Ｓｔｏｒｙ ｏｆ ｔｈｅ Ｙｅｌｌｏｗ Ｒｉｖｅｒ ａｎｄ Ｃｈｉｎａ’ｓ Ａｃｕｐｕｎｃｔｕｒｅ

Ｂａｉ　Ｘｉｎｇｈｕａ　ＲＢ　Ｂａｒｏｎ

Looking down at the Earth from a celestial perspective, the waters of the Earth's rivers may be seen flowing through geographical channels, while a close inspection of the human body reveals the blood circulating through the body's blood vessels. It is not surprising to find that the two views are so similar.

The Chinese ancestors, more than any other ancient culture, drew a close comparison between Nature and Humanity. Through their observations of Heaven and Earth, they attained a deep and comprehensive understanding of Humanity, while also increasing their understanding of the universe through their study of human beings. Observing the systematic correspondence between natural phenomena and the functions of the human body, they came to believe that the body is a microcosm of the universe, similarly constituted and governed by the same laws. This gave rise to the central concept of Chinese holistic philosophy, "the Unity of Humanity and Heaven," which serves as the basis of the unique system of traditional Chinese medicine. The ancient practitioners of traditional Chinese medicine studied not only the human body, but astronomy and geography as well.

Acupuncture is a unique healing way that originated in ancient China and has spread throughout the modern world. The author of this article believes that this unique therapeutic system is an outgrowth of the ancient Chinese people's experience in dealing with the floods of the Yellow River. This enlightening and original concept, as expounded in this article, further confirms the value of Chinese holistic principles.

The Yellow River and Acupuncture:

The Yellow: The world's muddiest river One of the world's most flood-prone waterways Source of the earliest legendof flood control Acupuncture:A uniquely Chinese inventionFundamentally unchanged for over two thousand years Demonstrated to be effective by modern science The quality of a plant will vary when it is planted in different soils and climates. Similarly, the diverse outlooks and cultures of humanity are direct outgrowths of different geographical conditions. In contrast to today's global perspective, ancient peoples around the world developed a wide variety of traditional cultures due to the restraints of geography.

Since ancient times, the Yellow River has been a mixed blessing for the Chinese people. Like a golden dragon winding across China, the Yellow River nourishes thousands of square miles of fertile soil and is extolled as the cradle of Chinese civilization. In exchange for its benefits, however, the world's muddiest river extracts a heavy price. One of the most flood-prone rivers in the world, its severe and recurrent flooding has earned it the name of China's Sorrow. In response, the Chinese people have had no alternative but to develop ways to stop the river from overflowing its banks.

Actually, this necessity may have been a blessing in disguise. In their untiring fight against the flood, the Chinese ancestors became convinced that dredging or diverting water to flow naturally downward is superior to diking or other attempts to obstruct the water's passage. The success of the ancient Chinese people in the field of flood control heightened their confidence in their dealings with Nature. Most importantly, the lessons learned from the great rivers were extrapolated to social administration and the treatment of human disease.

Acupuncture, a uniquely Chinese system of healing based on clearing obstructions rather than erecting barriers, is a prime example of the application of the central principle of effective flood control to the problems of human beings.

Acupuncture treats diseases by the insertion of fine needles into the body. In July of 1971, Dr. Henry A. Kissinger made a secret trip to China to prepare for President Nixon's historical visit. Among his entourage was James Reston, a journalist from the New York Times. While in China, Reston suffered an attack of acute appendicitis and underwent an appendectomy at the Beijing Union Medical College, established by the Rockefeller Foundation of New York in 1916. During the second night after the operation, Reston started to experience considerable discomfort in his abdomen. With his approval, an acupuncturist at the hospital inserted and manipulated three long thin needles, one into the outer part of his right elbow and one below each knee. There was noticeable relaxation of the abdominal pressure and distension within an hour, with no recurrence of the problem thereafter. James Reston included a detailed description of his experiences with acupuncture in his dispatches from Beijing. This was the first such report to reach the English-speaking citizens of the United States, at least the vast majority who had no daily contact with Asians.

By contrast, acupuncture has been known and practiced in China for over 2300 years. Qin Yueren, the earliest recorded Chinese practitioner, is considered to be the founder of acupuncture. A biography of Qin Yueren is included in the Records of the Grand Historian (Shi Ji), the masterwork of the eminent Chinese historian Sima Qian (135 - ? BC). It is known that Qin Yueren lived around 407-310 BC, and was a contemporary of Hippocrates (c. 460-377 BC), the father of Western medicine.

Qin Yueren traveled widely throughout the feudal states that compromised China during his time, treating men and women, old and young alike. As a result, he was given the auspicious appellation Bian Que, which means Wayfaring Magpie - a bird that flies here and there dispensing good fortune. Several carved stones, unearthed from a tomb dating back to the Eastern Han Dynasty (25-220 AD), portray him with a human head and a bird's body.

On one occasion, while passing through the State of Guo (present-day Shan County in Henan Province), Bian Que learned that the Prince of Guo had died and his subjects were preparing to inter him. After careful examination, Bian Que believed that the prince had merely experienced a type of deep coma known as deathlike reversal. He successfully resuscitated the patient by needling an acupoint on the vertex of his head, and become known for bringing the dead back to life. This was the first recorded use of acupuncture in China.

Acupuncture is extraordinary. Needles have historically been among the most common tools of daily life, used for constructing garments all over the world. Just as needles are used to sew clothes, they are also utilized medically to suture incisions. While hollow syringes are used to inject fluids into the body or to draw them out, pricking the body with a solid acupuncture needle to treat illness seems quite incomprehensible. Most people prefer not to be punctured with needles, and associate needling with pain and injury. No wonder, to "needle" a person means to displease or to irritate in English. By trial and error, healers throughout the world have independently discovered similar treatments for pain and disease, including herbs, roots, wraps, rubs, blood-letting, massage, meditation, or surgery. But the invention of acupuncture is unique to China.

Why did the ancient Chinese begin to treat disease by puncturing the body with bare needles? A generally accepted answer to this question is that acupuncture evolved as a natural outgrowth of daily life in the Neolithic Age (c. 8000-3500 BC), through a process of fortuitous accident and repeated empirical experience. According to this theory, people noticed cases in which physical problems were relieved following an unrelated injury. This led to the discovery of the principle that injury to a certain part of the body can alleviate or even cure a pre-existing disease or disorder in a different part of the body. It is thought that with this discovery, Neolithic Chinese people eventually started to use stones, animal bones, or pieces of bamboo to deliberately induce injury to relieve physical problems. The traumatic nature of acupuncture, which seems quite crude by modern standards, as well as its long history in China, seem to lend credence to the theory of its prehistoric origins. However, if acupuncture did indeed arise from repeated empirical experience of accidental injury, it should have developed all over the world, rather than solely in China.