Alchemy applied; Spagyric preparation of Ren Shen

[Guest guest]

In order to help you obtain a clear idea of what the 3 principles of

Salt, Sulphur and Mercury mean in the Vegetable kingdom, I have

posted the following example. Understand that the mercury priciple

is analogous to the extraction medium in the case of dry plant

material as the Sulphur is to the extracted phytochemicals. The

salt principle is extracted from the ashes of the plant material as

follows;

 

 

Let us take as an example Chinese ginseng, also known as Ren Shen,

 

When one is preparing to make a tincture with a chinese herb it very

helpfull to review existing litterature on that particular herb such

as phytochemicals in this particular plant. You can find this in

Bensky, In the case of renshen one fids references in chinese

medicinal wine and liquor books that mention using spirits or white

alcohol (50 to 70 % alcohol) in proportions varying from 1:3 to 1:10.

 

So in practice, this would mean putting 50 grams of renshen in 150 ml

of 65 % alcohol and leave it in a warm place for about 3 weeks to 3

months. This way you will get about 70 % of the good stuff from the

plant.

 

Or, of course, one could use a process of percolation.

 

So what about the rest ?

 

If you do not have a lab, here is how they would proceed in China.

Decant your tincture off the mark. Take the mark, add 150 ml of fresh

menstrum and go outside your home find a heat source and

simmer/decoct

until the the volume is reduced by half. Let it cool, add 75 ml of

60%

alcohol, stir and decant. Taste the mark; if there a strong taste,

repeat the procedure exept that after the second simmering, use the

luid you decanted at the end of the first. Just our you previously

prepared tincture or fluid extract to the decanted decoction, mix

well

and voila ! there is your tincture.

 

 

If you have a lab, take your mark and put it in a soxhlet. If it is

saturated with 60-70 % alcohol, that will represent about half the

volume of the extraction chamber for a standard (500 ml flask)

soxhlet.

Put about 200ml of water and 50 ml of glycerine in the flask and

reflux for a couple of hours.

 

Take the contents of the flask after a couple of hours. Evaporate in

balneum at 60 C. The alcohol and water will evaporate, leaving

ginseng

phytochemicals and glycerine. Just our you previously prepared

tincture or fluid extract on the ginseng phytochemicals and

glycerine,

mix well and voila ! there is you tincture.

 

There are many ways to practice spagyry and many traditions; western,

chinese, unani, ayurvedic etc. It is not an art you practice in a

kitchen. Most of the time, you need a lab.

 

The subject of calcining the marc (herbal residue after extraction)

appears to require some clarification. I will do this in the context

of our discussion about the ren shen tincture.

 

Let us pick up where we left our ren shen tincture. What

we finished with was one tincture, evaporated and collected

menstruum.

 

How will we make spagyric ren shen ?

 

First we take the marc and place it in a wide neck flask with a

helmet

( a cover that looks like a bell jar with a nose) connected to a

condenser. We then place the flask in a water bath and dry the mark,

carefully collecting the distillate/sublimate.

 

The marc is then placed in a crucible and calcined at about 700-800

degrees centigrade in a calcining oven. This will produce a white or

red ash.

 

While this is being done, we distill the previously collected liquids

to separate the alcoholic from the watery parts.

 

We take half of the watery part and pour it on the purified ash along

with other waters such as the water taken from the fresh plant,

thunderstorm water, dew or wine water from making wine spirits. The

total volume of water should be about ten times the volume of the

ash.

 

We then shake the jar with the ash and water and place it in an

incubator for a couple of days. After this , shake it up and filter.

The resulting liquid is a solution of water soluble salts, mostly

potassium carbonate, since it is done at low temperature. It is very

alkaline.

 

It should be noted here that an extraction in a soxhlet or boiling

water will extract the calcium carbonate along with the potassium

carbonate from the ash.

 

Then the liquid is evaporated and a crystalline substance

remains.This

is referred to by most as the salts. By different processes of

distillation and sublimation of our afore mentioned liquids and our

spagyric salts the extraction liquids are accuated and energized by

three methods; volatiliuzation of the salts, a process similar to

estirification and a potentization somewhat akin to homeopathy.

 

The menstrumm thus produced is used to extract as described before.

You will get a more powerfull product.

 

Now, what about this talk of adding alkaline salts back into a

tincture ?

 

Not always a good idea; as I have illustrated previously, some

phytochemicals will change if suddenly exposed to alkaline

environments. So unless you know exactly what will happen, save your

salts.

 

What about the non-water soluble part of the ash ?

 

Back in the oven at for oxidising. At very high temperature.

Why ? Well, the calcium carbonate will turn into calcium oxide that

can be used to make further medicines or to accuate the extraction

liquid. Other metallic oxides found in the ash can be collested,

circulated with olive oil to make a specific glycerine. or it can be

used in esterefication processes.

 

 

The previous post is an example of ONE spagyric technique. There are

thousands from many traditions. I have read examples of water soluble

salts extracted in chinese medical litterature. In tcm calcination is

used, from simple roasting to carbonization.

 

It is interesting to note that, for example, the chinese will roast

certain herbs in vinegar prior to decoction. In addition to changing

certain phytochemicals, the plant material will transfer some of the

acidity to the decoction water thus facilitating the extraction of

alkaloids,poorly soluble in ordinary water.

 

In tcm, cinnabar is used au naturel. In ayurveda, it is purified by

different triturations and calcinations. Some times it is separated

into mercury and suphur and reassembled. Similar thing with animal

products.

 

Sometimes it is best just to decoct. Luo Bou Ma comes to mind. It is

also important to remember that in the process of decoction in a

formula with many herbs, some phytochemicals become extraction agents

for others. How ever, if you taste the Huang Lian marc after

decoction, there is still plenty of bite left. Most of the alkaloids

are still there.

 

Now, what about existing " spagyric " products on the market ?

 

2 things;

 

1) Pouring raw ash into a tincture is not a good idea. Why ? I've

explained this previously.. also, if the calcination was a little off

there might be creosotes left in the ash. Nasty stuff if taken

internally.

 

2) Try them yourself first before dolling them out. If they work

better than non-spagyric, fine. If not... As we know, there are all

kinds of products on the market.

 

Another interesting aspect of spagyrics is the analytical protocols

to

determine the elemental (ie how much and what proportion of " earth " ,

" water " , " air " , " fire " ) there is in a medicinal plant.

 

 

Basically these protocols involve submitting the dried and fresh

plant

material to element specific extraction techniques (sublimation,

distillation, extraction, calcination, coagulation etc.) in

specialized apparatus with specialized menstuums. The techniques used

can be complex. I'll try and give you a few examples.

 

Let's take Bo He (mint). Let us steam distll it and oversimplefy.

What

people refer to as " essential oil " in the case of mint generally can

be called by certain schools " volatile Sulphur " . But to answer your

question, the essential oil is representative of the Air and Fire in

Bo He. The essential oil is further worked by sublimation and

circulation to separate it into Air and Fire.

 

Now that's Mint. It's worked that way because of it's classification

and it's signature.

 

Let's get exotic and talk about the aerial parts of luo bou ma

(Apocynum venetum, NOT to be confused with it's american

cousin). Different classification and signature. Different method.

Here is an outline.

 

First thing we need is 1 liter of thunderstorm water. It is charged

by lightning and contains amonium nitrate from the atmosphere along

with many other interesting things. Sublimation and distilling

apparatus will separate it into what comes over first; 250 ml of

fire-water . Then the next 250 ml to come over is the air-water, the

next water-water etc. The PH of these fractions will be different.

Indentical samples of luo bou ma. are extracted with each of these

fractions. Thus the preliminary elemental division pf Luo bou ma is

done. There are other ways to do it.

 

Thus a plants energetics can also be manipulated by creating a

medicine with varying proportions.

 

I think this will give you an idea on how spagyric analysis is

conducted.

 

Cheers,

 

Dr. G.