BioMed
A scholarly English selection from foundational Sanskrit medical writings, with historical introductions that preserve the tradition’s own categories.
The same body of medical writing gives practical techniques, such as surgery, knife handling, and treating poisons, alongside prayers against disease spirits and the reading of dreams. Its idea of healing does not separate the practical from the religious, as modern medicine does.
The principles of moderation and humoral balance from this ancient system still sit at the heart of many complementary therapies used in the West today. Being old and still in use, though, shows that the ideas have lasted, not that they work.
In this tradition, health is the state in which three bodily humours are held in balance, and illness is what happens when they drift out of proportion. The physician's job is less to attack a disease than to restore that balance.