Healing, Magic and the Medicine Buddha:
The Bhaiṣajyaguru Cult and Esoteric Medicine in China
Lee A. Weiss
Topics In Chinese Religion and Philosophy
Dr.Marcus Bingenheimer
4/27/17
Introduction
From the earliest Mahāyāna sources to contemporary healing practice,
Bhaiṣajyaguru, the Medicine Buddha, appears-perhaps unsurprisingly- as the
embodiment of the healing and salvific capacity of the Buddhist faith. Even before
becoming a Buddha in his own right, the Bodhisattva(s) Medicine King feature
prominently in central chapters of the Lotus Sūtra, and in other texts which celebrate his
Medical, and magical, potency.
How and why did this figure attain the level of prominence in Chinese Buddhism
it has? Often being depicted in a triad with Śākyamuni and Amitābha, and a ubiquitous
component of healing rituals. What makes this mystical figure a King of ‘Medicine’?
And in the face of a ritual tradition closely tied to the development of Tantric Buddhism,
one that features more spells and pujas than it does drugs and surgery, what is medicine
or health in a Buddhist context?
This paper has two main trajectories, the first is to examine the development
of the Bhaiṣajyaguru, from an influential Bodhisattva, to a Buddha associated with
longevity and health, and finally to the chief of seven major Buddhas, increasing in
influence and popularity from there.
The second is an analysis of the interrelation of magic and medicine in
Buddhist discourse, particularly as it relates to the development of tantra. In
analyzing Buddhist approaches to healing, as embodied in the Bhaiṣajyaguru corpus,
I endeavor to display not only the nature of ‘Healing’ in Buddhism but also the deep
interrelation of Medicine, Magic and esotericism evidenced in the textual tradition
of Bhaiṣajyaguru. Raoul Birnbaum, an authority on the Chinese Bhaiṣajyaguru cult
and Buddhist healing, as well as translator of most of the lesser-known sutras cited
in this essay, opines that “The Rhetoric of healing pervades Buddhism.”1 Beyond this
pervasion I hope to demonstrate that magical practice and medical theory are
intimately woven together in the Buddhist approach to healing. That, within the
term Medicine and Healing lies a telling holism that unifies Buddhist doctrine and
esoteric practice with, then contemporary, theories of medicine and healing,
demonstrating the deep interrelation of healing and magic in Chinese Buddhist
thought.
Terminological Considerations: Magic and Healing
One issue I approach in this paper, the ‘meaning’ of Medicine in a Buddhist
context, and the imagined division of ‘physical’ and ‘spiritual’ medicine, requires
introduction and clarification. Additionally, new categories for old ways of thinking
create problems for intricate analysis, ‘magic’, ‘occultism’ and ‘esotericism’ have
developed in reaction to western traditions, and the distinctions they imply often
fail to capture the integration of ‘magic’ and ‘occult’ technologies in Chinese thought
and society.
Buddhist Medicine is a difficult category to pin down. The tradition grew up
alongside the development of medical practices, and as we will see internalized
1
Sullivan, Lawrence Eugene, J. Barzelatto, and Raoul Birnbaum. "Chinese Buddhist
Traditions of Healing and the Life Cycle." Healing and Restoring: Health and Medicine
in the World's Religious Traditions. New York: Macmillan, 1989. 53
medical doctrines in its earliest texts and facilitated the transmission of Āyurvedic
theory to China. 2However, the medical traditions of both India and China existed
largely independent of Buddhist concerns, this distinction is also evident in the
Buddhas exhortation to his followers not to become doctors for fear of distraction
from Dharma, while preaching they learn medicine to treat each other. 3
Additionally, Buddhist medical or healing practice in China was not differentiated
(by the Buddhist practitioners) from what is now known as Traditional Chinese
Medicine, and Buddhist medical practitioners would employ techniques from both
canons.
Accepting that ‘magic’ and ‘occultism’ are both vague terms, I think it is
necessary to observe the holistic tendencies of Chinese Medicine. Often ‘Traditional
Chinese Medicine’ is understood through the proliferation of Herbal medicine and
certain physical techniques, pressure point massage and acupuncture specifically.
However this is only a partial vision, one that coheres with a western conception of
medical treatment, but not with the historical Chinese conception or the Buddhist
conception treated here.
While ‘medicine’ is often assumed to refer to observable, physical and chemical
practices, diagnostic and preventionary techniques in China involved astrological
and other divinatory practices, in addition to simple visual diagnoses. The medical
practitioner would apply those skills he had mastered, be they pharmacology or
surgery or divination, and ostensibly outsource or disregard the others.
2
Vijaya J. Deshpande. "Buddhism as a Vehicle for Medical Contacts Between India and
China."Annals of the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute 89 (2008): 41-58. Print.
3 Ibid, 43
So, it is not accurate to say Chinese Medicine developed wholly independent of
Buddhist influence, as it was the Buddhist who introduced many of the most
influential manuals on surgery from India to Chinese doctors, however,
simultaneously, neither Ayurveda or Chinese medicine are theoretically reliant on
Buddhist principles. Even the distinction I have drawn, of physical and spiritual
medicine, invites a false equivalency, as the Medicine being practiced by nonBuddhists still engaged with many of the same occult theoretics as Buddhist
practices, employing divination, spells, and other magico-spritual elements. In fact,
divination and other ‘mantic’ arts extend across wide swathes of Chinese culture;
divinatory methods were engaged at birth and death, during coronations and wars.
4Therefore
the division I wish to observe is not in terms of methodology, physical
surgery and drugs versus spiritual prayer and ritual, but a concern with the physical
body and wellbeing compared with the spiritual self within the Buddhist world. The
difference being, Buddhist Medicine does not stop when the patient is cured, or
when the patient is dead. While many of the rituals and incantations these sutras
prescribe mention only the physical ailment, they all link back to the figure of the
Buddha, and the texts all betray the primary concern as enlightenment, with healing
and alleviation of physical illness a means to an end: more effective Buddhist
practice. The difference then, is one of framing, while a Doctor may use magic and
ritual to cure an illness; if his ultimate goal is not salvific he is treating only that
4
Unschuld, Paul U., and Zheng JInsheng. "Manuscripts as Sources in the History of
Chinese Medicine." Trans. Mitch Cohen. Medieval Chinese Medicine: The Dunhuang
Medical Manuscripts. By Vivienne Lo and Christopher Cullen. New York:
RoutledgeCurzon, 2005. 19-44. 157
wound, only that imbalance within the body. The religious practitioner or monk
doctor, be he Buddhist or Daoist, may be employed to treat a particular wound or
ailment, but his approach is utterly holistic, embracing both conventional medical
theory and a salvific cosmic concern for the individuals ultimate fate.
This may be a superficial distinction, but I think it is still a necessary one,
especially in examining the Buddhist understanding and metaphorical (as well as
literal) employment of ‘Healing’ and ‘Medicine’. As we will establish the Ultimate
Doctor is the Buddha, be he Śākyamuni or Bhaiṣajyaguru, the ultimate medicine
Buddhism, and at the root of all illness, from a broken bone to leprosy to being a
woman, is Samsara.
To properly understand what Healing and Illness mean and connote in the
Buddhist sense it is important to remember the intricate karmic web Buddhists believe in.
Disease does not arise wholly from imbalance of bodily humors (though this is how it
manifests within the body) it arises in accordance with prior deeds and acts. Illness
manifests in the body through the vehicle of bodily mechanics, the humors and
imbalances, but it is ultimately caused by karmic laws of reciprocity and cyclical
existence.
Birnbaum outlines three principle types of healing in the Pāli canon.”(1) The cure
of diseases through healing agents (herbs and food), surgery and other physical means;
(2) spiritual causes and curses of diseases; and (3) the healing process as a metaphor for
spiritual growth, with the Buddha named as Supreme Physician and the Buddhist
teachings termed the King of Medicines.”5
5
Birnbaum, Raoul. The Healing Buddha. Boston, MA: Shambhala, 1989, 3
The Textual Development Bhaiṣajyaguru: From the Lotus Sūtra to Buddhahood
Bhaiṣajyaguru’s most famous appearance is perhaps the Lotus Sūtra, modern
dating conventions have proved however that while the earliest sections of the
Lotus were composed at roughly the same time period as the other sutras which
feature Bhaiṣajyaguru as a bodhisattva, the sections of the Lotus which feature him
prominently wouldn’t have been added until after the 1st century CE, closer to the
time of the presumed composition of the Bhaiṣajyaguru Sūtra, which sees his
ascension to Buddha status. This two hundred year time span coincides with the
early growth of what would become Mahāyāna and it seems the earliest
Bhaiṣajyaguru texts were composed at this time. The Bhaiṣajyaguru Sūtra for instance
is conservatively dated to the hundred-year timespan during which the additions
Lotus were being composed, and the Sūtra on the Contemplation of the Two
Bodhisattvas, which will be discussed below.
Unfortunately, with little beyond these loose textual timelines to guide us, it is
difficult to determine the early Indian development of Bhaiṣajyaguru worship and
rituals. Given the large role he plays in the later chapters of the Lotus, a role which
we will see mirrors his later esoteric significance, it seems safe to assume that
Bhaiṣajyaguru was somewhat influential in these early years, leading up to the
composition of the initial text of the Lotus Sūtra, and that (as Birnbaum posits) his
surviving textual corpus likely emerged from the worship of an earlier Buddhist
‘king’ of healing. 6
Though it seems likely that most of the Bhaiṣajyaguru content was added to the
Lotus Sūtra toward the end of its composition, it’s importance in the spread of the
Bhaiṣajyaguru cult and corpus of rituals cannot be understated. The text is of seminal
importance in the spread of Mahāyāna Buddhism across east and central Asia, and its
translation into Chinese precedes the translation of the major Bhaiṣajyaguru related sutras
discussed in this essay.
