प्राचीन भारत में शिक्षा (डॉ. ए.एस. अल्तेकर - गुरुकुल एवं बौद्ध विहार शिक्षण इतिहास)

290 EDUCATION IN ANCIENT INDIA [App. the great hold which religion possesses over the Hindu mind, it is natural to expect some rituals in useful and professional education also. We proceed to describe some of them in sections E to G. All Castes eligible : Upanayana or Initiation was primarily intended for Vedic education, but very soon its principle was extended to useful education also. Early writers on Āyurveda, like Charaka and Suśruta, lay down a special Upanayana ceremony for students seeking admission to the medical course. The medical profession was not like the Vedic scholarship an exclusive monopoly, in theory or practice, of any particular caste ; so Suśruta holds that a Kshatriya or a Vaishya physician also can play the role of the teacher for boys of his own caste.¹ It is quite probable that even Brahmana boys may have been initiated by non-Brahmana medical teachers, though our texts do not attest to this practice. The surgical school of Suśruta was in favour of the admission of even Shudra boys, though formal Upanayana with the recitation of the Mantras was prohibited in their case.² It is quite probable that Kshatriya and Shudra surgeons may have been, by tradition and environment, better adepts in the use of the knife than their Brahmana and Vaishya compeers.³ Survey of the Ritual : Ayurvedic Upanayana was a short ritual modelled largely upon the Vedic proto-

1. Sūtra-sthāna, II, 5.
2. Ibid.
3. Such minor surgical operations as were performed before the introduction of the modern surgery were usually attempted by barbers both in India and Europe.