The Compendium of Caraka 4.6: ṣaṣṭho 'adhyāyaḥ/

Now we shall explain the anatomical [chapter on] the Investigation of the Body.

Thus spoke the venerable Ātreya:

Investigation of the body is desired for the benefit of the body.

For having known the truth of the body, knowledge arises regarding things that produce benefit for the body.

Therefore, the skilled praise the investigation of the body.

Here, 'body' designates that which is the substratum of consciousness, consisting of an aggregate of modifications of the five great elements, maintaining balanced contact. For when the bodily constituents in this body fall into disharmony, it incurs affliction or destruction.

Furthermore, falling into disharmony among the bodily constituents is undergoing increase or decrease, either in part or by nature.

Simultaneously, however, increase and decrease occur among mutually opposed bodily constituents.

For that which brings about the increase of one bodily constituent results in the diminution of a bodily constituent of opposite qualities.

Therefore, that very medicine, when properly administered, simultaneously brings about equilibrium among deficient and excessive bodily constituents: it reduces the excessive and nourishes the deficient.

For just this is the desired result in the administration of medicine and in the observance of healthy conduct: that there should be equilibrium of the bodily constituents.

For even healthy persons, skilled in benefiting the equilibrium of the bodily constituents, wish to use tastes, qualities, and dietary modifications in rotation, as recognized to be wholesome; and using an excess of one kind, they wish to balance it by physical activity known to produce the opposite effect.

For the proper performance and use of actions and dietary modifications opposite to the qualities of place, time, and self; the control of all excesses; the non-suppression of manifested natural urges; and the avoidance of rash actions—just this is taught as healthy conduct for the sake of favoring the equilibrium of the bodily constituents.

Moreover, the bodily constituents of the body attain increase by dietary modifications of similar qualities or predominantly similar qualities being regularly consumed, but decrease by dietary modifications of opposite qualities or predominantly opposite qualities being regularly consumed.

Here, these are the qualities of the bodily constituents that produce enumeration and efficacy: namely—heavy, light, cold, hot, unctuous, dry, dull, sharp, stable, flowing, soft, hard, non-slimy, slimy, smooth, rough, minute, gross, dense, and liquid. Among them, those that are heavy are replenished by the qualities of dietary modifications that are heavy being regularly consumed, and the light ones decrease; the light ones are replenished by light ones, and the heavy ones decrease. In just this way, the increase of all qualities of the constituents occurs from association with what is similar, and decrease from the contrary.

Therefore, muscle tissue is replenished by muscle tissue more than by other bodily constituents; likewise, blood by blood, fat by fat, muscle-fat by muscle-fat, bone by cartilage, marrow by marrow, semen by semen, and the fetus by an undeveloped fetus.

If, however, there should be an absence of dietary modifications possessing similarity of such description, or if, though present, there should be no use of them due to impropriety, disgust, or another reason, and that constituent is to be increased, dietary modifications which have similar qualities to it should not be consumed, but dietary modifications of even a different nature that possess predominantly similar qualities may be used.

Namely: in depletion of semen, the use of milk, ghee, and other substances designated as sweet, unctuous, and cold; in depletion of urine, of sugarcane juice, vāruṇī liquor, scum of boiled rice, and substances that are liquid, sweet, sour, salty, and moistening; in depletion of feces, of half-boiled barley porridge, black gram, kuṣkuṇḍā, goat entrails, barley, leafy vegetables, and fermented grain-wash; in depletion of vāta, of substances that are pungent, bitter, astringent, dry, light, and cold; in depletion of pitta, of substances that are sour, salty, pungent, alkaline, hot, and sharp; in depletion of kapha, of substances that are unctuous, heavy, sweet, dense, and slimy.

Action too, whichever produces the increase of a constituent, should be practiced accordingly.

Thus, the increase and decrease of other bodily constituents as well should be effected according to time through similarity and contrariety.

Thus, the factors producing increase and decrease of all the constituents individually and by extension have been explained.

These factors, however, produce growth of the body in its entirety: namely—the conjunction of time, inherent nature, excellence of food, and absence of impediment.

These factors, moreover, produce increase of strength:

namely—birth in a place of strong people and in a time of strong people, pleasant conjunction of time, excellence of the qualities of seed and field, excellence of food, excellence of body, excellence of wholesomeness, excellence of mind, inherent nature, youth, action, and enthusiasm.

These factors, moreover, produce transformation of food:

namely—heat, wind, moisture, unctuousness, time, and balanced contact.

Among these factors that produce the transformation of food, such as heat and the rest, these are their specific actions:

namely—heat digests, wind draws [it] down, moisture produces looseness, unctuousness produces softness, time brings about completion, and their balanced contact results in producing the equilibrium of the transformed constituents.

As food transforms, its qualities that are not contradictory assume the state of bodily qualities according to their respective nature; and those that are contradictory destroy, and destroyed by opposing [qualities], [they destroy] the body.

Bodily qualities, moreover, are in brief twofold: waste products and refined products.

Among them, the waste products are those that cause affliction to the body.

Namely—the coatings in the bodily orifices originating separately and turned outward, overcooked constituents, deranged vāta, pitta, and kapha, and whatever other entities present in the body lead to harm of the body, all those we declare as waste; but the others as refined products, beginning with heavy and ending with liquid by distinction of quality, and beginning with chyle and ending with semen by distinction of substance.

Of all of them indeed, vāta, pitta, and kapha, when corrupted, are the corrupters, owing to their nature as doṣas.

Moreover, of vāta and the rest when corrupted in a different constituent or at a different time, their recognitions are properly stated in the chapter on Various Kinds of Food and Drink.

The vitiation of the corrupted doṣas extends only so far as their contact with the bodily constituents.

Health, however, is the fruit of vāta and the rest when in their natural state.

Therefore, the wise should endeavor to maintain their natural state.

And here it is said:

The physician who knows the body in every way, completely, and at all times, / knows in its entirety Āyurveda, which bestows happiness upon the world.

To the venerable Ātreya who was speaking thus, Agniveśa said: “This discourse that was spoken by the Venerable One regarding the body has been heard.

Which limb of the embryo is formed first in the womb, facing where and how does it stay inside, on what food does it subsist, in what manner does it emerge, by what dietary regimens does it, when born, immediately perish, by which does it grow free from disease, do its afflictions arise from destiny or from derangement, or not, what does the Venerable One determine regarding the existence or non-existence of timely and untimely death for it, what is its maximum lifespan, and what are the causes of its maximum lifespan?”

To Agniveśa who had spoken thus, the venerable Punarvasu Ātreya said: “This was stated previously in the Descent of the Embryo: how it is formed in the womb, and which limb-group of it is formed when.

There are, however, various disagreements here among all the author-sages. Learn of these too as they are spoken: ‘The head is formed first in the womb,’ considers Kumāraśiras Bharadvāja, on the grounds that it is the seat of all the sense organs. ‘The heart,’ says Kāṅkāyana, the physician of Bāhlīka, because of its being the substratum of consciousness. ‘The navel,’ says Bhadrakāpya, on the grounds that it is the source of food. ‘The large intestine and rectum,’ says Bhadraśaunaka, on the grounds of their being the seat of wind. ‘The hands and feet,’ says Baḍiśa, because they are the instruments of man. ‘The sense organs,’ says Janaka of Videha, on the grounds that they are his seats of intellect. ‘It is imperceptible, hence inconceivable,’ says Mārīci Kaśyapa. ‘The formation of all limbs occurs simultaneously,’ says Dhanvantari; and that is reasonable, because of the simultaneous formation of all limbs, such as the heart and the rest.”

For the heart is the root of all its limbs and the substratum of certain entities, yet there is no prior emergence of these before it; therefore, the emergence of all limbs beginning with the heart is simultaneous, for all entities are mutually interdependent; hence seeing things as they actually are is correct.

