundice, fever, epilepsy, fistula-in-ano, dyspnea, cough, hiccup, hoarseness, flank pain, disorders of the liver and spleen, retention of urine, urinary calculus, vātarakta, and diseases of the whole body or a single limb.
It promotes strength, improves complexion, acts as an aphrodisiac, benefits the eyes, and grants sons.
Or, if accustomed to oil, one should drink oil combined with milk and sugar.

24.6

Evacuating enema, emesis, purgation of the body and of the head, and bloodletting [constitute śodhana]. / That which does not purify the doṣas, nor excites them when balanced,
or Balātaila as mentioned under vāta diseases,
or cooked a hundred times.
With milk cooked with vāta-dispelling [drugs] or with sour liquids, one should perform an affusion comfortable to the touch.
Particularly [avoiding] cold water baths, cold drinks, excessively high pillows or absence of a pillow, anger, and grief.

24.7

but balances the aggravated ones, is śamana; and that is sevenfold: / digestive, appetiser, hunger, thirst, exercise, sunshine, and wind; / bṛṃhaṇa indeed acts as śamana for vāyu and pitta-vāyu.
Or a poultice of unctuous fruit pulp;
or a warm poultice made with dried bilva pulp, tagara, devadāru, sarala, rāsnā, hareṇu, kuṣṭha, and śatapuṣpā, combined with curd and whey.

24.8

One should stouten those emaciated by disease, medicines, wine, women, or grief, / those weakened by carrying loads, walking distances, or chest injury, and those who are dry, weak, or of vātika constitution;
or the root of śigru mixed with mātuluṅga, amlavetasa, rock salt, and ghee;
or the root of sahacara and jīvantī;
an inunction of ghee cooked with wax, the paste of rāsnā, madhuka, guḍūcī, the two balās, jīvaka, and ṛṣabhaka, and milk.

24.9

and also pregnant women, puerperal women, children, the elderly, and others during summer / with meat, milk, sugar, ghee, and sweet and unctuous enemas.
Or a decoction of śatāvarī, paṭola, triphalā, guḍūcī, and kaṭukā;
and ghee and milk cooked with the sweet and bitter groups [of drugs];
or cooked with rāsnā, abhīru, daśamūla, and balā;
or freshly milked while warm;
or mixed with trivṛt powder for purgation;
or, living on a milk diet, one should repeatedly drink castor oil with milk;
or with a decoction of amṛtā, āragvadha, and aṭarūṣaka;
or one should give milk enemas with ghee;
or drink dry ginger with milk.

24.10

[Those to be nourished are treated] with sleep, comfortable beds, massage, baths, ease, and rejoicing.
Those suffering from urinary disorder, disorders of āma, excess unctuousness, fever, stiffness of the thighs, and skin diseases,
as well as those afflicted with erysipelas, abscess, splenic disorder, and diseases of the head, throat, and eyes [should be fasted].
Or with milk, sugarcane juice, honey, sugar, and rice water;
or combined with grapes, liquorice, and kāśmarya;
or with sour gruel, or with ghee prepared with the jīvanīya drugs, or with ghee washed a hundred times.
And that very [preparation] should be administered in drink and food;
and the sudation methods described for facial paralysis [should be given].
If in this manner it does not digest, then tube sudation repeatedly, and non-unctuous and unctuous enemas that remove vāta, and head enema [should be administered].

24.11

And one should always fast the corpulent, and others also in late winter;
among them, by means of purifications, those with excess corpulence, strength, pitta, and kapha;
[and those afflicted] with disorders of āma, fever, vomiting, diarrhea, and heart diseases.
A paste of wheat flour mixed with goat's milk [may be applied];
or sesame seeds ground with milk, roasted in an earthen vessel, and then cast again into milk to be quenched.

24.12

Patients with constipation, heaviness, eructation, nausea, and the like,
having moderate corpulence and the like, [should be treated] mostly beforehand with digestives and appetite stimulants.
One should employ that for morning drink.
When it is digested, the [patient], sprinkled with lukewarm water, should be fed with [meat] juice containing rock salt.
When thoroughly unctuous, one should purge him with a decoction of grapes, paṭola, śrīparṇī, mūrvā, and trivṛt, combined with the powder of trivṛt, pathyā, and areca nut.

24.13

Those afflicted with these diseases who have mild corpulence, strength, and the like,
[should be treated] by restraint of hunger and thirst; but strong persons afflicted with doṣas of moderate strength
[should be treated with] a decoction of triphalā;
or an extract of liquorice, ginger, abhayā, and kaṭurohiṇī.
And having drunk the appropriate oleant, one should mildly induce emesis and produce dryness;
and one should not apply excessive sprinkles and pastes.

24.14

—by wind, sunshine, and physical exertion; what then of men with little strength?
One should not nourish those who ought to be fasted, but one should mildly fast those to be nourished;
or according to proper application, based on the strength of place, time, and so forth, one should treat them.
Or with vacā, chimney soot, the two night-shades (turmeric and tree turmeric), kuṣṭha, and dill;
or with punarnavā along with ghee;
or powder of sesame, mustard, linseed, and barley;
or mixed with śleṣmātaka, kapittha, and madhuśigru, ground with alkaline water and urine; [or] sprinkling with alkaline water, oil, and urine prepared with the pungent group.

24.15

In one who has been nourished, there should be strength, corpulence, the eradication of diseases curable by that,
clarity of the senses, evacuation of waste products, lightness, and appetite.
And in all cases, as appropriate, one should habituate oneself to guḍūcī, guḍa with harītakī, or increasing doses of pippalī, and frequent administration of enemas.
And here it is said:
And for one whose bodily channels have been purified, meals [should be taken] with wild meat juice, or with cold milk.

24.16

Simultaneous emergence of hunger and thirst, purity of heart, eructation, and throat,
softness of disease, enthusiasm, and loss of stupor [occur] in one who is fasted.
One should perform internal treatment by means of purgation, non-unctuous enema, and unctuous drinking.
And when it is digested, gruel containing sesame, black gram, and meat paste [should be given].
Then one should induce emesis with a thin gruel prepared with the decoction of emetic drugs, containing ghee, made dense with powder of rock salt and black gram, and accompanied by hot water.

24.17

Administered without regard to dose and the like, these two produce
excessive corpulence, excessive emaciation, and the like; and they will be described along with their medicaments.
And by those very [signs] the symptom of the excessively nourished and the excessively fasted is to be known.
And by warm pastes, poultices, and sprinkles, one should overcome [a condition] dominated by vāta.
In cases of anorexia and heaviness, however, one should purify.

24.18

There, with reference to purification, corpulence and the like have been declared before.
The chyle originating from food, mixed with sluggish śleṣman accumulated by heavy foods and the like,
[and] gout dominated by pitta and blood [should be overcome] by cooling pastes.
Mung bean flooded with oil and sprinkled with ginger powder [should be the] food, and according to habituation, dry, sharp, and hot [items].

24.19

being āma itself, brings about corpulence by slackening the bodily tissues.
From excessive corpulence there arise excessive hunger, thirst, profuse sweating, dyspnea, and sleepiness.
And lukewarm pastes are praised in gout dominated by kapha.

24.20

Inability to exert oneself, sluggishness, short lifespan, lack of bodily strength and vigor,
foul odor, and stammering speech would occur from excess nourishment of fat.
Increase of burning sensation, swelling, pain, and itching would occur from astringent retention.
And here, oil prepared with rasāñjana, ativiṣā, mustā, and bhadradāru [is used as] nasal drops.

24.21

When the bodily channels are obstructed by fat, vāyu, moving especially
in the digestive tract, kindles the digestive fire; hunger and thirst therefore become excessive.
From hot [substances] there occurs burning, severe pain, redness, sweating, and bursting open.

24.22

And in its increase, the digestive fire and wind burn that corpulent person like a hollow tree.
Because it is the origin of sweat-carrying vessels, and because of exudation
of fat, and due to association with śleṣman, profuse sweating occurs.
One should cook an āḍhaka of oil with equal milk along with one-pala amounts of the pastes:
When the ghee is digested, one should feed [him] with wild meat juice poured over [the food],
and one should treat the unctuous patient as in kapha catarrh.

