# vyāyāmaśakti (व्यायामशक्ति)

> Canonical version of this page: https://nighantu.ageayurveda.com/lexicon/vyayama-shakti/

An Ayurvedic technical term, rendered into English in 5 different ways.
The renderings do not agree, and the difference between them changes what the term is taken
to mean.

## Identification

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Transliteration | vyāyāmaśakti |
| Devanagari | व्यायामशक्ति |
| Also written | karmaśakti, vyayam shakti |
| Category, as gathered | prakriti |
| Grouped under | Regimen and constitution |
| Classical citations | 2 |
| Citations checked | 2026-10-08 |

## How it is translated, and whether the translation holds

Each rendering is given with the source that uses it. The assessment is ours.

### power of performing exercise

WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda (2022) · ITA-4.7.5 item 9 · standard

The only occurrence of the compound in the WHO standard; no headword of its own.

Reproduced unaltered and attributed from the WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda, which is what that
licence permits, and deliberately absent from the downloadable dataset, which is CC BY 4.0.

### Therapeutic exercise

WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda (2022) · ITA-9.1.51 (vyāyāmaḥ) · standard

'The process of making the person take exercise as a therapeutic measure.'

Reproduced unaltered and attributed from the WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda, which is what that
licence permits, and deliberately absent from the downloadable dataset, which is CC BY 4.0.

### Sweating induced by exercise

WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda (2022) · ITA-9.2.58 (vyāyāmaḥ) · standard

A second vyāyāmaḥ headword, a svedana modality. WHO carries vyāyāma twice as a treatment and never once as a faculty.

Reproduced unaltered and attributed from the WHO International Standard Terminologies on Ayurveda, which is what that
licence permits, and deliberately absent from the downloadable dataset, which is CC BY 4.0.

### capacity for exertion

Charaka Samhita, tr. Kaviratna (1896-1913) · Vimanasthana 8 · translation

Kaviratna deliberately avoids 'exercise'; his footnote elsewhere in the Vimanasthana notes that vyāyāma there 'means exertion or motion, and not physical' exercise.

### exercise tolerance / exercise capacity

Indian Ayurvedic college usage · textbook · our paraphrase of the source, not its words

Fits Vi 8/121's criteria better than most such borrowings, but implies standardised testing the classical procedure does not have.

## The classical passages

### Charaka Samhita Vimanasthana 8:121, checked against the source

> vyāyāmaśaktitaścēti vyāyāmaśaktirapi karmaśaktyā parīkṣyā| karmaśaktyā hyanumīyatē balatraividhyam||121||

Sanskrit mūla · https://www.carakasamhitaonline.com/index.php/Rogabhishagjitiya_Vimana

The whole term: vyāyāmaśakti is examined BY karmaśakti, and from karmaśakti the threefold division of strength is inferred. Note the verb anumīyatē, this is explicitly an inference, not a direct observation of bala.

### Charaka Samhita Vimanasthana 8:121, checked against the source

> Next, as to examination (of the patient) in respect of capacity for exertion : capacity for exertion should be ascertained from capacity for action (such as capacity for bearing weights, the length of time for which one can undergo physical labour, &c.,) ; since by capacity for action the strength, which is of three kinds, of a person is capable of being judged.

tr. Kaviraj Avinash Chandra Kaviratna · https://archive.org/download/BIUSante_47357/BIUSante_47357_djvu.txt

Public-domain English for Vi 8/121, and the source of the two concrete criteria usually quoted: weight borne and duration of labour sustained. Kaviratna's footnote adds that the three kinds of strength here are superior, middling and inferior, following Gangadhara.

## Not to be confused with

- **karmaśakti.** Vi 8/121 makes karmaśakti the MEANS by which vyāyāmaśakti is assessed. Not synonyms: one is the observable, the other the inferred capacity.
- **bala.** Vi 8/121 says bala is inferred FROM karmaśakti; vyāyāmaśakti is an indicator of bala.
- **vyāyāma (the practice).** WHO's only vyāyāma headwords are the therapeutic procedure. The dinacaryā rule to exercise to half one's capacity concerns the practice; Vi 8/121 the capacity.
- **ardhaśakti.** The half-capacity rule presupposes vyāyāmaśakti as its denominator but is a prescription, not an assessment.
- **āhāraśakti.** The adjacent item; both śaktis assessed for the same purpose, but one is intake-and-digestion and the other output.

## Renderings that do not hold

- exercise. Drops śakti. The examination item is the capacity, not the activity; WHO's own vyāyāma entries are all the activity and none is this item.
- physical fitness. A population-normed modern construct with standard tests. Vi 8/121's criteria are relative and clinical.
- stamina. Covers only the duration limb and drops the load limb.
- strength. That is bala, which Vi 8/121 says is INFERRED from this. Collapsing the two removes the inference the verse describes.

## Open questions

Recorded rather than resolved.

- Has anyone mapped vyāyāmaśakti onto a standard exercise-tolerance measure? Nothing found.
- Does Kaviratna's note that vyāyāma can mean motion generally rather than physical exercise bear on Vi 8/121?

## Citation

Age Ayurveda Nighantu, "vyāyāmaśakti", https://nighantu.ageayurveda.com/lexicon/vyayama-shakti/, CC BY 4.0.
Whole lexicon: https://nighantu.ageayurveda.com/lexicon.json and https://nighantu.ageayurveda.com/lexicon.csv.

Educational reference only. A term entry explains what a word means and how it has been
translated. Nothing here is advice.