rasāyana: what the term means and how it is translated
rasāyana रसायन is an Ayurvedic technical term. It is rendered into English in 5 different ways, which is the reason this page exists: the renderings do not agree, and the difference between them changes what the term is taken to mean.
| Transliteration | rasāyana |
|---|---|
| Devanagari | रसायन |
| Also written | rasāyana-cikitsā, rasāyana-tantra, rasayan |
| Category, as gathered | chikitsa |
| Grouped here under | Examination and treatment |
| Classical citations | 4 |
| Citations checked | 2026-10-07 |
How it is translated, and whether the translation holds
Each rendering is given with the source that uses it. The assessment is ours.
Rejuvenative therapy
WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda (2022) · ITA-9.1.35: 'The procedures or medicines used to improve health and longevity.' IAST rasāyanam. Also ITA-9.8.1 rasāyana-cikitsā: '...revitalization therapy: One of the eight branches of Ayurveda which deals with rejuvenation and improving life quality, longevity and disease control.'; ITA-9.1.34 svasthasyorjaskaram 'Health-promoting: A medicine or regimen which boosts health in a healthy person; a feature of rejuvenative therapy.' · comparator-standard
WHO uses both 'rejuvenative' and 'revitalization'; the two-word English for ITA-9.8.1 was cut by page layout and the first word should be re-read before quoting.
Reproduced unaltered and attributed from the WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda, which is what that licence permits. It is deliberately absent from the downloadable dataset, which is offered under CC BY 4.0 and invites the modification a NoDerivs licence forbids.
The term Rasāyana comprises of two words I.e. Rasa and Ayana [...] Precisely stated as drug or food which has capacity to prevent ageing, improves longevity, provide immunity against the diseases, promote mental competence, increase vitality and luster of the body.
NIA Jaipur / WHO-APW draft terminology (2011) · nia.nic.in/pdf/TERMINOLOGIES.pdf, entry rasāyana (code printed beneath: RS0188) · comparator-draft
Etymological gloss plus functional list; a draft, not the 2022 WHO text.
Reproduced unaltered and attributed from the WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda, which is what that licence permits. It is deliberately absent from the downloadable dataset, which is offered under CC BY 4.0 and invites the modification a NoDerivs licence forbids.
'Rasayana (tonics)
Kaviratna, Charaka Samhita, Chikitsasthana Lesson I · archive.org BIUSante_47357 OCR, his aphorism number 5 (standard Chi. 1.1.4) · public-domain-translation
'tonics' is his gloss in parentheses; his introduction (not the text) also says 'Rasayanas are medicines that promote nourishment or growth'.
Elixirs (rasayana)
Bhishagratna, Sushruta Samhita vol. 4 Chikitsasthana ch. XXVII-XXX chapter titles (wisdomlib) · wisdomlib doc142939-142945 · public-domain-translation
'Elixir' carries alchemical connotations absent from the Sanskrit; also 'tonics' in body text.
rejuvenation; adaptogen; immunomodulator
Modern pharmacology literature (e.g. PMID 21390573) · peer-reviewed-usage · our paraphrase of the source, not its words
'Adaptogen' is a 20th-century Soviet pharmacological category retrofitted onto rasāyana.
The classical passages
Each citation gives its address so a reader can check it in a printed edition, our account of what the passage establishes, and the result of reading it against its source.
Charaka SamhitaChikitsasthana 1, pāda 1 (Abhayāmalakīya Rasāyana Pāda):Standard Ci. 1.1.4 (carakasamhitaonline, Trikamji numbering). Kaviratna prints '2-3' after the corresponding English ('The medicine is of two kinds. Some medicine has for its purpose the increase of the ojos of a healthy person. Some, again, has for its purpose the alleviation of disease by which one is affected. 2-3'); his '2-3' covers standard 3 (the synonyms of bheṣaja, which he prints unnumbered with a footnote) and standard 4. His '5' belongs to standard 5b, not to this verse. Both numbers recorded, no conversion applied. · checked against the source
bhēṣajaṁ dvividhaṁ ca tat | svasthasyōrjaskaraṁ kiñcit kiñcidārtasya rōganut
Medicine (bheṣaja) is twofold: some promotes vigour (ūrjaskara) in the healthy, some removes disease in the afflicted. This verse does not name rasāyana; the next verse (Ci. 1.1.5, svasthasyorjaskaraṁ yattu tadvṛṣyaṁ tadrasāyanam) is where the vigour-promoting kind is divided into vṛṣya and rasāyana.
Charaka SamhitaChikitsasthana Lesson I (Abhayamalakiya):Kaviratna's printed numbers 5 and 7-8 (printed after the passages, archive BIUSante_47357 leaves 1296-1297). Standard Ci. 1.1.5, second half (svasthasyorjaskaraṁ yattu tadvṛṣyaṁ tadrasāyanam ||5||) and Ci. 1.1.7-8 per carakasamhitaonline (Trikamji numbering). Kaviratna's '2-3' = standard 3-4 and his '4' = standard 5a; from his 6 onward his numbers coincide with the standard ones in this chapter. · checked against the source
That which increases the ojos of a healthy person is of two kinds viz., 'Vrishya' (aphrodisiacs), and 'Rasayana (tonics). 5 [...] From the administration of 'Rasayana' one obtains longevity of life, memory, apprehension, health, youth, brightness, complexion, excellence of voice, great strength of body and the senses, power of making speech true, bows (from others), and comeliness of features. These drugs (or preparations) are called 'Rasayana' because of their capacity to impart superior 'Rasa' and other 'dhatus' (or ingredients of the body). 7-8
Kaviratna's rendering of the definition and benefits of rasāyana; 'ojos' is his spelling of ojas.