Birnbaum observes, in the textual development of Bhaiṣajyaguru within the Lotus
sūtra, that as the later references to Bhaiṣajyaguru are added, the references “…amplify
rather than transform the conception…” of Bhaiṣajyaguru as King of Medicine.7 While he
is being used in the same symbolic way, I disagree with Birnbaum’s contention that
nothing of Bhaiṣajyaguru is transformed in later chapters. Whereas Bhaiṣajyaguru is used
only as a symbolic description of the efficacy of the text itself in the early chapters, being
employed in promotion of the cult of the book, the worship of the Lotus Sūtra itself, he is
depicted in a more independent and familiar light later on. His past lives allow for the
development of cultic rituals, and his role in the dhāranī chapter belies his esoteric and
proto-tantric significance. In the earliest contributions to the text, he has little more role
than any other aptly named Bodhisattva, by the end he is symbolically tied to the text, as
an analogue to the sūtra itself, and to its influential 26th chapter, the esoteric dhāranī
chapter.
6
Birnbaum, Raoul. The Healing Buddha, 30
7
ibid, 35
Bhaiṣajyaguru appears in the audience of the first chapter where he is used only as
a symbol, a foil for the Buddha, he represents the efficacious power of the Dharma. In the
tenth the relationship the text seems to draw is that the Lotus Sūtra itself can be compared
to the Bhaiṣajyaguru, it is the unparalleled medicine. “Should one wish quickly to attain
every kind of wisdom, he must receive and keep this sūtra and honor those who keep it.”8
This would also seem to reference earlier uses of Bhaiṣajyaguru to identify both the
Buddha and the Dharma in pre-Mahāyāna Buddhism.9
Bhaiṣajyaguru appears again in Chapter 13, Exhortation to Hold Firm, in a similar
role. He and the bodhisattva Great Eloquence, having been ‘convinced’ of the supremacy
of the sūtra, exhort the faithful to propagate the sūtra itself as a holy act.
World-honored One! We also vow to publish abroad
this sūtra in other lands… Because in this Saha realm men
abound in wickedness, cherish the utmost arrogance, and are
of shallow virtue…10
The Lotus Sūtra fittingly extolled through Great Eloquence and Medicine King,
again two qualities being directly applied to the text through the Sūtra’s symbolic use of
interlocutors. In these early appearances Bhaiṣajyaguru is being employed to promote the
Cult of the Book, and present the Sūtra as the ultimate medicine.
In chapter 23 the past lives of Bhaiṣajyaguru are recounted, laying the
groundwork for his mythology and some of the later rituals associated with his worship.
8
Kato, Bunno, Yoshiro Tamura, Kojiro Miyasaka, William Edward Soothill, Wilhelm
Schiffer, and Del Campana Pier P. The Threefold Lotus Sutra: Innumerable Meanings,
the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Law, and Meditation on the Bodhisattva Universal
Virtue. Tokyo: KoÌsei Pub., 2007.188
9 Birnbaum, the healing Buddha, 3-17.
10 Bunno, 216
While this chapter still embraces and promotes the Cult of the Book, and Bhaiṣajyaguru’s
equation with it, it also provides him with an independent backstory (somewhat unique,
compared to Great Eloquence or Constellation King Flower) from which, most
infamously, rituals centered around self-mutilation and immolation emerged.11 12Some of
the more cosmic dimensions of ‘healing’ are introduced to his character as well. Any
women who so much as hear and recall the stories of Bhaiṣajyaguru’s past lives will not
be required another such unfortunate rebirth, assuring them the ability to attain nirvana at
a later point.13 This focus on ‘hearing’ and ‘recalling’ names and stories, which forms a
central part of the worship of the Lotus Sūtra the middle chapters, especially the tenth,
establish is also of central importance the Healing capacity of Bhaiṣajyaguru in his own
sūtra.
As important for the later development of the cult, and oft referenced in this
paper, is the Dhāranī chapter, in which Bhaiṣajyaguru is the central figure, receiving, and
thus relating to the reader, a series of dhāranī, or as we will see below, mantric spells.
Dharani are a central feature, not only of esoteric Buddhism, but also of medical practice
in Chinese Buddhism14. As such dhāranī feature heavily in the esoteric-medical rites of
Bhaiṣajyaguru, and each text reviewed for this essay contained both new dhāranī for
various needs, and elaborations of older dhāranī.
ibid, 308
Birnbaum, Chinese Buddhist Traditions of Healing.
