Tulsi (Ocimum sanctum): myths, Ayurvedic tradition and botany of holy basil

The plant of this articleTulsi - Holy Basil · Ocimum tenuiflorum (syn. Ocimum sanctum)★★★★★5.0(14)from €7.00View →

The plants that walk with the cycles, to live inside them fully.

The holy basil India prays to every morning before drinking it. In the courtyards of Hindu homes it grows on a small altar of earth or masonry, the tulsi vrindavana, and it is often the first presence greeted each day. Tradition reads its Sanskrit name, tulasī, as "the Incomparable". It is also called the Queen of Herbs, and Vrinda, after the woman it was born from.

Vrinda, the woman who became a plant

The Puranas tell her story in several ways. In the best-known version, from the Padma Purana and the Shiva Purana, Vrinda is the wife of the asura Jalandhara, and a devotee of Vishnu. As long as she stays faithful to her husband, Jalandhara cannot be defeated. So Vishnu takes on his appearance and comes to her; the spell broken, Jalandhara falls in battle.

When Vrinda discovers the trick, she curses Vishnu: let him become stone. He becomes the shaligram, the black stone his devotees still venerate, often a fossil ammonite gathered from the bed of the Gandaki river in Nepal. From her ashes the tulsi grows, and Vishnu promises that no worship of him will be complete without a tulsi leaf.

The Brahma Vaivarta Purana gives another version, and every region has its own. They all arrive at the same place: the plant and the goddess are one. The woman who walks around the tulsi in the morning is greeting Vrinda herself.

The courtyard altar

The tulsi vrindavana is a pot or a small square platform, in the middle of the inner courtyard or in front of the door. Every morning a woman of the house waters the plant, lights an oil lamp, recites a prayer, walks around it (parikrama, circumambulation) and touches a leaf to her forehead. This daily practice, the Tulsi Puja, holds prayer and everyday life together: it is one and the same gesture.

In the worship of Vishnu and Krishna, a tulsi leaf is laid on every offering of food, as the story promised. Vaishnava devotees wear beads carved from tulsi stems around their necks, and count their mantras on a rosary of the same wood, the tulsi mala.

Tulsi Vivaha, the plant's wedding

Every year, in the month of Kartik (October-November), India marries the tulsi. Between Prabodhini Ekadashi and the full moon of Kartik, the plant is dressed as a bride: a sari, bangles, vermilion. The groom is the shaligram, or an image of Krishna. The family celebrates the wedding as it would a daughter's, with songs and sweets, and the wedding season opens after it. Only a person can be wed: the feast says what tulsi is to those who pray to it.

What the texts say

The two great treatises of Ayurveda, the Charaka Samhita and the Sushruta Samhita, name the plant, often as surasa. Ayurveda places it among the rasayana, "the path of essence": plants taken every day, over time. In Tamil Nadu, Siddha medicine calls it thulasi.

Tulsi Tea strengthens faith, inspiration, compassion, and spiritual clarity.

The plant

Ocimum tenuiflorum, long named Ocimum sanctum, is a member of the Lamiaceae, cousin to kitchen basil, mint and rosemary. It has the square stem of its family, oval, lightly toothed and downy leaves, and small white or purplish flowers in spikes. Rubbed between the fingers, a leaf releases a warm, peppery scent with a note of clove. Native to the Indian subcontinent, it is grown throughout tropical Asia.

India distinguishes three:

Tulsi at the House

We offer two varieties, Rama Tulsi and Lemon Vana: two flavours, one sacred plant. They are dried leaves from India, from a certified organic supply chain and laboratory-tested.

• The tea: one to two teaspoons of dried leaves in water just off the boil, around 90 °C, five to ten minutes, then strain.
• The moment: any time of day, morning or evening. A cup is often enjoyed after a meal.
• The rhythm: one to two cups a day, in cycles of 7 to 21 days, with breaks between cycles.

The gesture of the Indian courtyard travels well: a leaf touched to the forehead before it goes into the cup. Rama and Lemon Vana also go well with a few rose petals, and ashwagandha simmered in the morning milk keeps company with tulsi sipped through the day. In a pot on a sunny balcony, tulsi grows happily in summer; it does not like frost.

For those who want the prayer in the first sip.

Precautions

• Pregnancy and trying to conceive: abstain (animal data at high doses).
• Breastfeeding: ask a health professional.
• Known allergy to basil or other Lamiaceae: avoid.
• Anticoagulants, diabetes medication, thyroid disorder or medication: medical advice first.
• Planned surgery: stop about two weeks before.

When in doubt, your doctor before the plant.

Sources

• Padma Purana and Shiva Purana: the story of Vrinda and Jalandhara.
• Brahma Vaivarta Purana: the story of Tulasi.
• Charaka Samhita and Sushruta Samhita.
• David Frawley and Vasant Lad, The Yoga of Herbs, Lotus Press, 1986.
• Frederick J. Simoons, Plants of Life, Plants of Death, University of Wisconsin Press, 1998.
• INFUSE product sheet: varieties, origin, certification, preparation and precautions.

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