Buddhist Healing in Medieval China and Japan

Published by University of Hawaii Press 2020

Buddhist Healing in Medieval China and Japan

Edited by: C. Pierce Salguero and Andrew Macomber
With contributions by: Anna Andreeva , Catherine Despeux , Andrew Macomber , Antje Richter , C. Pierce Salguero and Zhiru Ng

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780824884222

Overview
Contents

About this book

From its inception in northeastern India in the first millennium BCE, the Buddhist tradition has advocated a range of ideas and practices that were said to ensure health and well-being. As the religion developed and spread to other parts of Asia, healing deities were added to its pantheon, monastic institutions became centers of medical learning, and healer-monks gained renown for their mastery of ritual and medicinal therapeutics. In China, imported Buddhist knowledge contended with a sophisticated, state-supported system of medicine that was able to retain its influence among the elite. Further afield in Japan, where Chinese Buddhism and Chinese medicine were introduced simultaneously as part of the country’s adoption of civilization from the “Middle Kingdom,” the two were reconciled by individuals who deemed them compatible. In East Asia, Buddhist healing would remain a site of intercultural tension and negotiation. While participating in transregional networks of circulation and exchange, Buddhist clerics practiced locally specific blends of Indian and indigenous therapies and occupied locally defined social positions as religious and medical specialists.

In this diverse and compelling collection, an international group of scholars analyzes the historical connections between Buddhism and healing in medieval China and Japan. Contributors focus on the transnationally conveyed aspects of Buddhist healing traditions as they moved across geographic, cultural, and linguistic boundaries. Simultaneously, the chapters also investigate the local instantiations of these ideas and practices as they were reinvented, altered, and re-embedded in specific social and institutional contexts. Investigating the interplay between the macro and micro, the global and the local, this book demonstrates the richness of Buddhist healing as a way to explore the history of cross-cultural exchange.

Author / Editor information

Salguero C. Pierce :

C. Pierce Salguero is professor of Asian history and health humanities at Pennsylvania State University’s Abington College.Macomber Andrew :

Andrew Macomber is assistant professor of East Asian religions at Oberlin College.Macomber Andrew :

Andrew Macomber is assistant professor of East Asian religions at Oberlin College.Salguero C. Pierce :

C. Pierce Salguero is professor of Asian history and health humanities at Pennsylvania State University’s Abington College.Ng Zhiru :

Zhiru, a Buddhist Nun ordained in the Chinese tradition, received her M.A. from the University of Michigan and holds a doctorate in East Asian Buddhism from the University of Arizona. She has authored a number of articles on medieval Chinese Buddhist cults and contemporary Buddhism in Taiwan. She is currently professor in the Department of Religious Studies at Pomona College.C. Pierce Salguero (Editor)
C. Pierce Salguero is associate professor of Asian history and religious studies at Penn State University’s Abington College.

Andrew Macomber (Editor)
Andrew Macomber is assistant professor of East Asian religions at Oberlin College.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Abbreviations Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Introduction C. Pierce Salguero and Andrew Macomber Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1. “A Flock of Ghosts Bursting Forth and Scattering”: Healing Narratives in a Sixth-Century Chinese Buddhist Hagiography C. Pierce Salguero Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	23
2. Teaching from the Sickbed: Ideas of Illness and Healing in the Vimalakīrti Sūtra and Their Reception in Medieval Chinese Literature Antje Richter Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	57
3. Lighting Lamps to Prolong Life: Ritual Healing and the Bhaiṣajyaguru Cult in Fifth- and Sixth-Century China Shi Zhiru Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	91
4. Buddhist Healing Practices at Dunhuang in the Medieval Period Catherine Despeux Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	118
5. Empowering the Pregnancy Sash in Medieval Japan Anna Andreeva Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	160
6. Ritualizing Moxibustion in the Early Medieval Tendai-Jimon Lineage Andrew Macomber Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	194
List of Contributors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	243
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	245

Language: English
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 264
Illustrations
- Other: 10 color, 5 b&w illustrations

eBook

Published: August 31, 2020
ISBN: 9780824884222