Since the beginning of mankind, diseases have been following us around and challenging our survival. In order to reproduce, human beings must conquer disease, and so began a long exploration, testing, summing up, concluding, exploring again, testing again, concluding again, and concluding again. …… This story has happened for thousands of years, and has happened all over the world, and finally, developed into different kinds of medicine. Chinese medicine is one of them.
Experimental medicine – the prototype of Chinese medicine
Long, long ago, in the yellow earth of China, people do not feel well, find some flowers and herbs, chew and swallow them, and people get well. Later, when civilization changed to decocting these plants with water and adding some stones, shells or bones, etc., and then drinking the soup after decocting them together, they found that the effect was even better.
Sometimes, when I can’t find these things, I massage them on my body and find that when I press certain places on my body, I feel sore and numb, and then I feel much more comfortable. This was the beginning of healing, and the Chinese ancestors passed these tips down from generation to generation.
After a thousand years, the experience of healing gradually accumulated, and people found that certain methods were specialized to cure certain disorders, so they summarized their experience and made it into a guiding rule. For example, if you have a headache, find a certain flower or herb to decoct with, remove the residue and drink the soup; if you have abdominal pain, press a certain spot on your foot or iron your abdomen with heat.
After some days, people found that certain discomfort will appear at the same time, and follow a specific pattern of evolution, and some external factors will cause the discomfort to aggravate or alleviate, with a certain method, can be cured of this discomfort.
Therefore, people summarize these perceptions and call them diseases. Diseases have connotations such as causes, manifestations, changes and treatments, and at the same time, they can be reasoned and predicted.
However, all these perceptions are based on observation and summarized as experience. At this time, empirical medicine emerged on the land of China.
The above is the period when the Chinese ancestors explored the relationship between health and disease, around the Xia, Shang and Zhou Dynasties.
The appearance of the Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine
In the Eastern Zhou period, the Zhou dynasty was in decline, and the learning originally limited to the Zhou emperor, royal officials, and officials such as the TaiBuTaiShi began to flow into the people, opening the eyes of the ignorant common people. After the people’s wisdom was opened up, people began to study the principles of different things and gradually developed all kinds of doctrines, forming a situation where nine streams and ten schools of thought would contend in the future.
At this time, some people were particularly interested in studying the operation of the human body and discovered the internal organs and meridians. They applied the theory of the five elements of yin and yang to the operation of the human body and discovered that man and nature were very similar and that the changes in nature had a profound effect on human health.
They continued to study the interaction between human beings and nature, and gradually, most of the changes in the human body were explained, and with this understanding, human diseases could be predicted, prevented, and treated. They wanted to pass on these great discoveries to the next generation, but they were afraid that they would not be treasured because they were too small to speak, so they decided to entrust the book to Huang Di, and instead they became nameless.
Huangdi is the first name, his surname is Xuan Yuan (full name Xuan Yuan Huangdi), is the leader of the ancient times, defeated the Yandi and Chi You, unified the various ministries, became the common master, the creation of the Chinese civilization, the Chinese people also call themselves the descendants of the Yellow Emperor. As the name of the Yellow Emperor is loud enough, let’s pretend that the work was written by the Yellow Emperor and name it “Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine”.
The Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine is written in a dialogue in which the Emperor asks medical questions and Qibo answers them, focusing on medical theory and bringing out the ways of nature.
This Qibo was a medical officer during the time of the Yellow Emperor, so it is most appropriate to use him to answer the Emperor’s questions about the relationship between medicine and nature. Huang Di’s questions were made, and Qibo’s answers were also made, but the medical theory and the way of nature brought out between the questions and answers were true. The theoretical foundation of Chinese medicine was laid by the appearance of the Huangdi Nei Jing. This foundation, to put it bluntly, is that the sky and the human one breath, the same breath seek.
Chinese medicine is built on this foundation, naturally also has a macrocosmic view of the whole, subsequent research and development, in the study of health, disease, treatment and health problems, all towards the direction of the heaven and man, the overall macrocosm.
All of these, all started from the Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine, and later on, Chinese medicine was called “QI Huang’s Art”. The “QI” is Qibo, and the “HUANG” is Huang Di, the main character of the Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine. The importance of the Nei Jing is evident.
The emergence of “The Treatise on Typhoid and Cold” and “The Essentials of the Golden Pillow
After a few hundred years, in the late Eastern Han Dynasty, Zhang Zhongjing, the sage of medicine, emerged. He was a “superb” physician who, with his exceptional talent and ability, wrote the “Treatise on Typhoid and Cold Diseases”. The book was scattered in the fires of war before it was completed, and was later collected and organized into two parts, The Treatise on Cold and Injury and The Essentials of the Golden Pillar, which became the other two classics of Chinese medicine, the former focusing on acute external diseases and the latter on miscellaneous internal diseases.