13 Bunno, 309
14 Unschuld, Paul U., and Zheng JInsheng. "Manuscripts as Sources in the History of
Chinese Medicine." Trans. Mitch Cohen. Medieval Chinese Medicine: The Dunhuang
Medical Manuscripts. By Vivienne Lo and Christopher Cullen. New York:
RoutledgeCurzon, 2005.
11
12
The importance of the Lotus sūtra in the development of the Bhaiṣajyaguru cult is
evident; in it we find the earliest association of Bhaiṣajyaguru with dhāranī, the cult of
the book, and cosmic Buddhahood, central elements of his ritual corpus. Below we will
examine other sutras in the tradition, each of which builds on, and adds to, the incipient
Bhaiṣajyaguru worship hinted at in the Lotus sūtra.
Of additional and particular importance, and the oldest surviving sūtra to focus
specifically on Bhaiṣajyaguru is the Sūtra on the Contemplation of the Two Bodhisattvas,
King of Healing and Supreme Healer, in which two bodhisattva healers, King of Healing,
Bhaiṣajya-Raja and Supreme Healer, Bhaiṣajya-Samudgata appear. “They are mentioned
in a number of Mahāyāna texts, which were composed ca. the first century B.C.E through
the first century C.E.”15 Although Birnbaum also posits that the King of Healing had
providence as an earlier single deity, and certainly he is seen alone in the earlier Lotus
Sutra. (Though the chapters in which he features most prominently in the Lotus are
tentatively dated to the same time period as this Sutras composition) Prior to this
Bhaiṣajya-Raja is used to identify the Ultimate Medicine16 as we have said, an analogy
for the Dharma, which is portrayed as a perfectly efficacious medicine, which needs only
to be looked upon to cure one of all diseases instantly. The alternate names provided for
the Sūtra, in the Sūtra itself, equally telling, “Eliminating all Faults and Fetters” and
“Sublime Medicine, the Sweet Dew Which Cures Afflictions and Diseases.”17
Thus, Birnbaum concludes that Bhaiṣajya-Raja preceded Bhaiṣajya-Samudgata, he
goes on to observe that the brothers appear in a large variety of Sutras (as recorded in the
Birnbaum, The Healing Buddha. 24.
ibid
17 ibid, 46
15
16
Taishō canon), and that they appear more frequently in esoteric sutras, the bulk of which
are produced after non-esoteric Sutras such as the Lotus.18
It represents another significant contribution to the corpus in the form of
visualization practices, it is the reliance on Visualization, in addition to dhāranī and
complex, deity based, ritual, which distinguishes the Medical practices of Bhaiṣajyaguru
as esoteric. This is one of the earliest texts to employ visualization in the Mahāyāna
canon to be translated into Chinese. Visualization is an esoteric practice in which one
envisions, and thus embodies a particular cosmic deity, in the Bhaiṣajyaguru canon these
techniques, originating here and elaborated on in the proto-tantric Bhaiṣajyaguru-sūtra,
are used to promote healing and longevity.19 Each brother has his own rituals of
visualization, the practitioner contemplates aspects of their divine nature, imagining the
cosmic nature of the particular bodhisattva. “Then each pore of the Bodhisattva King of
Healing will emit rays like ten million mani gems which illumine all wayfarers. When
wayfarers see this they will gain purification…”20 The esoteric implications of these
mental rites will be discussed in more detail below.
Of course the most influential text for the Bhaiṣajyaguru cult itself is the
Bhaiṣajyaguru-Sūtra. The Bhaiṣajyaguru-Sūtra is unique in that it is building atop the
textual traditions seen in the lotus and brothers sutras. As an elaboration of these texts a
number of parallels are evident that we can use to track the development of the
Bhaiṣajyaguru cult. The belief in the salvific powers of recalling, reciting or copying the
text is seen, associated directly with Bhaiṣajyaguru, in the Lotus Sūtra and the cult of the
ibid,25
ibid,125
20 ibid,126
18
19
Book. The past lives of Bhaiṣajyaguru are revisited, and the occult role of dhāranī are
expanded. There are also newer, more visibly esoteric elements that brand the text as
proto-tantric. In addition to the dhāranī, complex rituals, and particularly visualization
practices are seen again, expanded from their roles in the Sūtra on the Contemplation of
the Two Bodhisattvas, and significantly the focus is shifted to the titular cosmic Buddha
as the object of worship: Bhaiṣajyaguru is now a full-fledged Buddha.
