Vesna A. Wallace
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195122114
- eISBN:
- 9780199834808
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195122119.003.0005
- Subject:
- Religion, