Shennong's Classic of Materia Medica is divided into three volumes, containing 365 kinds of drugs. It is divided into three categories: upper, middle and lower, and its conciseness has become the essence of Chinese medicine theory.
20/kloc-in August, 2005, the English version of "Quantu Shennong Herbal Classic" was published by foreign languages press. The translator and annotator of this book, Mr. Andre and his wife, are experts in Sinology, and have translated and published many books on China's traditional culture. Mr. Liu Jingzeng, a famous flower-and-bird painter, has created many species images that have never been set foot in before in this book, which greatly increases the species of traditional flower-and-bird painting and has important reference value for the practice of new species painting. The painting method of this book is not limited to the appearance of shadows, and it has broken through the shackles of the painting method of drug specimens since the Ming and Qing Dynasties. These paintings contain a lot of poems, historical materials and other ancient cultural information of China related to this species. Readers can savor those intriguing wonderful pictures.
The historical role of the development of traditional Chinese medicine
The historical position of Shennong Herbal Classic cannot be underestimated. It systematically summarizes the scattered pharmaceutical knowledge before the Eastern Han Dynasty, and contains many contents with scientific value, which are cherished by doctors in past dynasties. And it has long been used as a compilation style of pharmaceutical works. As the first monograph on pharmacology in China, its influence is far-reaching. This classic put forward the prescription theory of "monarch, minister, assistant and envoy" for the first time, which was used by later generations. The ordered example (or preface) is a volume of its own, which is the general introduction of the book and summarizes the pharmaceutical theory of 13.
The publication of Classic has had a great influence on the development of pharmacy in China. Several representative materia medica in history, such as Notes to the Classic of Materia Medica, Newly Revised Materia Medica, Materia Medica with Syndromes and Compendium of Materia Medica, all originated from the Classic and developed. The relationship between drugs is also a key to pharmacy, and the principle of "seven emotions and harmony" put forward in Benjing has played a huge role in the practice of medication for thousands of years.
Some drugs can help each other and play a greater role when used together, and some are even several times stronger than those used alone; When two drugs meet, one will reduce the medicinal properties of the other, so it is difficult to play its role; Some drugs can reduce the toxicity of another drug, which is often used to process toxic drugs or limit the toxicity of one drug in a prescription; Some two drugs are non-toxic, but when they meet, they will produce great toxicity, damage the body and so on. These are the basic professional knowledge necessary for medical practitioners or personnel engaged in pharmaceutical research, which is very important and even controls the gap between life and death. We shouldn't neglect every penny.
For a long time, Classic was a textbook for yohji yamamoto to study Chinese medicine, or as a required book, it was placed in a very important position. The positioning of drug properties and the description of its functional indications in the book are very accurate, and most of the pharmaceutical theories and compatibility rules stipulated in it are still important theoretical pillars of traditional Chinese medicine. For the clinic of modern Chinese medicine, the exposition of Benjing still has a very solid authority, and it has also become one of the necessary reference books for medical workers' desks.
Prescribe the dosage form of the medicine.
"Jing Xu" thinks: "The medicinal properties include pills, powder, boiled water, wine stains, ointment and decoction. Those who can't eat soup or wine must follow the medicinal properties and can't violate the rules." Here, on the one hand, it reflects the achievements of traditional Chinese medicine dosage forms before 2000, on the other hand, it also reflects the research experience of drug dosage forms and which dosage forms should be used, such as Xiaoshi "refining into ointment", Shuzuo as bait, Leonurus heterophylla "making bath soup" (external lotion), grape "making wine", Angelica dahurica "making face fat", and ox horn. This paper not only talks about the processing methods of drugs, but also shows that different drugs should adopt different dosage forms in specific applications in order to play their therapeutic role more effectively. It has great critical value to the phenomenon that Chinese medicine only uses soup as medicine.
Objectively evaluate the therapeutic effect of drugs.
The preface to Shen Nong's Materia Medica holds that "if you want to treat the disease, you should first examine its source, wait for its pathogenesis, the five internal organs are not deficient, the six hospitals are inexhaustible, the blood vessels are not chaotic, and the spirit is not scattered, so you must take medicine to treat it." If the disease has become, you can get half of the cure. The illness is over and life will be hard. "Here, first of all, warn people that illness must be treated early; Secondly, it is emphasized that whether the disease can be cured or not can not depend entirely on the role of drugs, mainly the body's defense function, the body's inherent ability to exorcise evil spirits, and the ability to recover from the disease under the intervention of drugs.