The key to the sūtra ’s efficacy lies in the complete absence
of doubt on the part of the practitioner. If he is utterly sincere he
is in a de facto state of Samadhi- the very state of the Buddhas
and Bodhisattvas. His mind is then the mind of the Buddhas-their
merits and virtues and become his own. How then can disease or
calamity defend him? 21
The Bhaiṣajyaguru-Sūtra contains four distinct sections, the first chronicling his
twelve bodhisattva vows, the second the blessings of healing one attains by
contemplation, recollection and veneration of the Bhaiṣajyaguru-Sūtra, the third a series
of complex rituals, and the fourth a list of the twelve Yaksa generals who serve as his
messengers and defenders of the sacred.
The rituals introduced are more complex than in previous Bhaiṣajyaguru
literature, making reference to his past lives and healing prowess, and requiring energy
and various component materials. The rituals, though they all deal with healing and
promoting live and enlightenment, are prescribed for various ailments, one is to protect
21
Thanh, Minh, and P. D. Leigh. Sutra of the Medicine Buddha Kinh Du'o'c Su'. Taipei:
Corporate Body of the Buddha Educational Foundation, 2001. 25
against untimely death, another for karmic infractions, and one particularly involved
ritual to bring health back to a sick or dying person.
…if you desire to deliver a sick person from the pain of disease,
for the sake of this person you should accept and hold to the
eightfold vows for seven days and nights… you should worship
with a pūja offering that Lord Master of Healing, the Lapis Lazuli
Radiance Tathāgata… read and recite this sūtra forty nine times.
Light the forty nine lamps and make seven images of the form of
that Tathāgata. In front of each image arrange seven lamps…and
for forty nine days let their shining light ceaselessly burn...22
The Bhaiṣajyaguru-Sūtra is not just a book of spells, however, and the currents of
popular medicine, and the efficacy of that medicine, is made explicit in the text. After the
chapter describing the various rituals, and before discussing the vows of the twelve
generals, “There follows a list of nine afflictions for which ‘The Skillful means of spells
and drugs’ may be used” 23
The oldest surviving translation of the Bhaiṣajyaguru-Sūtra is part of a significant
esoteric/proto-tantric anthology, The Consecration Sūtra, which is a Buddhist book of
spells. It forms the final chapter of this anthology of esoteric writings, dealing with
exorcism, propitiation, funeral rituals, and salvation.24 .The consecration sūtra is one of a
number of dhāranī sutras compiled between the 4th and 6th centuries25, and the
Birnbaum, The Healing Buddha. 162
Robert E. Chinese Buddhist Apocrypha. Delhi-India: SRI Satguru
Publications, 1992. 83
24 ibid. 83
25 ibid. 72
22
23Buswell,
Bhaiṣajyaguru-Sūtra sutras inclusion not only allows us to date it, and it’s influence in
China, more accurately, it also places it at the forefront of the import of early esoteric
practice in Buddhism.
The Consecration sūtra is especially significant for understanding the subtle
connections between healing and tantric magic, prescribing various efficacious spells and
talismans against demonic possession and promoting the path to Nirvana. Understanding
these connections, between spirit possessions, spells, incantations and the ‘Healing’ of
illness is also critical to fully understanding the meaning of Medicine and Healing in the
context of the Medicine Buddha, and the Greater Buddhist world in general.26 The typical
elements of tantric ritual, including Mudras, Mantras and deity visualization (what will
become Deity Yoga as tantra develops) are all dealt with in the Consecration Sūtra, and
in their protective element the healing potential for them is made clear; mudras which
prevent demons of sickness from entering into a home27, talismans to ward off illness and
preform exorcisms, and even rituals to summon beneficial spirits28 29 all precede the
rituals and visualizations of the Bhaiṣajyaguru-Sūtra.
Medicine, Healing, and Magic in Buddhism
Medicine is perhaps best understood as a series of techniques, theories and
practices for healing and promoting health. As we pointed out above it is clear that
26
Strickmann, Michel, and Bernard Faure. Chinese Magical Medicine. Stanford, Calif:
Stanford U, 2005. 113-19
ibid, 135
ibid, 149
29 Unschuld, Medieval Chinese Medicine: The Dunhuang Medical Manuscripts
27
28
even techniques we now see as magical, such as divination and talismanic practices,
were a part of the medical theory of China. While this was not a unified theory, in
that Daoist, Buddhist and non-aligned doctors would apply techniques from their
own corpus, and from the mainstream medical knowledge developed over centuries.
By the time Buddhism enters China, as we have pointed out, the Chinese had already
developed an extensive medical theory. Chinese Buddhist healing practice was built
alongside this, not in reaction or opposition to it, and Buddhist healing practices
were understood to cohere with the conventional medical knowledge of the time. In
the same way that an herbalist would have a unique knowledge of materia medica
for the concoction of medicines, or an astrologer would have unique
diagnostic/divinatory capabilities, Buddhists had a similarly unique skillset, theirs
spiritual and textual. When an illness required diagnoses various mantic or
divinatory rituals, astrological, geomantic, or otherwise, would be preformed to
determine the illness, these methods were used in tandem with pulse and urine
analysis based on need or availability. In the same way one would go to a geomantic
or herbal specialist for a certain purpose they may seek out a Buddhist or Daoist
doctor for their particular specialization in treating their malady.