24.23

For in him whose bodily channels are blocked, the chyle being digested within the digestive tract itself,
because it finds no circulation everywhere, fat mostly accumulates.
With sthirā, haṃsapadī, māṃsī, the two medās, and madhuparṇī;
and having again oleated him whose nasal channels have been purified, one should purge him.
One should boil roasted barley combined with bhūstṛṇa, āmrātaka, cumin, and trivṛt with cow's urine;
one should make him drink that decoction mixed with the powder of abhayā, ginger, black pepper, areca nut, rock salt, and barley alkali, together with citron juice,
and one should make him follow it with lukewarm water to the throat.

24.24

The remainder of it, being scanty chyle, is insufficient to nourish blood and the other [tissues] due to its scarcity.
Even with an equal accumulation of vāyu and the rest, what was accumulated previously accumulates all the more;
therefore fat does not distribute itself equally among the bodily tissues.
With jīvantī, jīvaka, ṛṣabhaka, tvak, patra, nakha, and vālaka;
and sharp evacuating and unctuous enemas,
and fermented decoctions for drinking.

24.25

Soon [it produces] dyspnea and other diseases, fever, abdominal enlargement, fistula-in-ano,
urinary disorders, thigh-stiffness, eruptions, abscess, and the like.
Application of the fourfold [oleation] relieves gout, pitta, burning, fever, and distress.

24.26

One with disproportionate corpulence and energy, with trembling buttocks, abdomen, and breasts,
is known as excessively corpulent; there, food that removes wind should be employed.
One should cook it a hundred times in milk, similarly in liquorice decoction.

24.27

And whatever removes śleṣman and fat: horse gram, poor barley, barley,
sorghum, wild millet, mung bean, and the like; in drink, fermented decoctions and honey-water.
And in heart disease, anemia, gout, pitta, and the like, [treat] as previously [stated];
and one should sustain [the patient] with anti-helminthic formulations.

24.28

Whey and buttermilk, sharp, hot, dry, and scraping medicaments, / worry, sexual intercourse, physical exercise, purification, and wakefulness should be resorted to. / Because of the excessive aggravation of vāta, oleation and nourishing therapies are initially not recommended. / Oil or ghee cooked with the decoction and paste of pippalī, kuṣṭha, śuṇṭhī, viḍaṅga, and mṛdvīkā serves as an errhine.

24.29

Taking into account the body, dry baths, unctions, and so forth [are employed]; / he should lick triphalā, guḍūcī, abhayā, and ghana with honey, / [or] rasāñjana, the great pañcamūla, and guggulu. / One should employ oleating medicine and whatever purifies the blood. / Sudation for one who has been oleated; / nasal administration of milk and ghee, or oil prepared with the sweet group; / unctuous smoke; / likewise also in obstruction of the nose; / thus, if it does not subside, head-purgation.

24.30

The use of śilājatu combined with the juice of agnimantha is beneficial; / viḍaṅga, nāgara, alkali, iron powder, and honey. / However, through the excessive increase of raktapitta, it quickly proceeds to suppuration. / With cold [medicaments], upward and downward purges, pastes, and sprinklings [are done]; / in discharge from the nose, a sharp nasal errhine and smoke [are used].

24.31

The powder of barley and āmalaka is a formulation that overcomes excessive obesity; / madana, triphalā, mustā, saptāhvā, ariṣṭa, and vatsaka. / Their treatment, like that of an ulcer, consists in incising, purifying, and healing; / and, as in kapha-predominant catarrh, oleation, sudation, and emesis [are employed].

24.32

Pāṭhā and āragvadha drunk together conquer diseases caused by excessive nourishing therapy; / likewise vatsaka, śamyāka, devadāru, and the two types of turmeric. / When prāṇa and the other [vital airs] are simultaneously provoked according to the specified rule and the disease, / the remedy must be adapted near at hand and according to bodily strength.

