www.satishankar.in
Hriday has different
connotation to different people, to Rishis, it is One or his or her
deity, for a physician it is a part of the body, to a poet or a lover, it is
the lover. In aesthetics, it is the core of Rasa, Rasika and Rasawant,
all at once. In the Vedic tradition it has been at the centre stage, right from
the very beginning, but unfathomable to most but Vedic Rishis or seers. In the Veda,
Hriday is equated to Divine, manas, cosmos both micro and macro,
the non-living and living being, and to Brahman. Whole of the cosmos is
interlinked with the central core, the Hriday. Even in Ayurveda and
modern medical sciences, Hriday has been a controversial issue. Pragmatically,
Brain and Heart, share almost equal claims to be synonymous to Hriday.
Two Hriday have been accepted, namely UroHriday and SiroHriday,
the seat of Buddhi, Manas, Chetana and Indriya. It is also
proposed that there are two brains, one in cranial cavity and other is situated
in Hriday itself. Here we take up Rig Veda 10.129.04, from the Nasadiya
Sukta, one of the most famous hymns on cosmogony, also misleadingly called,
the creation hymn as the starting point. The structure of the hymn is such that
the verses 1, 6 and 7 put forward
unanswered questions on cosmogony and the verses 2 to 5, placed in the middle
of the hymn, provoke the wisdom by leading into the, Hriday with a view
that the seeker will find the answer on his or her own. Sayana /Wilson,
rendered it as," In the beginning there was desire, which was the first
seed of manas; sages having meditated in their Hriday have discovered by
their wisdom the connexion of the existent with the non-existent." A
careful review of scholarship and interpretation of this hymn during the last
few centuries, reveals that the Manas-Hriday interaction is still a
mystery. To have a deeper insight, a careful study of Manas-Hriday
antahkriya, is indispensable. Our knowledge depends on our jnanendriyas.
Paper ponders in some facts from Rigveda and Ayurveda to lay a
few bricks to the bare foundations of the core of Vedic Cosmogony and Ayurveda.
Keywords: Hriday, Heart, Agni, brain, Manas, Charak, Sushrut, Vagbhata, Ayurveda, Rigveda, Marma, Trimarmsiddhi, Paripalanam, Sadhaka Pitta, Manovaha, Sanjnavaha Srotas. Triguna, Tridosha, Mahabhoot