‘Healing’ In the Buddhist view is far more multifaceted than Medicine implies. It
is not only physical ailments, but mental and spiritual, which are targeted, in the various
‘medical’ Sutras and Spells. Ultimately, all illness, be it physical or spiritual, is rooted in
the same source, our perpetual suffering in samsara. We have already established the
symbolic definition of ‘medicine’ in the Buddhist vocabulary as the dharma, or at least
the salvific capacity of Buddhism, and there is no sūtra that will provide merely an
incantation or a decoction without prescribing meditation and steadfast faith in the
Buddha and Dharma.
Both Indic and Chinese medical systems, at the time of the initial
composition, translation, and dissemination of the texts in question, operated under
similar (though ultimately very distinct) systems of balance and humors. Sickness
and health, (with the exception of physical injuries i.e. broken bones and
lacerations.) are determined by fluctuating levels of humors, elements, or energies
of the body. Medicine and healing attempt to bring the body and its components into
balance, and through a restoration of the balance, eliminate the illness that is a
manifestation of the proliferation of one element above another. Though this is an
obvious oversimplification of two complex and distinct, medical systems, it is
important to identify the tendency towards balance and holistic methods, methods
Buddhism shares in common with them. As early as the third century Buddhist
sutras describe a body composed of elements30 and humors, illness became a
manifestation of imbalance, and treatment an issue of bringing the component
substances back into proper measure.
Even in the Pali canon spiritual and physical healing are employed as seen fit,
and a wide variety of material medica are prescribed by the Buddha himself, as seen in
the Vinaya, Mahāvagga, section IV.31 Buddhist engagement with medicine is thus
intricate and ancient, medicine in India and China developed largely independent of
religion, in that both medical knowledge and medical professionals could be practiced
30
31
Birnbaum, Chinese Buddhist Traditions of Healing and the Life Cycle. 55
Birnbaum, The Healing Buddha. 4
without recourse to a given religion. At the same time, religious professionals often
studied medicine, physical medicine was preserved and described in religious texts, and
monks and priests often preformed spiritual healing rituals. This deep interrelation is
evident in the Bhaiṣajyaguru’s sutras treatment of both physical and spiritual maladies.
Buddhist texts prescribe rituals, prayers and herbs, and the centrality of this medical
preoccupation is displayed in the many symbolic usages of Healing and Medicine in the
Buddhist canon.
The spiritual and magical methods these texts employed were deployed alongside,
or in preference to, what we now identify as Medical practices, whether of Indian or
Chinese providence texts describing drugs and surgery-some rudimentary, some quite
complex- Cataract surgery is known to have been transplanted from India to China, and
was so prolific it became a symbolic phrase in Buddhist literature. In the Vairocana
Sūtra, it is said, “The Buddha, King of Physicians, or Vaidyā-Rāja clears away the
membrane of ignorance with a golden probe.” 32And the Lotus sūtra, is rife with medical
analogies, the poison arrow and the skilled physician giving medicine to his sons. The
proliferation of ‘physical’ medicine, that is medical practices involving direct
engagement with the body through medication or surgery, belies the symbolic usage of
the term in the Buddhist context. Monks were trained in physical medicine, and were
often the ones who translated and imported medical techniques. One of the earliest
surviving Indian medical documents, the Suśrutasaṃhitā, contains detailed analysis of
surgery, pathology, pharmacology and dentistry, without reference to the Buddha, or any
Vedic religious concepts, the text is conservatively dated from the 8th to 2nd century BCE,
32
Deshpande. Buddhism as a Vehicle for Medical Contacts. 46
while the roots of Traditional Chinese Medicine extend to pre-Buddhist philosophical
conceptions of the composition of the body, the elements, and qi.
Buddhism then, even when it is actively importing these physical medical
techniques and theories, is also providing a supplemental spiritual practice. Rather than
rejecting the Āyurvedic or Chinese conceptions of bodily humors and elements,
Buddhism accepted them at face value, and tied these medical theories into its
worldview. So, it should be understood that there is a deep degree of symbolism and
literalism in the medical language employed in these ‘healing’ sutras, medical theory and
practice would have been well known, especially, by the educated monks. There is no
‘substitute’ or ‘alternative’ medical technique being proposed in the medical sutras, but a
spiritual analog. These techniques are ‘medical’ in their purpose and symbolically in their
function, they treat the spiritual causes of physical afflictions (including the arch-physical
affliction of existence in samsara) and spiritual ones with the same focus, immediacy and
purpose as surgery. The various rituals, spells and invocations are a spiritual medication
designed to cure specific afflictions.
