Lord Adisesha is a Serpent king with one-thousand hoods and Lord Vishnu is supposed to sleep on his coils.

Once he had a terrific stomach ache. He got prescriptions and Ayurvedic medicines from various top specialists in Ayurveda. Two years passed but there was no relief from his pain. He got disgusted with Ayurveda. As a result, he decided to collect all copies of all the main works like Ashtanga Hridayam, Charaka Samhita, Madhava Nidanam and make a bonfire of them.

He collected all the books in a heap. He was just bringing a match box to set fire to them all. At that time, Dhanvantari the Lord of all Doctors and medicines came over to Lord Sesha disguising himself as an old brahmin. He enquired into the reasons for setting fire to so many books. On hearing the reasons he promised to cure Adisesha of his pain through any of the medicines he has been taking.

He inserted a long rubber tube into the throat of Adisesha. Then he fixed a funnel to the outside end of the rubber tube. He took out the liquid medicines and poured them direct into the throat of Adisesha through the funnel and the tube. The medicine directly went to the stomach of Adisesha. Within half an hour Adisesha was miraculously cured of his stomach ache for good.

Adisesha was amazed. Dhanvantari told him: “The medical science and the medicines are perfectly allright but while applying them to the various circumstances one should learn to adopt suitable methods of administration. You have poisonous teeth being a serpent and all the medicines which were poured into the mouth were contaminated by the teeth and became poisonous and hence ineffective. Now that I poured the medicines directly into the throat through the rubber tube without being contaminated, the medicines worked immediately.”

Whether philosophy or science when it is put to practical application, it should be tailored to the needs of the environments and circumstances.

Source: Stories for inspiration by Swami Shantananda Puri