The embryo, indeed, facing the mother's back with head turned upwards, rests inside the womb contracting its limbs.

Devoid of thirst and hunger, dependent in its existence, relying on the mother, the embryo subsists in the womb by osmosis and sweating, its limbs and members being manifest and unmanifest; immediately thereafter, osmosis occurs in it partly through the pores of the body hair and partly through the channel of the umbilical cord.

For its cord is attached to the navel, and the placenta to the cord, and the placenta is attached to the mother's heart; the mother's heart inundates that placenta through flowing vessels; that becomes its chyle, which confers strength and complexion, and that is a nutriment containing all tastes.

For in a pregnant woman, chyle is distributed in three ways: for the nourishment of her own body, for breast milk, and for the growth of the embryo.

Sustained by that nutriment (relying on the mother with dependent existence), it subsists within.

And when the time of birth has arrived, by the action of the labor-wind, turning around with head downwards, it emerges through the genital tract; this is the normal condition, but what is otherwise is abnormal.

From this point onward, however, its existence becomes independent.

Its food and regimen, taught in the Chapter on the Origin of the Embryo, cause no disorders and promote growth.

And by those very two improperly practiced, when born it is immediately destroyed, like a tree newly transplanted, unrooted, by wind and heat.

Afflictions caused by the derangement of gods and the like, not corresponding to derangement of the doṣas, are recognized from authoritative instruction, from the observation of wondrous symptoms, and from the specifics of origin, signs, and treatment.

Regarding the existence or non-existence of timely and untimely death, this indeed is our determination: 'Whoever dies, dies only at his time, for there is no void in time,' so say some.

And that is incorrect.

For neither being without a void nor having a void is applicable to time, because of the intrinsic nature of time's own characteristic.

On this matter others say: 'Whenever one dies, that is one's fixed time of death; that is true for all beings, because of the uniformity of operation.'

This too is a misconception of the meaning.

For it is not the case that because no one fails to die, [time] is of uniform operation.

For time is spoken of with reference to the measure of lifespan.

And for one by whom it is held that whenever one dies, that is one's time of death, all entities would have their own fixed time; and that is not admissible, for the undesirable fruit of untimely food, speech, and action is directly observed, and in the contrary case, the desirable; and the manifestation of timeliness and untimeliness is directly perceived in various conditions after considering each particular purpose, such as: 'this is the time, or not the time, for this disease, for food, for medicine, for counter-treatment, for evacuation.'

In the world too this occurs: the rain falls in season, the rain falls out of season; cold in season, cold out of season; heat in season, heat out of season; flowers and fruits in season, and flowers and fruits out of season.

Therefore both exist: death in time and out of time; there is no exclusivity in this matter.

For if there were no untimely death, all lifespan would have a fixed measure of time; this being the case, knowledge of the wholesome and unwholesome would be purposeless, and perception, inference, and authoritative instruction—which are authoritative means of knowledge in all treatises, by which wholesome and unwholesome factors for longevity are understood—would become invalid.

The sages consider this doctrine, that there is no untimely death, to be mere verbal expression.

A hundred years, indeed, is the measure of lifespan in this age.

The cause of it is perfection of constitutional qualities and self, and the practice of wholesome habits.

Here are the summary verses:

What the body is, how it subsists afflicted by diseases, / how it undergoes distress and destruction, and what its tissues are;

how their increase and decrease [occur], and what the medicine is for them when depleted; / factors promoting bodily growth and those promoting strength;

factors causing transformation and their distinct actions; / tissues called waste products and those called refined products, and the question [itself]—

this ninefold determination has been systematically disclosed / in its truth in the Investigation of the Body, in the Śārīrasthāna, by the supreme sage.

Thus ends the sixth chapter, named Investigation of the Body, in the Śārīrasthāna of the treatise composed by Agniveśa and redacted by Caraka.