Occultism and Medicine in Chinese Society
Given the magical and salvific usage of the various med bud texts, what are we to
understand by Healing and Medicine in the Buddhist context? The Consecration Sūtra
anthology is far from a conventional medical text, and contains primarily protective and
excorcistic rites, alongside other equally magical Sutras describing healing rituals, the
Great Spells of the Maniratna and the Summoning of the Dragon-kings of the Five
directions33 all prescribe rites and spells to avert or treat medical malady.
33
Buswell, Chinese Buddhist Apocrypha
In the context of this paper ‘magic’ is used colloquially to refer to at least two
categories of practice, the first is mantic or divinatory occult ritual, the second is
ritual magic, or spellcasting, which includes the Proto-Tantric practices.
‘Mantic’ or divinatory magic is a large enough part of the social life of
(medieval) China that shushu, or guides to divination, were copied by school
students as written exercises, alongside Confucian classics and encyclopedias.34 In
his analysis of Mantic texts in Chinese culture, based on the shushu documents
discovered in Dunhuang, Marc Kalinowski concludes that these educational texts
evince “…that subjects like divination, astrology, and the calendrical arts were
taught on a regular basis in the schools”35
The ubiquitous dhāranī, and the intricate, mystical visualization rites, are
distinct from these mantic rites, in that mantic ritual attempts to divine singular
answers or guidance be it from the stars, earth, or spirits. The spells and rituals of
the Bhaiṣajyaguru texts do not seek answers, but promote direct change; they affect the
world around them, and the practitioner directly. In healing practice this distinction can
be seen in the use of mantic rites to diagnose the patient and dhāranī and visualizations to
bring about healing and cures.
Ultimately, magic, occultism, and the like are not simply a part or component
of Chinese medicine, these methodologies are a part of Chinese culture. These
techniques were involved in innumerable aspects of social life, statecraft, funerals,
births,36 various mantic documents relate rituals to divine auspicious conditions and
ibid, 121
Kalinkowski, Medieval Chinese Medicine: The Dunhuang Medical Manuscripts. 120
36 ibid, 124
34
35
horoscopic guidance for all of these. The various divinatory technologies of China
were a component of daily life, and as such, were as naturally employed in medicine
as pulse and urine analysis.
In addition to the obvious association with physical medicine, the Medicine Buddhas
and Bodhisattvas, and their texts, are often classed as esoteric, and rather than what we
would identify as medical, the rituals employed use an occult methodology. It is not an
accident that the earliest surviving copy of the Bhaiṣajyaguru-Sūtra is found in a
compendium of occult instruction and spell-craft. In addition to the mantric chanting of
dhāranī, many of the sūtras employ the Tantric technique of visualization, manifesting
and then mentally occupying the form of the particular deity invoked. Additionally, the
methods prescribed by the medicine Buddha texts often deal with problems outside, or
unaddressed by, then contemporary medicine. Spirit possession, the negative impact of
sorcery, mental deterioration from long periods of solitude37 and the root of all illness, the
karmic impact of past deeds, are all maladies the medicine Buddha sutras confront,
alongside more conventional illness.
Dhāranī are one of the central healing technologies the Bhaiṣajyaguru textual
tradition champions, alongside visualization rituals, and more complex rites involving a
combination of visualization and incantation. This proliferation of spells for healing
marks a development from the dhāranīs provided in the Lotus Sūtra, the five of which are
‘general use’ protective spells.
The dhāranīs, like the Lotus Sūtra, and the name of the Medicine Buddha, are to
be remembered and recalled, more than being simply ‘read’. We see this with
37
Birnbaum, Chinese Buddhist Traditions of Healing and the Life Cycle. 35
exhortations to recall the past lives of Bhaiṣajyaguru to bring about beneficial return, the
dhāranīs are paid reverence themselves, perhaps in order to promote their promulgation.
The central dhāranī of the Bhaiṣajyaguru-sūtra, which Bhaiṣajyaguru intones as he enters
into the samahdi fittingly known as ‘Dispeller of the Afflictions of All Beings’, is the
central focus of a number of complex rites that have been discussed, but the importance
of the dhāranī itself is what the text focuses on. One is not told to keep the ritual close to
his heart, though it is said to be powerful, he is not told to keep the rites of puja on his
mind constantly, though they are efficacious. It is the short incantation that is directly
equated with Bhaiṣajyaguru himself, and which must be taken from the text by the
faithful, memorized, intoned and internalized.“…revere and worship that Master of
Healing, the Lapis Lazuli Radiance Tathāgata, and they should ever hold this dhāranī,
never allowing it to be lost.”38
A similar concern is seen in the developing ‘cult of the book’ within the Lotus
sūtra. As previously pointed out, the worship of the text itself was said to bring healing,
as was copying and promulgation of the text, by bringing the veneration to the text,
spreading it amongst the community becomes an act of worship. Similarly, the
recollections, remembrances, and recitations found throughout the text serve to allow the
Bhaiṣajyaguru-sūtra, and the other texts of the Bhaiṣajyaguru ritual corpus, to gain more
traction, spread more easily, and compete more effectively with other texts and practices.