Attach importance to dialectical application of drugs
The preface to Shen Nong's Materia Medica puts forward that "treating cold with hot medicine, treating heat with cold medicine, eating without eating, spitting medicine, ghost poison, sore poison, rheumatism with rheumatism medicine, each according to its needs." This language not only highlights the main idea of syndrome differentiation and medication, but also suggests that under the premise of syndrome differentiation and medication, it is necessary to distinguish the nature (cold and heat) of the disease, the cause, the treatment for the disease (such as "diet is unnecessary" and "rheumatism"), the severity of the disease, and the medication according to the severity of the disease (such as "ghost-borne disease" and "poison-caused disease" are all serious and dangerous diseases). The former uses "sore medicine" and "rheumatism medicine", while the latter uses "poison". If we look at the efficacy and indications of 365 drugs in the book, we can also find that different drugs are given according to different diseases, such as internal medicine diseases, gynecological diseases, surgical diseases, facial diseases, skin diseases and so on. These contents fully reflect the idea of dialectical treatment.
Pay attention to the relationship between medication time and curative effect
The preface to Shennong's materia medica holds that: "those above the chest diaphragm should take medicine first;" If the disease is below the abdomen, take medicine before eating; If the veins of the limbs are sick, it is advisable to eat on an empty stomach; Those with bone marrow diseases should be full at night. " This shows that the author of this book has realized the close relationship between medication time and drug efficacy on the basis of summarizing the previous medication experience.
The Value of Practicing the Theory that Medicine has Yin and Yang
Neijing first put forward the theory that "medicine has yin and yang", and this classic put this theory into practice. The so-called "medicine has yin and yang" has a wide meaning. If yin and yang are only divided from plant medicine and mineral medicine, mineral medicine is heavy and dominant, and its attribute is yin, while plant medicine is light and clear, belonging to yang. As far as plant medicine is concerned, those who use its flowers, leaves and branches as medicine are mostly yang, while those who use its roots and stems are mostly yin. If the deep connotation of drugs is divided into yin and yang, then "Yang means qi, Yin means taste ... Yin means lower orifices and Yang means upper orifices. Thick taste is yin, thin taste is yin and yang. Thick gas is yang, and thin gas is yin of yang. Strong flavor is catharsis, while light flavor is catharsis. If the gas is thin, it will be vented, and if it is thick, it will be hot. " The smell is sweet, but the bitterness overflows into yin. For details, please refer to Su Wen's theory of Yin and Yang.
Drugs are sour, salty, sweet, bitter and pungent.
The original meaning of the so-called "medicine has five flavors: sour, salty, sweet, bitter and pungent" in the classic preface refers to the real taste of medicine that people can taste and its effect on human qi, blood, yin and yang. There are more than five real flavors of drugs. Influenced by the five-element classification theory of things, all the tastes of drugs have been classified into five flavors since ancient times, with astringency attached to acid and sweetness attached to sweetness, and classified according to the five elements of drugs.
The drug "has four qi of cold, heat and cold"
The drugs mentioned in this classic are "cold, hot, warm and cool". Four qi, that is, four natures, are cold, hot and cold of medicine or food. Compared with the five flavors that people can perceive in taste, four flavors belong to yang and five flavors belong to yin, which means that "Yang is qi and yin is taste" in Su Wen's theory of yin and yang should be like a big picture. The yin and yang properties of things can be divided, "there is yin in yang and yang in yin", so the cold, hot and cool properties of drugs can be further divided into yin and yang. Warm is yang, cool is yin. The heat is more than the temperature, and the cold is very Liang Yu, which is only the difference in degree. Warm drugs have different orders of magnitude such as temperature, temperature, heat and heat; Cold medicine has different orders of magnitude, such as cold, slight cold, cold and severe cold. If there is no obvious difference between cold, hot and cold in nature, then the nature is calibrated by "flat".
It is considered that the drug is "toxic and non-toxic, and should be considered as appropriate"
In the preface of Classic, "toxic and non-toxic, considering its suitability" means that we must be familiar with which drugs are toxic and which drugs are non-toxic when using drugs in clinic. Toxic drugs, the size and degree of toxicity, etc., and then consider using drugs according to the actual clinical situation.
It is believed that medicine has "seven emotions and harmony"
According to the classic preface, medicine is "single line, mutual need, mutual help, mutual fear, mutual evil, opposition and mutual killing." All seven emotions are combined with each other. "This is the source of' seven emotions and harmony' in the theory of drug compatibility, which refers to the special relationship in drug compatibility.