Sowa Rigpa

Traditional Tibetan medicine or Sowa Rigpa is the Tibetan medical system developed in the 8th century under King Trisong Detsen that incorporated the best international medical practices of that time.Claude Arpi, ''Glimpses on the Tibet History'', "Sowa Rigpa" (Art of Healing). Dharamsala: The Tibet Museum, 2016, Chapter 9 The medical treatise ''Giyud Shi'', or the ''Four Tantras'', was then originally composed and later edited in the 12th century.

Tibetan medicine employs multiple approaches to diagnosis that incorporate techniques including Venesection, Moxibustion, Compression Therapy, Medicinal Bathing, and massage. The pharmacology relies on complex formulas of multi-ingredient medicines that use herbs, minerals, metals, and animal products.

The Tibetan medical system's Four Tantras was based on Tibet's indigenous health practices, and this knowledge joined that of the 8th century invited conference attendants arriving from Greece, Persia, India, China, and Central Asia that met at Samye Monastery and formed Trisong Detsen's Medical Council, composed of respected international practitioners. Together they developed ''Sowa Rigpa''.

The current practice of Sowa Rigpa or Tibetan medicine is mostly based on the 12th century edits by Yuthok Yongten Gompo the Younger to the original "Four Tantras" medical treatise prepared by Yuthok Yongten Gompo the Elder.

Tibetan medicine has since spread to the Ladakh and Sikkim regions of northern India, to the western and northern parts of Nepal, and throughout Bhutan. Historically, Mongolia and Turkestan (currently Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang) and the Mongolian-populated areas in the northeast have been greatly influenced by Tibetan medicine. Tibetan medicine is also predominantly used in the Buryat and Tuva regions of the Russian Federation, as well as the Republic of Kalmykia, located in the Volga River basin.

Tibetan medicine embraces the traditional Buddhist belief that all illness ultimately results from the three poisons: delusion, greed and aversion. Tibetan medicine follows the Buddha's Four Noble Truths which apply medical diagnostic logic to suffering.

History

The pre-empire Tibetan people's accumulative knowledge of their local plants and their various usages for benefiting people's health were collected by Tonpa Shenrab Miwoche (སྟོན་པོ་གཤེན་རབ་མི་བོ་ཆེ།), and passed down to one of his sons. Later, Yuthok Yontan Gonpo the Elder compiled these practices and authored the ''Gyud Shi'' or the ''Four Tantras''. The ''Four Tantras'' then became a medical source for the 8th century Medical Council convened by Tibetan King Trisong Detsen at Samye Monastery. The Council gathered to compile the best of additional medical sources from Greece, Turkestan, India, China, Persia, and Central Asia and to develop ''Sowa Rigpa'' or the Tibetan Art of Healing.

Later in the 11th and 12th centuries, a number of additional Indian medical texts were also transmitted. While the Ayurvedic ''Astāngahrdayasamhitā'' or the ''Heart of Medicine Compendium'' attributed to Vagbhata was translated into Tibetan by Rinchen Zangpo (རིན་ཆེན་བཟང་པོ།) (957–1055), Ayurvedic practices had already been adopted in the 8th century by the Tibetan medical Council. Tibet had also absorbed the early Indian Abhidharma literature, for example the 5th century ''Abhidharmakosasabhasyam'' by Vasubandhu, which expounds upon medical topics, such as fetal development. A wide range of Indian Vajrayana tantras, containing practices based on medical anatomy, had likewise been adopted by Tibet.

In the 12th century, Yuthok Yontan Gonpo the Younger (གཡུ་ཐོག་ཡོན་ཏན་མགོན་པོ།) visited India six times before editing the ''Gyud Shi'', or ''Four Tantras'', into its 156 chapters that are still in current use. Around the turn of the 14th century, the Drangti family of physicians established a curriculum based on the ''Four Tantras'' and on supplementary literature from the Yutok school at Sakya Monastery (ས་སྐྱ་དགོན།) .

The 5th Dalai Lama (ཏཱ་ལའི་བླ་མ་སྐུ་ཕྲེང་ལྔ་བ།) commissioned Kalon Sangye Gyatso (སྡེ་སྲིད་སངས་རྒྱས་རྒྱ་མཚོ།) to establish the Chagpori College of Medicine in 1696. Chagpori taught Gyamtso's ''Blue Beryl'' as well as the ''Four Tantras'' in a model that spread throughout Tibet along with the oral tradition.

In the 18th century Tibetan medical practices began gaining international acclaim after missionaries who arrived in Tibet featured Tibetan medicine in their recorded travelogues, and by 1789 the British surgeon Robert Saunder published an article on the process of making Tibetan medicines. In the 1850s, the Russian capital at Saint Petersburg opened a clinic of Tibetan medicine and a specialized school of Tibetan medicine. By 1898, a part of the Tibetan medical masterpiece the ''Four Tantras'' or the ''Four Medical Classics'', was translated into the Russian language. In Poland, Tibetan medicine was practiced in the 1920s, and two presidents, Stanisław Wojciechowski and Ignacy Mościcki were both treated with Tibetan medicine. In 1969, the PADMA AG based in Zurich, Switzerland, was the first Western pharmaceutical company to specialize in the production and sale of Tibetan medicine.

In September 1959, the Tibetan People's Government merged the ''Men-tsee-khang'' (སྨན་རྩིས་ཁང་) and Chagpori College of Medicine and established the Lhasa Tibetan Hospital on this basis. In September 1961, at the congress of Tibetan doctors in Lhasa area, Chingpo Lobu was appointed as the director of Lhasa Tibetan Hospital. On September 1, 1980, the Chinese government of the Tibet Autonomous Region expanded Lhasa Tibetan Hospital to become Tibetan Hospital of Tibet Autonomous Region (西藏自治区藏医院), laying a solid foundation for the vigorous development of Tibetan medicine. In 1999, Tibet Nordicam Pharmaceuticals Co., Ltd. became the first high-tech pharmaceutical listed enterprise of the Tibet Autonomous Region.Social Sciences Literature Press