In the two books, Zhong Jing first discusses the symptoms, pulse and mechanism of the disease, then lists the prescriptions for treatment, and details the composition of the prescriptions, as well as the method of decoction; if the disease changes, Zhong Jing also provides the corresponding addition or subtraction method. The appearance of the two books provided a basis for clinical treatment in later generations and also laid down the principles for the use of prescriptions.
Zhong Jing’s prescriptions have been handed down to the present day by virtue of four characteristics: less medicine, more quantity, more power, and more work. Later generations have come to refer to Zhong Jing’s prescriptions as “Jing Fang”, which means the classical prescriptions and the orthodox prescriptions.
Today, even if the living environment and habits of human beings have changed, even if the diseases of today are different, but people are still people, the Jing prescriptions used correctly, still have unparalleled effectiveness.
The soul of Chinese medicine
As can be seen, the development of Chinese medicine has two important milestones, one is the “Huangdi Nei Jing” came out, the second is the “treatise on typhoid” and the ” Jin Phenomenon” written and compiled. The former reasoning, the latter two on treatment, to Chinese medicine laid the foundation. Thousands of years after that, and out of many doctors, Chinese medicine, many achievements, the formation of the theory of attacking evil, earth, warm disease. But these achievements are on the basis of the redevelopment, only the icing on the cake, rather than the emergence of new medicine. It can be seen that the soul of Chinese medicine has always been built on the “Nei Jing”, “typhoid” and “Jin Shao”. Once detached, Chinese medicine is not Chinese medicine.
Lost soul of Chinese medicine
Unfortunately, in recent times, the gradual expansion of Western learning, so that Chinese people doubt and abandon their traditional culture, whether good or bad, in short, part of the tradition, to be discarded. The introduction of Western medicine, the invention of antibiotics, the development of surgical techniques and modern examination equipment, all of which have left the Chinese people in awe, Chinese medicine has been a major challenge.
Today, with the shrinking of Eastern philosophy and the prevalence of Western thought, practitioners of Chinese medicine have lost their self-confidence and have embarked on the path of westernization, gradually being assimilated into Western medicine.
Westernization of Chinese medicine refers to the use of Western thinking and concepts to explain the theories of Chinese medicine and to guide clinical treatment in Chinese medicine. For example, the saying that “the heart is the master of the mind” is rejected because the heart in Western medicine has nothing to do with the idea of the mind, but the heart in Chinese medicine is not the heart in Western medicine.
Another example is that when a TCM practitioner sees that a patient has high blood pressure, he uses herbs such as Danshen, Safflower and Tianma to invigorate the blood and dispel wind; when liver enzymes are elevated, he uses a large team of liver tonics; when he sees that a patient has yellow phlegm in his cough, he prescribes anti-inflammatory and anti-bacterial herbs such as Aconite and Fritillaria.
All of these are wrong. What is wrong is not that the Western medical examination is wrong, but the thinking of Chinese doctors. They are not faithful to the theoretical foundation of Chinese medicine itself, but instead, they intermingle a lot of Western medical ideas, but prescribe Chinese medicine. Patients who take these prescriptions, which are not Chinese but not Western, certainly do not have satisfactory results, and then they question the inability of Chinese medicine practitioners to cure their diseases.
In fact, the problem does not lie in Chinese medicine itself, but in the Westernization of these practitioners. Unfortunately, the problem of Westernization of Chinese medicine is very serious, and Chinese medicine urgently needs to correct its roots and recover its own orthodoxy and soul.
“The spirit of “Traditional Chinese Medicine
The name of this website is “Traditional Chinese Medicine”, which has two meanings. The first meaning is to emphasize the importance of the foundation. “QI Huang” refers to the Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine, “Jing” is Zhang Zhongjing, and “Liao” is Jinguiyaolue. This is the orthodoxy of Chinese medicine, which we must defend and carry forward.
What are the classics of Chinese medicine? It is the Nei Jing, the Typhoid and the Jingui. The second layer of meaning is our ambition – to revive Chinese medicine.
This website is not only for Chinese medicine practitioners, but also for everyone. People are always sick, but when they are sick, what do you think of? Seeking Western medical treatment as soon as possible is what most people think of, and it is even the reflex action of most people.
However, there are other options besides Western medicine, and Chinese medicine is one of them. However, in order for people to believe in Chinese medicine, they must first have an understanding of it. “Traditional Chinese Medicine” is intended to show the most orthodox side of Chinese medicine and to serve as a bridge for people who are new to Chinese medicine.
Chinese medicine is not a mysterious, abstruse, or incomprehensible subject. It is not only practical, but also theoretical and logical. Moreover, it is rich in philosophy and art, and it is worthwhile to savor and grind the wisdom in it.
You don’t know how to approach orthodox Chinese medicine? Then let’s start with “Traditional Chinese Medicine”.