Prasuti-Tantra Made Easy

Ayurvedic Samhitas were written several hundreds of years back. They were written in a different style, which is very much different from today's style of writing. In comparison with today's text books on medicine, they do not look like well organized books. The reason is well known. In those days students were not taught through books. Sishyas used to be with their Gurus always and gurus kept explaining various points to shishya at anytime convenient to them. When-ever a shishya got a doubt; it was clarified to him by guru then and there. Sometimes they used to have a discussion on a particular topic and drew conclusions. It was only later that some of the sishyas attempted to compile notes based on discourses and discussions in an organized way. They tried to bring some order while compiling their learning into Samhitas. Yet, we find that many of the Samhitas were not organized into chapters covering topics and unless we read all shlokas in the Samhitas from beginning to end, we will not be in a position to know which topic is covered in which chapter.

There is no doubt that the best way of gaining knowledge is reading the original Samhitas. But for various reasons, it is difficult to read and understand the originals. As the topics are not arranged in a sequence that is followed today, students of Ayurvedic medicine may find it all the more difficult to read them. Therefore, they may require text books to help them to understand the topics. They can refer to the original Samhitas after getting a clear understanding of the topics from the text books written keeping in view the requirements of students and their syllabus.

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