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Writer's pictureAnoop Kumar, MD

Ancient Wisdom & Modern Health 12

Kenopanishad


"I do not think I know well; I know too; not that I do not know. He of us who knows that knows that as well as what is meant by ‘I know too; not that I do not know.’"


The teacher just finished giving the lesson, and the student has already responded. The student is reassuring the teacher, saying: Yes, I understand you. I'm not falling into the trap of thinking that I know this. Rest assured, I know I don't know it in one sense.


At the same time, the student also says those who do know this state of quintessential completeness, of the reality of our nature, of health as wholeness, also know what is meant by saying that I know, suggesting that the student does "know" this state as one's nature. 


What may seem like an impossible tangle of words is the result of trying to apply language to that which is beyond simplicity. That which is self-evident, self-sufficient, and one's own very nature cannot be put into language because it does not live in the world of modification that language and thought live in.


In today's health scene, there are innumerable ways to know health and think about health. We have the way of healthcare, the way of wellness, the way of spirituality, the way of religion, and the way of philosophy. For each of these categories there are perhaps a hundred measurements or markers telling us what health is. In the ER we have blood pressure, heart rate, pulse oxygenation, respiratory rate, temperature, pH, white blood cell count, red blood cell count, platelet count, sodium, potassium, chloride... and on and on. Each has meaning, but to think that by knowing one of these measurements or markers and mapping our thought to that, we can apprehend the totality of health would be folly.


Measurements and markers have their place, but health as wholeness is something beyond these.

We know health in the sense that we are health already. We know health in the sense that we are already whole. Healing is the process of our personality and body moving towards the wholeness that we already are in our deepest nature.

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