24.33

Together with mustā, pāṭhā, khadira, triphalā, nimba, and gokṣura, / madana and the rest, an unguent, should also be employed in baths and the like; / and with dry unguents, sprinklings, and the like, one should overcome solitary vāta; / or with śigru, bṛhatī, dantī root, bilva, the three spices, surasā, and rock salt.

24.34

Asafoetida, garnet, the three spices, kuṣṭha, heron's bone, gokṣura, / cardamom, vṛkṣaka, ṣaḍgranthā, kharāśvā, and aśmabheda; / one should apply ghee alternately and have him drink the vitality-promoting [decoction]; / when it is advanced, [treat it] like a sinus ulcer; / and when he has undergone emesis, nasal errhines and fumigation should be administered to him.

24.35

Drunk with buttermilk, whey, or juice of jujube, / it eliminates dysuria, parasitic worms, urinary disorders, and obesity; / enemas with milk, milk boiled with the pañcamūla and balā. / But having touched large ones with a surgical blade, after cauterization, one should apply cooling treatment.

24.36

An unctuous drink of viḍaṅga and triphalā with oil, roasted grain flour, the three pungent spices, and caraway, / immersed in iron-infused water, is recommended for patients suffering from over-nourishment; / sprinkling with liquorice, balā, oil, ghee, and milk, / or with a decoction of the pañcamūla or cold water.

24.37

The three pungents, kaṭvī, varā, śigru, viḍaṅga, ativiṣā, sthirā, / asafoetida, sauvarcala salt, cumin, caraway, coriander, and citraka; / sharp sudation, evacuating enemas, and emesis with purgation; / cooked with karañja, lodhra, water lily, liquorice, seeds of tinduka, triphalā, and heartwood of khadira.

24.38

The two turmerics, the two bṛhatīs, hapuṣā, pāṭhā, and root of kembuka: / the powder of these, with equal parts of honey, ghee, and oil; / when combined with kapha and pitta, one should first conquer pitta.

24.39

Joined with sixteen times the amount of roasted grain flour and drunk, it cures / all diseases such as excessive obesity and other conditions of that kind, / heart disease, jaundice, leukoderma, dyspnoea, cough, and constriction of the throat; / sudation, massage, meat juices, milk, and unction are beneficial when covered by muscle tissue; / and when excised, he should blow it out; / and the ulcer, rubbed while mobile, one should burn with a probe or with oil; / one should then smear the fire-cauterized wound with cooling poultices.

24.40

It produces intellect, wisdom, and memory, and stimulates the sluggish digestive fire; / sudation and bloodletting should also be applied according to the disease; / the great unction when [vāta is] situated in bone and marrow, and what was previously taught when enveloped by semen; / in a tumor born of pitta or born of blood, a paste of godanta, rock salt, blue vitriol, bronze, and indigo ground with water [is applied]; / and then cooling poultices and sprinklings; / and ghee, massage, errhines, and potions prepared only with cooling substances.

24.41

Extreme emaciation, giddiness, cough, excessive thirst, anorexia, / loss of unctuousness, digestive fire, sleep, sight, hearing, semen, vital essence, hunger, and voice; / when [vāta is] enveloped by urine, diuretics, sudation, and urethral douches; / castor oil when situated in feces, and enemas and purgative unctions. / And here it is said:

24.42

Pain in the bladder, heart, head, thighs, calves, sacrum, and flanks, fever, / delirium, upward movement of wind, debility, vomiting, and splitting pain in the joints and bones; / even when vāta is enveloped in all its locations, that should be done immediately; / from insufficient excision, recurrence occurs; from excessive excision, loss of voice, / loss of the sense of smell, erysipelas, and fainting occur; therefore, one should excise evenly.

24.43

Retention of feces and urine and other troubles arise from excessive fasting; / due to extreme emaciation, [the patient cannot bear] exertion, rain, cold, heat, thirst, and hunger; / sustaining enemas, mostly sweet, along with unctuous enemas [should be given].

24.44

He does not tolerate satiety, disease, or the weight of medicine due to his slight strength; / dyspnoea, cough, wasting, splenomegaly, abdominal swellings, piles, and sluggishness of the digestive fire; / the use of all rejuvenatives is commended.

