I am not entirely clear on the difference between a Dharmic interventions and a Divinatory (etc.) techniques other than the first is performed by a Buddhist and the other by a lower level popular healer - I see the difference in the social roles but wonder if they both might be considered as faith based healings? The similarity is curious to me because at first it seems that Zhiyi is separating by physical and spirit level illnesses, but classifications 2 and 3 appear to both fall under spirit level while the first is physical. Or perhaps 2 is more mental/emotional and 3 is spirit level?
The other aspect that caught my attention was the ontological perspective. While illnesses are physical phenomena that occur, it seems important to understand the cause of the illness to address the correct treatment. This assessment then classifies the type of illness and hence the necessary treatment. But then to say it is all emptiness can undermine everything and simultaneously solve everything. Is this then implying that healing is enlightenment?
(This does to some extent parallel the Ling Shu with its premise that all illness is rooted in the spirit. The difference may be that the meridian pathways in acupuncture serves as a kind of alchemical process that negotiates heavenly/karmic qi and corporeal qi - which makes the body an evolving conduit for spiritual experience and physical manifestation. The Buddhist interpretation seems more instantaneous and direct b/w spirit and physical?)
You wrote about Dharmic vs fangshu interventions: "[I] wonder if they both might be considered as faith based healings? The similarity is curious to me because at first it seems that Zhiyi is separating by physical and spirit level illnesses, but classifications 2 and 3 appear to both fall under spirit level while the first is physical. Or perhaps 2 is more mental/emotional and 3 is spirit level?"
My response is that "faith based healing," "spirit level illnesses," "mental/emotional".... these are all YOUR categories, and are not found in the Chinese original. Applying our own present-day categories may actually not be that useful in helping us to understanding the medieval materials, and may even be misleading. More to the point, what's important to me as a historian is trying to understand the shape of knowledge in the medieval period — how did THEY carve these things up and make sense of them? And for Zhiyi at least, physical/spiritual/emotional weren’t relevant distinctions, but he thought that classical medicine, Dharma, and fangshu were obviously completely different from one another!
On your question about "the ontological perspective": I'm not sure exactly what you mean by that phrase, but, yes, it's a basic Mahāyana Buddhist principle that illness is a "conventional truth" as opposed to an "ultimate" one. That means that the concept falls apart (i.e., is revealed to be empty) under scrutiny. I didn't fully get into it in this essay because my focus was elsewhere, but recognizing illness as empty is one of the main ideas underpinning Zhiyi's thinking in this chapter. I wrote a little piece on those teachings more generally here: https://tricycle.org/article/a-brief-introduction-to-mahayana-medicine
Those are just some thoughts in response to what you wrote. Thanks again for reading the piece and engaging with it. Cheers! ☺️
I think I wasn't clear enough and I did not give enough context! The levels I was referring to are more related to the three levels of herbal medicine of the Shen Nong Ben Bao- Traditional Chinese Medicine has these three levels of herbal treatment to treat different levels of diseases. The three levels, sometimes just vaguely described as upper, middle, and lower were actually based on an illness being related to the spirit, emotional (having to do with blood, regulation and tonifying), and physical - many of the upper herbs for the spirit have the word "shen" in them that indicates their function, such as Fu Shen. Another part of the same plant is called Fu Ling and that treats/tonifies the spleen as well as some emotional aspects. This would be considered a middle level herb. The lower grade herbs as the strongest ones with higher toxicity that treat specific illnesses with physical presentations. These do date back to the medieval period, and as my teacher was Taoist, this is a more taoist interpretation of the SBNC.
My interest is in considering how these more Daoist notions that were part of TCM were reconsidered, if at all by Zhiyi?
And my reference to faith based healing is me trying to wrap my head around how healing occurs if the ultimate realization is that the illness doesn't exist. Could this be considered as having a faith that your visualization and/or realization will bring about healing? I don't mean it in the Christian sense, more in the broader sense that a mental state of mind can bring about healing. (Hope this is clearer as well!)
All of these being said, a practitioner that has studied Daoism and practiced Buddhism and also being familiar with Taintai, I am very curious how Shiyi developed his herbal medicine. The breathing, meditations and visualization techniques seem to align with Tiantai more directly than creating an herbal formula would. I read that he did incorporate the five elements - perhaps there was a connection there? I'm trying to find readings on this. If you happen to know of any, I would love to know! Thank you for entertaining my curiosity :)
Oh, I see. Well, Zhiyi does not overtly name any Daoist sources or practices here, as far as I can tell. He does refer to a three-level classification of physicians ("a superior doctor will listen to the voice, a middling doctor will observe the features of the countenance, and an inferior doctor will examine the pulse"), but I did't notice any engagement with the three levels of herbal treatment you're referring to. Basically, I think his main position in regard to herbal prescription is to leave those matters to the doctors, who he recommends consulting.
"Ninety years ago, one of the great forefathers of academic Buddhology, the French scholar Paul Demiéville (1894–1979)” so basically, a colonizer who orientalized buddhism and gave it a new name, and now more european dudes write about other european dudes talking about the asian knowledge they stole...
If you read to the end of the piece, you will see that the whole point of the essay is to critique the application of Western categories to knowledge from other times and places.
More importantly, please read our commenting guidelines before further participation in this community: https://www.asianmedicinezone.com/about#§commenting-guidelines. We welcome dissent and disagreement, but comments must be framed in a constructive way that promotes dialogue.
Gracias Pierce.
I am not entirely clear on the difference between a Dharmic interventions and a Divinatory (etc.) techniques other than the first is performed by a Buddhist and the other by a lower level popular healer - I see the difference in the social roles but wonder if they both might be considered as faith based healings? The similarity is curious to me because at first it seems that Zhiyi is separating by physical and spirit level illnesses, but classifications 2 and 3 appear to both fall under spirit level while the first is physical. Or perhaps 2 is more mental/emotional and 3 is spirit level?
