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Abstract
This article examines forms of knowledge and medical practice in three generations of Bon medical practitioners in Tibet. A key component of the discussion is the way in which Tibetan medicine, and particularly the two principal texts of the Bon and Buddhist medical tradition, serves as a symbolic marker of social and cultural identity. Based on ethnographic data collected in the Ngari, Kham, and Amdo regions of Tibet, the author assesses continuity and change in notions of identity and forms of practice among Bon medical practitioners as they react to the forces of modernity in post-Imperial China.
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Notes
1 Bon is the name of the religion; a Bonpo is a follower of Bon. For an outline of the Bon religion, see CitationKarmay 1975 and CitationKvaerne 1995.
2 This was a three-year project funded by the Leverhulme Trust.
3 The Buddha of medicine in Mahāyāna Buddhism.
4 According to Bon history, Zhang Zhung was a Central Asian kingdom where the Bon religion flourished. The doctrine of Bon spread from Zhang Zhung to Tibet during the reign of the legendary first king of Tibet, Nyatri Tsenpo (gnya' khri btsan po).
5 The Gelugpa (Yellow Hat) sect of Tibetan Buddhism was founded by Tsong kha pa (1357–1419). It is one of the four major sects of Tibetan Buddhism. The Gelugpa sect became politically dominant in Tibet in seventeenth century during the time of the fifth Dalai Lama.
6 There are a number of different accounts concerning the rediscovery of the Bumshi; these are discussed in CitationMillard 2009.
7 Take, for example, the annotated bibliography of Tibetan medicine by CitationJürgen Aschoff published in 1996. Of the 1,712 works listed, very few mention the Bon medical tradition.
8 Tenzin Namdak now resides at Triten Norbutse Bon monastery in Kathmandu, Nepal. He is regarded as one of the greatest living scholars of the Bon religion. His biography can be found in the appendix of Bonpo Dzogchen Teaching (CitationNamdak 2006).
9 CitationAlay 2011 gives account of Khyungtrul Jigme Namkhai Dorje's early life, CitationKvaerne 1998 gives an account of his various pilgrimages, and CitationMillard 2009 gives an account of his life and his contribution to Tibetan medicine.
10 Rinpoche (Rin po che), meaning “precious” or “jewel,” is an honorific title for Tibetan lamas.
11 I interviewed Kamchog in 2008 at Menri monastery in Dojanji, India, where he currently resides, and Palden Yeshe in 2009 in Tholing.
12 On the rime movement—a nonsectarian Buddhist movement originating in east Tibet in the nineteenth century—see CitationSamuel 1993: 525–52.
13 Tapiritsa was a famous Bon master during the seventh century. Gelong is the title of a fully ordained monk.
14 Many of the texts Khyungtrul refers to, including this one, are difficult to identify and likely no longer exist.
15 In his catalog (dkar chag) of Bon texts, the nineteenth-century Bon lama Nyima Tenzin listed nine medical texts in the Bon Kanjur (bka' 'gyur), or Bon canon. The Bumshi is one of these. He also writes that it was “transformed” into the Gyüshi, but in his opinion it was the famous eighth-century translator Vairocana who did this (CitationKvaerne 1974: 101).
16 The zhitro are the peaceful and wrathful deities of the Bon tantric tradition.
17 The Bon religion and all the major sects of Tibetan Buddhism have a set sequence of preliminary practices, which includes prayers, mandala offerings, and prostrations that have to be carried out one hundred thousand times.
18 Nyingma is the “old translation school,” one of the four major sects of Tibetan Buddhism.
19 On one level, Tibetan medicine can be viewed as a unified field of knowledge based on key texts, though the application of this knowledge in specific locales through specific genealogies has produced distinct local traditions. In Craig CitationJanes's (1995) view, it was the introduction of institutional modernity in the twentieth century that disrupted this variation.
20 The Baiḍūrya Ngonpo, or Blue Beryl, is the famous commentary of Desid Sangye Gyatsho (1617–82). The Trungpe Drime She Gyi Melong, or Flawless Crystal Mirror, is an extensive and detailed pharmacopoeia published in Chamdo in 1995.
21 Geshe (dge shes) is the title given to a monk who has completed the course in Buddhist or Bon dialetics.
22 Rinchen rilbu, “precious pills,” are made of a medicinal compounds that include detoxified forms of minerals (e.g., coral, sulfur) and metals (e.g., copper, mercury).
23 A khu, or “paternal uncle,” is an honorific form used for lamas and notables in Amdo.
24 The Bon Kanjur is the Bon canon, consisting of the teachings of the Buddha Tonpa Shenrab.
25 Amdo Shar-khog is the southern region of Amdo, north of the Chinese town of Songpan in Ngaba (Aba) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan Province.
26 A nagpa is a noncelibate religious practitioner who takes specific religious vows. The nagpa is a specialist in tantric ritual, which he carries out for the benefit of the community.
27 Khyenrab Norbu was the first director of the Lhasa Mentsikhang.
28 Janet CitationGyatso (2004) notes that the trend in Tibet to make medicine something isolable from religion goes back to at least the seventeenth century.