| From The River Of Heaven |
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| Books By David Frawley |
| NATURE'S MEDICINE : AYURVEDA | |
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| It holds that diseases are of two
causes; either owing to imbalances of energies in the body itself or
owing to karmic, that is psychological causes. The latter are thought to predominate over the
former, though both factors are present in most diseases. The three main classical texts for Ayurveda are CHARAK, SUSHRUT and VAGBHAT. While they are still studied today and give the fundamental principles much of their material is no longer relevant, so many modern books have been written to adapt them to changing conditions. While their present form we find these texts in today was not finalized until the early centuries A.D., Charak and Sushrut are about the same time as Krishna (c. 1500-1000 B.C.). Many Ayurvedic practices are also mentioned in Buddhist teachings and in the stories of the Buddha himself. Ayurveda was adapted by the Buddhists and is the basis of Buddhist medicine. Vagbhat himself was a Buddhist and his text and commentaries on it are still commonly studied in Buddhist medicine. Nagarjuna, the most famous of the Buddhist siddhas, and perhaps the most renowned figure in the Mahayana Buddhist tradition after the Buddha, was a great Ayurvedic doctor.
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