The other aspect that caught my attention was the ontological perspective. While illnesses are physical phenomena that occur, it seems important to understand the cause of the illness to address the correct treatment. This assessment then classifies the type of illness and hence the necessary treatment. But then to say it is all emptiness can undermine everything and simultaneously solve everything. Is this then implying that healing is enlightenment?
(This does to some extent parallel the Ling Shu with its premise that all illness is rooted in the spirit. The difference may be that the meridian pathways in acupuncture serves as a kind of alchemical process that negotiates heavenly/karmic qi and corporeal qi - which makes the body an evolving conduit for spiritual experience and physical manifestation. The Buddhist interpretation seems more instantaneous and direct b/w spirit and physical?)
Thanks for reading and commenting!
You wrote about Dharmic vs fangshu interventions: "[I] wonder if they both might be considered as faith based healings? The similarity is curious to me because at first it seems that Zhiyi is separating by physical and spirit level illnesses, but classifications 2 and 3 appear to both fall under spirit level while the first is physical. Or perhaps 2 is more mental/emotional and 3 is spirit level?"
My response is that "faith based healing," "spirit level illnesses," "mental/emotional".... these are all YOUR categories, and are not found in the Chinese original. Applying our own present-day categories may actually not be that useful in helping us to understanding the medieval materials, and may even be misleading. More to the point, what's important to me as a historian is trying to understand the shape of knowledge in the medieval period — how did THEY carve these things up and make sense of them? And for Zhiyi at least, physical/spiritual/emotional weren’t relevant distinctions, but he thought that classical medicine, Dharma, and fangshu were obviously completely different from one another!
On your question about "the ontological perspective": I'm not sure exactly what you mean by that phrase, but, yes, it's a basic Mahāyana Buddhist principle that illness is a "conventional truth" as opposed to an "ultimate" one. That means that the concept falls apart (i.e., is revealed to be empty) under scrutiny. I didn't fully get into it in this essay because my focus was elsewhere, but recognizing illness as empty is one of the main ideas underpinning Zhiyi's thinking in this chapter. I wrote a little piece on those teachings more generally here: https://tricycle.org/article/a-brief-introduction-to-mahayana-medicine
Those are just some thoughts in response to what you wrote. Thanks again for reading the piece and engaging with it. Cheers! ☺️
I think I wasn't clear enough and I did not give enough context! The levels I was referring to are more related to the three levels of herbal medicine of the Shen Nong Ben Bao- Traditional Chinese Medicine has these three levels of herbal treatment to treat different levels of diseases. The three levels, sometimes just vaguely described as upper, middle, and lower were actually based on an illness being related to the spirit, emotional (having to do with blood, regulation and tonifying), and physical - many of the upper herbs for the spirit have the word "shen" in them that indicates their function, such as Fu Shen. Another part of the same plant is called Fu Ling and that treats/tonifies the spleen as well as some emotional aspects. This would be considered a middle level herb. The lower grade herbs as the strongest ones with higher toxicity that treat specific illnesses with physical presentations. These do date back to the medieval period, and as my teacher was Taoist, this is a more taoist interpretation of the SBNC.
My interest is in considering how these more Daoist notions that were part of TCM were reconsidered, if at all by Zhiyi?
And my reference to faith based healing is me trying to wrap my head around how healing occurs if the ultimate realization is that the illness doesn't exist. Could this be considered as having a faith that your visualization and/or realization will bring about healing? I don't mean it in the Christian sense, more in the broader sense that a mental state of mind can bring about healing. (Hope this is clearer as well!)
All of these being said, a practitioner that has studied Daoism and practiced Buddhism and also being familiar with Taintai, I am very curious how Shiyi developed his herbal medicine. The breathing, meditations and visualization techniques seem to align with Tiantai more directly than creating an herbal formula would. I read that he did incorporate the five elements - perhaps there was a connection there? I'm trying to find readings on this. If you happen to know of any, I would love to know! Thank you for entertaining my curiosity :)
Oh, I see. Well, Zhiyi does not overtly name any Daoist sources or practices here, as far as I can tell. He does refer to a three-level classification of physicians ("a superior doctor will listen to the voice, a middling doctor will observe the features of the countenance, and an inferior doctor will examine the pulse"), but I did't notice any engagement with the three levels of herbal treatment you're referring to. Basically, I think his main position in regard to herbal prescription is to leave those matters to the doctors, who he recommends consulting.
As for how illness is understood in light of ultimate vs relative truth, please see the other article, where I go through it in some detail: https://tricycle.org/article/a-brief-introduction-to-mahayana-medicine It's not really about "faith" at all.
(I shouldn't have used the term 5 elements, let's just stick with wu xing. There isn't a good translation for that.)
Lol, that's what my previous article here on AMZ was all about: https://www.asianmedicinezone.com/p/the-mistranslation-that-changed-chinese ☺️
"Ninety years ago, one of the great forefathers of academic Buddhology, the French scholar Paul Demiéville (1894–1979)” so basically, a colonizer who orientalized buddhism and gave it a new name, and now more european dudes write about other european dudes talking about the asian knowledge they stole...
If you read to the end of the piece, you will see that the whole point of the essay is to critique the application of Western categories to knowledge from other times and places.
More importantly, please read our commenting guidelines before further participation in this community: https://www.asianmedicinezone.com/about#§commenting-guidelines. We welcome dissent and disagreement, but comments must be framed in a constructive way that promotes dialogue.
(Also, FWIW, I'm not European. 😘)