Traditions of Esoteric Energy Systems

Many spiritual traditions, particularly those of the East, have attempted to create synthesized systems that incorporate aspects of biological fact and aspects of religious belief regarding “subtle” or “astral” bodies into a functional system of medicine and health. The most well known of these today is the Chinese tradition of acupuncture, qi, and energetic meridians. Also well known are the systems of chakras and pranas in Hindu Ayurvedic medicine. Both of these remarkably comprehensive and detailed systems predate what we would consider modern medicine, and both Eastern systems are still being used today. The basic, yet extremely important, distinction between Ayurveda and Chinese medicine and contemporary Western medicine is that the theoretical system of Western medicine does not include a component of energy in the human being beyond what is materially visible in the body and its electrochemical reactions.

Both Ayurveda and traditional Chinese medicine are based on the theoretical premise that there is an energy component of the human body that transcends, yet is intimately linked to, the physical body. In Ayurveda and Kundalini yoga the idea is that prana, (which can be though of literally as breath, but also metaphorically as life energy) flows through energy centers called chakras and nadis points or nadirs, and that health is based to a large degree on the proper flow of prana through the body (1). Yogic exercises are used to promote the healthy flow of prana. In Chinese medicine we also find the idea that there is a non-physical energy component of the human body, which they call qi, that can be regulated by acupuncture and exercises like martial arts and Qigong (2). Both of these traditions, whether in Tantric ritual texts or in Taoist scripture, teach that this spiritual energy (which may or may not be easily equated with literal internal and sexual fluids) must be conserved for the spiritual development and health of the individual (3).

Intriguingly, both of these spiritual medicine systems also focus on parts of the head — particularly the space between and slightly above the eyes, and the place at the top of the head — as focal points of these “subtle energies.” Modern anatomical science has located the mysterious pineal gland as being close to the center of the brain, making it the gland nearest in proximity to the top of the head (4). The pituitary gland is nearest to the location of what has been iconographically identified as the “third eye” in Hindu traditions (5). By investigating these physical and energetic locations described in religious texts as a basis of comparison we may analyze and compare these Eastern medicine systems with known facts about human neurobiology to see what connections may be found.

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