Charaka SamhitaChikitsasthana 1.1:7-8 (carakasamhitaonline, Trikamji numbering); Kaviratna 7-8 · checked against the source
dīrghamāyuḥ smr̥tiṁ mēdhāmārōgyaṁ taruṇaṁ vayaḥ | prabhāvarṇasvaraudāryaṁ dēhēndriyabalaṁ param ||7|| vāksiddhiṁ praṇatiṁ kāntiṁ labhatē nā rasāyanāt | lābhōpāyō hi śastānāṁ rasādīnāṁ rasāyanam ||8||
The canonical definition (8b): rasāyana is the means of obtaining (lābhopāya) excellent rasa and the other dhātus. Verses 7-8a list what one obtains from rasāyana: long life, memory, intelligence, health, youthful age, lustre, complexion, voice, excellence, supreme strength of body and senses, effective speech (vāksiddhi), respect (praṇati) and radiance (kānti).
Sushruta SamhitaChikitsasthana XXVII (Sarvopaghāta-śamanīya rasāyana):Bhishagratna section 2 (he prints '1.' after the chapter opening sentence and '2.' immediately after the dyed-cloth sentence; the quoted sentence is the second of the two sentences he groups under 2) · checked against the source
A person whose system has not been (previously) cleansed (Sodhana) with the proper purifying remedies (emetics and purgatives) should not, in any case, have recourse to such tonics inasmuch as they would fail to produce the wished-for result, just as the application of a dye to a piece of dirty cloth will prove non-effective.
The śodhana-before-rasāyana rule and the dyed-cloth simile; Bhishagratna renders rasāyana here as 'tonics'.
The concept record for this term
A term entry answers what the word means. It does not answer whether the thing the word names is settled, and often it is not. That is what the concept record is for: it sets out the questions on which the sources disagree about this term, with each position attributed, and states what is not established.
Where this term does work in the theory
2 concept records name this term as one of their components. Each gloss is that record's own.
- Ojas and the Ayurvedic Account of Resistance to Disease as Rasayana
- The class of rejuvenative therapy prescribed to restore ojas. Sushruta assigns it specifically to visramsa and vyapat and withholds it from advanced kshaya, in the sentence quoted below. It is the practical intervention arm of the concept, and the arm where trials have been run, though the trials test formulations rather than the construct.
- Vyadhikshamatva: resistance to disease as Rasayana
- The therapeutic class aimed at augmenting ojas, bala and longevity; the intervention arm of the concept
Not to be confused with
- vājīkaraṇa
- The other branch of svasthasya ūrjaskara medicine (Chi. 1.1.4 and Kaviratna '5'); aphrodisiac/progeny-promoting, not rejuvenative.
- ācāra rasāyana
- Behavioural rasāyana (conduct-based), listed in NIA 2011 as a separate entry; not a drug.
- rasaśāstra / rasāyana as alchemy
- In later Sanskrit and in Hindi 'rasāyan' means chemistry/alchemy; NIA 2011 glosses rasajña as 'Expert in the subject of Iatrochemistry' immediately after rasāyana, showing the semantic neighbour.
- bṛṁhaṇa
- Nourishing therapy (one of six upakrama); rasāyana is defined by dhātu excellence and longevity, not bulk.
- adaptogen
- A pharmacological category defined by stress-response modulation; overlap is partial and asserted mainly by analogy.
Renderings that do not hold
- anti-aging therapy. Captures jarā-nāśana but drops memory, intelligence, complexion, voice and dhātu excellence in Chi. 1.1.7-8.
- elixir (Bhishagratna). Imports European alchemical 'elixir of life'; the Sanskrit is about the pathway (ayana) of rasa.
- immunity booster. Modern marketing gloss; vyādhikṣamatva is not in the definitional verses quoted here.
Open questions
Recorded rather than resolved. Each one is something this entry cannot currently settle.
- Kaviratna's chapter-opening passage calls rasāyana 'medicines that promote nourishment or growth' in his own introduction; confirm it is not being quoted as if it were the Samhita.
- Whether WHO ITA-1.4.9 rasāyanacikitsā (eight-branch list) wording differs from ITA-9.8.1; only the index line was read.
How to cite this entry
Age Ayurveda Nighantu, rasāyana
, https://nighantu.ageayurveda.com/lexicon/rasayana/, CC BY 4.0.
The whole lexicon is downloadable from the index.
Machine-readable source: Markdown.
Data exported 2026-10-08.
Educational reference only. A term entry explains what a word means and how it has been translated. Nothing here is advice, and nothing here describes how any condition should be treated.