Circumambulating Saraswati – A story of loss and discovery

 Circumambulating Saraswati – A story of loss and discovery

The Sanskrit word Saraswati means she-who-flows, portraying the ever-dynamic nature of knowledge. While there are stories abound, the one that we are going to discuss today, is interesting because it elaborates on how culture and geography influence the generation and interpretation of knowledge. 

The story goes like this – Ancient Greece with its numerous islands was a bastion of science and culture, long before the birth of Christ. The various city states constituting Greece with their trade and wars lead to cultural exchanges leading up the birth of Democracy and the Olympics, to name a few. It is easy to imagine why some of the earliest recorded medical practitioners thrived in such an environment. While earlier civilizations like Babylon did witness medical practice, the Greeks were arguably the first to systematically study medicine. The school of Hippocrates specialized in inductive medicine, or the art of abstracting universal principles from observations as opposed to the school of Galen which specialized in deductive medicine, or the art of applying universal abstractions in specific scenarios. With the rise of the Roman empire, Greek concepts of medicine were appropriated and put into force by Rome. The adoption of Christianity by Emperor Constantine the Great, the division of the Roman empire into Eastern and Western halves, and the subsequent fall of Western Rome, the study of medical texts fell into obscurity. Study persisted but in dwindling fashion, in Eastern Rome (Byzantium). Europe had fallen into the Dark Middle Ages.

In parallel to the Greco-Roman civilization (classical antiquity), were the Indian civilizations which studied philosophy, medicine, language and mathematics in great depth. Medicine was studied under the heading – Ayurveda (lit. knowledge of life), and Siddha in the South. The two primary schools of medical thought, were the Surgical School – supposedly expounded by Dhanvantari, an incarnation of Vishnu and promoted by Sushruta, and the Medical School, expounded by Charaka and promoted by Atreya. It is important to note that Doctors were considered untouchable, due to their handling of body fluids but this social consideration, did not mean they were poor or oppressed, they studied the various Darshanas of Indian Philosophy, for medicine and philosophy were inextricably linked in the East. Ayurveda and Siddha postulate a balance of humors of the body is prime for good health, and disease and its treatment follow from changes between these humors – vata or wind, pitta or bile and kappa or phlegm.  Doctors belonging to these schools engaged in extensive scholarship and authored extensive texts and commentaries, both in Sanskrit and the local Prakrits (precursors to Hindi).

With the 6th century rise of Islam in the Middle East, the Caliph rapidly expanded from Spain in the West to India in the East. Soon, Islam witnessed a Golden age of science, reason, medicine and philosophy.  Islamic scholars were exposed to ideas from the Greek speaking territories of the Eastern Roman Empire – Induction and Deduction, as well as Ayurvedic ideas of humoral balance. The Greek and Sanskrit classical works were thus translated into Arabic, the lingua franca of the Muslim world. Scholars wrote extensive commentaries upon these works. Al-Rhazi, considered the father of Islamic medicine, famously considered the locality where meat decays the slowest, the best for setting up a hospital. He also explored the doctor patient relationship. Ibn Sina, however, was considered the best of the Medeival Islamic physicians, his work revolved around extensive analysis of the physical properties of urine, as well as the pulse. Medieval Arabic Spain, in particular witnessed a period of extreme scholarship owing to religious tolerance between the Jews, Muslims and Christians.

But this golden period soon saw a decline, owing to Mongol Invasions and the following sack of cities. In the 15th century the last Islamic presence in Spain was wiped out, due to Spanish Christian armies. Earlier on in the 15th Century, Constantinople, the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire fell to Turkish Armies and scholars fled the city, carrying valuable manuscripts to reach Europe proper. These rapid changes in the socio-political map of Europe, as well as intellectual frustratuaion with what they saw as a turbulent, violent period in comparison to the Golden age of the Greeks and Romans, lead to the Renaissance (Lit. revival) in Italy. While the Renaissance is primarily remembered for its influence on Art and culture, this period saw the Latin Translation of the Arabic Translations of the Greek medical texts, as well as their commentaries. Other Greek manuscripts which either slept through the Middle Ages in abbeys attached to the Church, or entered with scholars fleeing Turkish Constantinople, were translated into Latin. The Renaissance culture spread through Europe, and soon medical students were dealing with the works of Galen and Hippocrates, peppered with voluminous commentaries by masters from across Europe and the Middle East. 

In the 17th and 18th Centuries, Europe saw the Enlightenment, or the Age of Reason, where knowledge was seen as superior to faith and belief. This change in attitude, with the development of industries and crowded, polluted industrial cities following the Industrial Revolution of the 18th Century, saw the birth of new medical techniques and public health. With the period of colonization, European ideas of medicine as well as the European medical pedagogy, made their way to the colonies such as India and China, where hospitals were set up, to cater primarily to the needs of the European colonizers. The need to support healthcare in colonies made it necessary for European thinkers to study indigenous diseases of colonies, through the lens of the enlightenment. Ronald Ross for instance, discovered the malarial parasite. 

While one can keep exploring the story of medicine, it serves well to introspect once in a while. This long story for one, partially explains why education today is so Eurocentric – ideas simply spread from Europe. But this doesn’t mean that Europeans can claim exclusive patronage of science - as explained, ideas which were exported from Asia and the Middle East, simply re-entered colonies. Saraswati thus, has only flowed back into her birth stream and she should be venerated.