DOC Buddhist Hagiography in Early Japan: Images of Compassion in the Gyoki Tradition (Routledge Studies in Asian Religion) by Jonathan Morris Augustine in History

Description

This book explores the cultural history of embryology in Tibet; in culture; religion; art and literature; and what this reveals about its medicine and religion. Filling a significant gap in the literature this is the first in-depth exploration of Tibetan medical history in the English language. It reveals the prevalence of descriptions of the development of the human body – from conception to birth – found in all forms of Tibetan religious literature; as well as in medical texts and in art. By analysing stories of embryology; Frances Garrett explores questions of cultural transmission and adaptation: How did Tibetan writers adapt ideas inherited from India and China for their own purposes? What original views did they develop on the body; on gender; on creation; and on life itself? The transformations of embryological narratives over several centuries illuminate key turning points in Tibetan medical history; and its relationship with religious doctrine and practice. Embryology was a site for both religious and medical theorists to contemplate profound questions of being and becoming; where topics such as pharmacology and nosology were left to shape secular medicine. The author argues that; in terms of religion; stories of human development comment on embodiment; gender; socio-political hierarchy; religious ontology; and spiritual progress. Through the lens of embryology; this book examines how these concerns shift as Tibetan history moves through the formative 'renaissance' period of the twelfth through to the seventeenth centuries.