About Health Tonics and Ancient Lore

Ancient India was not prudish.  I am sure if those people time-travelled to visit us, they’d laugh at us for being such a bunch of self-important and tight assed prudes.  I state this with conviction and no, Khajuraho is not what leads me to this belief – not really.

My understanding of the people who lived before us comes from our epics, our ancient history.  Yes, I am sure that the guys the epics describe walked the earth.  Sadly they did so too long ago for us to claim any kinship  –  a kinship I am moderately convinced they would reject.

They were practical people, down to earth and like I said earlier, not prudes.  No, no, no, perish the thought; I am not saying that anything about the diet of the pure Kshatriya in olden times.  Don’t you know eating cow meat is forbidden but torturing the poor bull for sport is all kosher in the name of tradition?

Tsk Tsk

I am talking about Chyawanprash, the health tonic that has taken up ad space on our televisions all through the winter.  The origins of Chyawanprash are really interesting.  Sage Chyawan was the son of Bhrigu, a powerful sage in his own rights and the son of Brahma.  The ancients were really obsessed with genealogy, weren’t they?   Well he, Chyawan I mean was a premature birth and was really feeble. Bhrigu being really macho did not know what to do about a son who wasn’t the epitome of manliness.  Accounts say he give him the ashram at Dhosi Hill and migrated elsewhere. But that doesn’t really matter.  The sage had a powerful father, embarrassed by him or not.  That’s half the battle won, isn’t it?  Maybe our old and feeble sage would have meditated into oblivion if Sukanya, a princess (a child by all accounts) hadn’t poked a hillock of white ants with a stick for sport.  It wasn’t a hillock, sadly for her.  It was Chyawan practising austerities.  Annoyed at the disturbance of his meditation, he wreaked havoc with her father King Sharyati’s armies.  He cursed the soldiers with constipation.

Gotta love the vengefulness of sages!

Nothing about forgive and forget, turn the other cheek and all such new age nonsense.

The King, being a realist, rushed to the ashram to ask for forgiveness.  He also cut his losses by offering his pesky brat to Chyawan for marriage under the garb of “Oh you are so alone and you need a good woman to take care of you” kind of stuff.

Here accounts vary.  Some say Chyawan realized her could not match Sukanya’s ‘youthful energy’.  Others say Sukanya really freaked at the thought of living with an old feeble man.  Whatever be the case, the Ashwini Twins came into play.  Remember that Chyawan was the son of Bhrigu so summoning the Vaids of the Devas was easy.  Chywan, along with the twins created this “jam-like cooked mixture of sugar, honey, Triphala, ghee, sesame oil, berries and other herbs and spices.”as it is called by Wikipedia.  It rejuvenated the old and feeble sage.  He was also required to bathe in a special pond after applying a paste on his body to make him young and physically pleasing to his young wife.  As a trade, this was a good investment for the twins since Chyawan won a war against Indra on their behalf and increased their stature in the Dev-Lok.

 

So, dear readers, Chyawanprash originated as an aphrodisiac for an old man who had to match his young wife’s ‘youthful energy!’

On that note, I wonder who Sheela was of the Sheelajeet fame.

 

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