The Tibetan medical tradition derived primarily from Indian Ayurveda but integrated other elements within an overall Buddhist philosophical framework. While using a theory of natural causation, medical doctors were also trained in meditative healing techniques. Since the Chinese occupation of Tibet, Tibetans have attempted to reconstruct their cultural heritage — including the medical tradition — in exile. The institutional structure of Tibetan Medicine in India is modern and secular yet Buddhism remains important, having been central in articulating Tibetan identity and in internationalizing Tibetan culture. The purpose of this paper is to outline the main approaches to illness and healing in pre-modern Tibet, with particular reference to the Tibetan medical system, and to comment on the modifications — and also continuities — which characterise Tibetan approaches to healing in the contemporary world, especially in exile. The first part of the paper considers the place of Buddhism in the theory of Tibetan medicine, summarises the essential features of the Tibetan medical system, and discusses its practice in pre-modern Tibet. The second part looks at the effects of the Chinese occupation on the medical system in Tibet and at the changes brought about by the circumstances of the exodus of refugees and their attempts to reconstruct their cultural — and in this case medical — heritage in exile. The radical disruption of the refugees’ social and economic life and the entirely new circumstances of life in India have meant that approaches to health and illness have greatly changed, and that biomedicine now has a central place in Tibetan refugee health care. At the same time, some aspects of the traditional Tibetan systems of healing are not only being preserved, but developed and taught beyond the Tibetan community. The Tibetan system of medicine is used in a way which is complementary to biomedicine, and its representatives have been involved in dialogue and cooperation with both western medical scientists and practitioners of various alternative medical systems. The Tibetan Buddhist meditative traditions healing have also generated interest in the west, where they are simplified and taught to broad non-Buddhist audiences. Buddhism has also been important in the expression of Tibetan identity in India, and despite the modernization and secularization of the Tibetan medical system, its connections with Buddhist thinking and practice are unlikely to be severed.
目次
Abstract 157 Part I 158 I.1 Tibetan Medicine: Its Relationship with Buddhism 158 I.2 Tibetan Medicine: Its Principal Features 161 I.3 The Practice of Tibetan Medicine and Other Methods of Healing in Tibet 165 Part II 169 II.1 The Chinese Occupation 169 II.2 Tibetans in Exile 171 II.2.1 The Impact of Exile 171 II.2.2 Folk Cures 172 II.2.3 Buddhist Healing Practices 174 II.2.4 Tibetan Medicine 177 References 182
