THE HISTORY OF AYURVEDA

THE HISTORY OF AYURVEDA

Ayurveda is a holistic healing science which comprises of two words, Ayu and Veda.

Ayu means life and Veda means knowledge or science. So the literal meaning of the word Ayurveda is the science of life.

It dates over 3000 years, with roots going back even further. It is the worlds first holistic system of health maintenance, based on lifestyle, diet and herbs.

According to many scholars knowledge of Ayurveda originated from India and influenced the ancient Chinese system of medicine and medical system practiced in Greece . Thus, Ayurveda is also known as the “Mother of all Healing”.

According to a legend, the knowledge of healing originated from Brahma who taught it to Daksha, who further taught Indra.

Ayurveda was said to be a world medicine dealing with both body and the spirit. Before the advent of writing, the ancient wisdom of this healing system was a part of the spiritual tradition of the Sanatana Dharma (Universal Religion), or Vedic Religion. VedaVyasa, the famous sage, shaktavesha avatar of Vishnu, put into writing the complete knowledge of Ayurveda, along with the more directly spiritual insights of self realization into a body of scriptural literature called the Vedas and the Vedic literatures.

Vedic Brahmans were not only priests performing religious rites and ceremonies, they also became the Vaidyas (Ayurvedic Physicians). The Sage- Physician- Surgeons of that time were the same sages or seers, deeply devoted holy people , who saw health as an integral part of spiritual life. It is said, that they received their training of Ayurveda through direct cognition during meditation. In other words, the knowledge of the use of various methods of healing, prevention, longevity and surgery came through Divine revelation . These revelations were transcribed from the oral tradition into book form, interspersed with the other aspects of life.

Consequently Ayurveda grew into a respected and widely used system of healing in India.
Around CA.1500 Before.Common era. Ayurveda was delineated into eight specific branches of medicine and there were two main schools - Atreya, the school of physicians, and Dhanvantari , the school of surgeons.
These two schools made Ayurveda a more scientifically verifiable and classifiable medical system.

Scholars from China, Tibet, Egypt, Persia, Greece and Rome flocked to India's Ayurvedic schools to learn about this holistic medicine

Ayurvedic texts were translated in Arabic and physicians such as Avicenna and Razi Sempion, who both quoted Ayurvedic texts , established Islamic Medicine.
This medicine became popular in Europe and helped to form the foundation of the European tradition in medicine.

In the 16^th Century Europe , Paracelsus , who is known as the father of modern Western medicine, practiced and propagated a system of medicine which borrowed heavily from Ayurveda.

IMPORTANCE OF AYURVEDA

Ayurveda is a science dealing not only with treatment of some diseases but is a complete way of life.

Ayurveda aims at making a happy, healthy and peaceful society. The two most important aims of Ayurveda are:
+ To maintain the health of healthy people
+ To cure the diseases of sick people

Today, well over 100 ayurvedic colleges in India grant degrees after a five-year program. More than 300,000 ayurvedic physicians belong to the All-India Ayurveda Congress, making it the largest medical organization in the world.