Herbs & Rasayanas
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Reservoirs of Balance and Intelligence
By Jay Glaser, MD
Rasayanas: Packets of intelligence
Ayurvedic herbal or mineral preparations used for promoting general health, immunity, strength, vitality virility and spiritual attainment are known as rasayanas. These preparations are held to be mediators of balance and intelligence, a concept that explains their biological actions. The concept of biological information in modern science, for example as coded in DNA, has a counterpart in Ayurveda.
The principle of complementarity
Veda is the blueprint for the cosmos, including plants and animals. Out of this rises an important consequence: the principle of complementarity in Ayurveda explains that the sequence of biological information as stored in plants and minerals corresponds to the sequence of biological information in the human physiology.
Rasayanas: Veda put to work
Rasayana therapy utilizes this principle of complementarity to eliminate distortions and restore integrity to the flow of biological information and intelligence in the human physiology. Rasayanas function like small "tuning forks" that impart the proper resonant frequency and thus restore balance to the system. To use another analogy, rasayanas can be seen as small packets of "software" that supply an essential program to restore integrity to the source code.
Ligands: binding sites for parcels of intelligence
Pharmacologists have identified sites on cell membranes, called receptors, to which small molecules, called ligands, such as hormones, neurotransmitters, and peptides can bind. Each molecule has a specific conformation and functions like a small key, fitting into the receptor site and activating another enzymatic reaction to produce its effect. It is widely held that many drugs and herbs act by fitting into the receptor site of naturally occurring hormones or neurotransmitters (called endogenous ligands), thus either inhibiting or mimicking their effects.
Balance: the basis of stability
When biological information is highly orderly and integrated, according to Ayurveda, the result is physiological "balance"--a state in which the parts of the organism are functioning in an integrated and harmonious state of equilibrium, rendering the organism as a whole both flexible and stable.
Rasayanas: agents with multiple biological effects
The results of research on rasayanas confirm that rasayanas have clinical effects on multiple disorders, suggesting that they act by strengthening the immune system and restoring balance in the physiology. This reaffirms the importance of using the whole plant in accordance with the descriptions of the classical Ayurvedic texts to produce a balanced effect in the whole physiology. In contrast to this comprehensive approach of Ayurveda, modern science focuses its attention on identifying the "active ingredient," which frequently acts on an isolated aspect of the physiology and therefore often produces unwanted side effects.
Medicinal plants: software for creating balance
Workers in the field of medical botany have frequently postulated that if a plant is found to have multiple clinical effects (and multiple ligands, for the most important membrane receptors) then the different substances may be interacting to create synergistic effects and minimize side effects. In other words, the plant probably possesses a certain balancing property over and above the presence of a few principle active ingredients. Many medical botanists hold that this balancing effect is especially true for medicinal plants, many of which contain thousands of different bioactive substances. The ability of rasayanas to treat multiple diseases must be distinguished from that of isolated active ingredients, which are used for multiple purposes (e.g., antihistamines are used to treat allergies, but also insomnia, colds, Parkinsonism, and motion sickness, but these secondary uses all take advantage of the same anti-cholinergic side-effect).
The whole plant: complete intelligence
Research on Ayurvedic preparations has shown that traditional formulations often contain dozens of active receptor sites (e.g. the research on MAK4). The presence of such a wide variety of ligands suggests that the preparation may be acting on a wide variety of tissues through a number of different mechanisms. This finding is not unexpected. Every plant contains thousands of various alkaloids, steroids, flavinoids, terpinoids and other molecules with bioactivity, and Ayurveda preparations may consist of many different plants. In addition, Ayurveda usually uses the entire part of the plant, for example, the whole fruit or leaf, and not just one constituent. It is therefore easy to see how Ayurvedic preparations such as MAK4 may contain many ligands.
Nature: the most subtle pharmacist
The presence of many naturally occurring ligands in one preparation suggests that the preparations are balanced in the sense described above. Modern pharmaceutical companies invest a great deal of time and resources carefully manipulating the formulas of various remedies, to enhance the desired effect while minimizing side effects. In the case of Ayurvedic rasayanas, this balancing is carried out by nature. To a botanical pharmacologist or phytochemist, the finding of such a wide variety of ligands to mammalian cell membrane receptors, which suggests an intimate relationship between plants and mammal neurochemistry, is indicative of the elegance, beauty, and harmony in nature.
Fallacy of the active ingredient
Modern Western medicine focuses on isolating and treating symptoms of disease. Its approach to botanical pharmacology has been to isolate the active ingredients of a plant that appear to attenuate symptoms. When the active ingredient is disconnected from the balancing power of the whole plant, harmful side effects can occur. For example, certain alkaloids present in a plant have been shown to augment the action of other alkaloids and minimize untoward effects. Investigators in botanical pharmacology are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of synergy and balance in herbal formulations. Ayurveda utilizes whole plants or parts of plants to maximize the therapeutic response while avoiding harmful side effects. This has been a consideration in the design of recent laboratory research studies of Ayurvedic herbal formulations or rasayanas.
The medicinal plants growing in any region are most effective for maintaining health in the people of that country.
Nature provides a remedy in the geographical location where disorder or imbalance exists. For example, the cinchona bush from which quinine is derived is generally found in areas where malaria is prevalent.
Selecting the remedy: constitutions and imbalances
Many rasayanas are recommended based on either one's imbalance or on one's constitutional type. In Ayurveda, every individual can be categorized into one of several different body types, depending on his or her physiological and psychological characteristics. These characteristics determine how a person will respond to various foods, climates, activities, and food supplements or rasayanas. (See description of constitutional types in the section About Vedic Medicine.) Previous research has shown that individuals with different constitutional types have different balances of neurotransmitters in the peripheral blood (Singh, Singh, & Udupa, 1980).
21st Century medicine: using intelligence to cure diseases of aging
The research on Ayurvedic preparations has used modern scientific methods to bring to light the inherent balance and intelligence in the relationship between plants and man without resorting to a reductionistic approach to research. There is great promise in this approach for the future treatment of the major diseases of this new century, the chronic degenerative diseases and aging itself. These diseases tend not to respond to a simple "magic bullet" like antibiotics, but require an intervention that has effects that are more fundamental.
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