Roga - Diseases

Remember this:  Diseases divided into two kinds, Nija and Agantu. The Nija diseases are individual to us, coming from within our own bodily systems, and the Agantu disease are those that come from outside us. The body is a space with various dravyas and various gunas and various doshas, and their disharmony creates disease. Any disease is a set of gunas that are imbalanced. When dravyas are imbalanced, the tissues (dhatus) become imbalanced and physical disease results, of metabolic origin. We can understand bodily diseases mechanically and metabolically, for example, if somebody does too much physical work and becomes exhausted, this is a mechanical disorder. If the metabolism becomes disrupted, then inflammation begins (arthritis, etc.), the materials of the body are not being transformed properly, and doshic imbalance results. This is a very important concept for comprehending disease. If food does not correspond to the optimal raw ingredients needed by the metabolism, and if the agni does not correspond to the food, then the metabolic process will not yield the optimal results. The metabolism is an entire other chapter to be understood, it is also a concept in contemporary medicine. The concept of kriya in Ayurveda is similar, understanding how disease arises in the tissues. 

The Agantu diseases also happen in the body, but their causes are external to the body itself. When the external temperature is too much for the body to cope with, for example, then that sparks a struggle within the body to attune itself, the body is firstly attuned to its own parameters, not to those of the outside world, and the more of a difference there is between the external and internal conditions, the harder this becomes to achieve. This is why we wear clothing. 

From the perspective of determining the location of the disease there are also other differences that we will discuss later.

Agantu can also involve insect bites, pollution, etc., but also external sensory stimuli that come into the bodily system and disrupt it. 

The internal (Nija) diseases happen inside the body, inside the organs. The Agantu diseases can involve impacting the body from the outside, for example, breaking through the surface barrier of the skin. From the perspective of psychology, there can also be an internal cause, a decision that affects the internal metabolism, or also the person can listen to others or perceive ideas that enter the mind and affect the person's metabolism. If the person perceives something as a threat to themselves, then the emotion of fear impacts the circulation and respiration, etc. We must have extensive knowledge of both physiology and psychology to understand the response of the mahabhutas to all these kinds of stimuli.

These differences have to do with the origin of the disease, which will determine where we intervene with our treatments. A change of environment and stimuli is sometimes the solution. If people are too attached to whatever is generating the disease then it will never be cured. Many factors are involved in determining the origin of disease.

Being able to study and absorb all of this information requires focusing on it and is best done during the time of life when study is most favored, young adulthood.

An example of a purely bodily disease can be diseases that are purely mechnical - holding the body in an incorrect position, for example, causes blood flow to stop, etc. The place where we can intervene is at the level of the body and at the level of the external causes. We cannot do anything about the fact that people were born with their particular samskars, etc.