24.45

Disorders of raktapitta and vāta mostly run after an emaciated person; / emaciation is indeed better than obesity, for there is no remedy for the obese; / nourishing therapy is not adequate [because of obesity], nor fasting because it overcomes excess fat, fire, and vāta; / or an electuary of Bhārgava, likewise made with one thousand one hundred [palas] of sugar.

24.46

Whereas emaciation is destroyed with ease by sweet and unctuous nourishment and comfort, / corpulence [is destroyed only] by resorting to absolute opposites; / carminative treatment of vāta and purification of the urinary bladder should be performed.

24.47

One whose buttocks, belly, and neck are dried up, whose joints are thick, and who is covered with veins / is called excessively emaciated; for him the nourishing regimen previously stated [is prescribed]; / the physician should perform it, having considered on his own what belongs to prāṇa and the others.

24.48

Aśvagandhā, vidārī, and other aphrodisiac medicaments are beneficial, / through freedom from worry, joy, and steady nourishing therapy; / the wise physician should pacify samāna, and should apply threefold treatment for vyāna.

24.49

And through indulgence in sleep, an emaciated person is nourished like a boar; / in the remaining diseases arising from fasting, one should also adapt / whatever is efficacious for the present moment and whatever serves for nourishment through habituation; / thus one should lead the diverted winds that have been covered back to their respective seats.

24.50

Because one who is freshly emaciated is quickly nourished by a nourishing therapy, / while one emaciated over a long time and gradually [recovers] by its habitual use, / and used in the manner of a rasāyana, when light, it destroys [ailments].

24.51

One should administer a nourishing therapy after observing body, dose, digestive fire, strength, and so on; / indeed, nothing produces bulk in the body like meat, / especially the meat of carnivorous animals, because it is nourished by meat. / Likewise in obstruction by blood, the medicine stated for gout [is useful], / as well as various rasāyanas beneficial for pitta, blood, and wind.

24.52

Therefore, [he should administer] the light juices of carnivorous animal meat, seasoned with pomegranate and salt, / and likewise juices, prepared and unprepared, from arid-zone animals made into veśavāra, / as well as milk and so forth, satisfying drinks, and repeated refreshing drinks; / this chapter is the fruit of Āyurveda, because it brings immediate relief from suffering.

24.53

He should administer it to those who are emaciated, febrile, coughing, suffering from dysuria, / thirsty, suffering from upward vāta, and having obstructed wind and feces. / Pacifying medicine is praised, known by synonyms as an auṣadha.

24.54

A mantha prepared with equal parts of long pepper, sugar, sesame oil, and honey, as satisfying ingredients taking two parts, / and likewise one prepared with sugar, honey, liquor, and roasted barley meal;

24.55

treacle, roasted barley meal, ghee, curd scum, and sour fermented wash / make a satisfying drink that destroys dysuria and is supreme in relieving upward movement of vāta;

24.56

a mantha made with dates, raisins, vṛkṣāmla, tamarind, pomegranates, / parūṣaka, and along with āmalaka immediately overcomes thirst and other disorders;

24.57

sweet or sour, made with water, mixed with unctuous substance or dry, / the mantha provides immediate nourishment and bestows stability, complexion, and strength.

24.58

Heavy and non-nourishing food is wholesome for the corpulent; the reverse for the emaciated. / Barley and wheat [are suitable] for both, through preparation that is suitable or unsuitable for them.

24.59

Even if corpulence and emaciation are innate by constitution, this rule still applies to them. / Because of constantly having the nature of a disease, it should always be administered with discernment.

24.60

Whoever utilizes fasting and nourishing therapies accompanied by proper dose and so forth / will have balanced bodily tissues, digestive fire, and body, and a symmetrical physique;

24.61

and owing to the firmness of the strength of the sense organs, he is not overcome by pairs of opposites. / Measures differ according to the movement of the doṣas, by distinctions of astringent, purgative, and so on, / but they do not differ from their two-fold nature, just as diseases do.

24.61_1

Thus ends the twenty-fourth chapter.

Linked texts (1)

Aṣṭāṅgasaṃgraha — Vāgbhaṭa, Sanskrit