Cleansing

(b) and (c) Cleansing the tongue and the gullet. With three fingers - fore, middle, and ring - operating together and inserted into the middle of the throat (i.e. gullet), slowly rub the base of the tongue and then wash out the phlegm impurity. After next cleaning the tongue with fresh butter, several times milk it (as it were), very gently pulling it with a metal instrument holding the tip

(d ) Cleansing the ears. The instruction here is very brief It says, 'With the first and ring fingers clean the two holes of the ears', and then mentions that when this is done regularly the internal sound will become clear. Quite often this is taken to mean that what are called the mystic internal sounds will be heard, but this is not justified, since the proper source of meditation in the heart centre such sounds is elsewhere described as meditation in the heart center.

(e) Cleansing the hole in the skull. Here it is the outside of the skull that is intended, for it says, with the thumb of the right hand rub (or massage) the hole of the forehead.' This hole is the depression between the forehead and the nose. It is quite usual for mothers to give this massage to their young children, and the practice is considered a help in keeping the nasal cavities clear. The method is also considered to be helpful in the development of clairvoyance or interior sight. It is added that it should be done every day on awakening, after meals and at the end of the day.

The third of the four kinds of cleansing is termed the 'heart-cleaning'. The term heart is, however, used in a very general -way, for the interior of the chest, including the base of the throat. This group of cleansing practices is described as three-fold (a) by a stick, (6) by ejecting (vamana), and (c) by a cloth. The second is sometimes described as vomiting, but is not so, and might be more accurately described as gargling.

(a) Cleansing by a stick. With a stalk of plantain (ram6ha), or of yellow sandal (or turmeric), or of cane (or reed), slowly moved down into the middle of the 'heart' and then slowly withdrawn, phlegm, bile, and other impurities are cleared out through the upper passage, that is, by the mouth.

(b) (cleansing. by gargling. After meals, drink water deep into the throat; then, after looking upwards for a short time, expel that water (through the mouth). There is no mention of shaking the water, or of bubbling air through it from the lungs, as is common in European or American gargling, but in practice it is often done with quite a good deal of vehemence and noise.

(c) Cleansing by a cloth. Slowly swallow a fine cloth of a width of four fingers (about three inches), and then draw it out again. This is credited with being a help in trouble Huh phlegm or bile, and in various skin diseases.

The fourth, and last, of the internal cleansings, the purification of the rectum (mula shodhana) is described as to be done with a stalk of the turmeric (or yellow sandal), or with the middle finger, made wet with plenty of water a number of times. This is declared to be a help against constipation and other digestive troubles.