Visualization is the second typically tantric practice that the Bhaiṣajyaguru sūtras
prescribe for medical and spiritual wellbeing.
38
Birnbaum, The Healing Buddha. 164
…the healer, who is about to use his wooden seal to cure a
patient, [is directed] first to visualize his own body as the body of
the Buddha…Only then, when he as effectively turned himself into
the Buddha through meditation, can he effect the miracle of
healing.39
The Sūtra Spoken by the Buddha on the Contemplation of the Two Bodhisattvas,
was translated alongside a number of other ‘contemplative’ sūtras, all of which became
classified as ‘esoteric’ at a later date. The proto-tantric nature of these texts, as posited
before, is evident in the contemplation, or visualization, rituals they offer. Texts of ‘deity
yoga’ can be seen as building on this tradition, providing intricate details and practical
steps, whereas these proto-tantric examples call only for the practitioner to visualize and
equate himself with the particular divinity. In the case of the Sūtra of the Two
Bodhisattvas, there are two distinct visualizations, unsurprisingly: one for each brother.
The visualizations for each require a series of purifying meditations, cultivating various
Buddhist virtues, altruism, discernment, they should abide “…in the undifferentiated
truth and never forsake majestic conduct.”40 The visualizations themselves belie the link
we have pointed out, as well as the influence on Pure Land Buddhism these texts had.41
The salvific virtues of these contemplation rituals is expounded constantly in the text, and
though they lack the detailed instructions of Generation Stage tantric practice, the
visualizations they prescribe are just as mind bending and cosmic. Light and color pour
39
Faure. Chinese Magical Medicine. 201
Birnbaum, The Healing Buddha. 129
41 The ‘Visualizations of Amitayus’ translated and imported to china alongside the
Sūtra of the two Healing bodhisattvas, is a highly influential text in Pure Land
Buddhism. ( Birnbaum, The Healing Buddha 36)
40
from the Bodhisattva’s pores; they are wreathed in halos and constantly surrounded by an
impossible array of treasures and delights. Those who practice, and practice intently,
these rituals “shall not meet with woeful opposition, and, in the end, they will not have
untimely deaths.”42 Even more substantially, in the altruistic vision of the bodhisattva
path, proper visualizations eliminate wholesale karmic imbalance accrued by sentient
beings.
..if there are any in the four-fold assembly who are able to
contemplate the Bodhisattva King of Healing in this way…it
will eliminate the faults of an aeon or even eighty thousand
aeons of dwelling in samsara.43
Conclusion.
In modern contexts it is easy to draw distinctions between medicine and
magic, surgery and spells, and the entire enterprise of Medicine and healing from
Religion and divination. And while it is possible to observe, or imprint, these cracks
onto healing practices in China, in a Buddhist context there is no separation. The
distinction made in Buddhism, as seen in the various Medicine Buddha and
Bodhisattva texts, is one of methodologies, applying different techniques to treat
different ailments.
While comprising only a small part of the totality of Buddhist and Chinese
attitudes towards medicine, the Bhaiṣajyaguru texts provide us with a glimpse into the
complex attitudes towards healing Buddhists embraced. From the rituals and traditions in
these sūtras it is clear that we are limited in our understandings of medical practice,
42
43
Ibid, 128
ibid
specifically by our categorization of different ‘types’ of practice. Conceptions of magic,
medicine and religion are revealed to be, rather than wholly distinct, a web of practices
and beliefs. Medical care and spiritual care become, for Buddhists, synonymous, and in
the greater world of Chinese healing the spiritual and magical cures become a part of the
rich tapestry of techniques used in diagnosis and healing. Medicine becomes a collection
of technologies and skillsets, in many ways similar to the current western model, experts
in diagnosis exist, surgeons and herbalists provide specialized care, and the religious
doctor, the Buddhist or Daoist, provides another-fully integrated- dimension of healing.
To understand Bhaiṣajyaguru as only involved in medicine and healing, however, is to
see only part of the equation. Just as one cannot divide the ‘occult’ elements from the
physical in Chinese medical practice, one cannot remove the tantric and esoteric tradition
from Bhaiṣajyaguru worship. He is not only a doctor of the body and the self, he is the
center of a profound esoteric tradition, bringing salvation to all who practice his doctrine,
be they sick or well, dying or healthy, he is a savior for all.
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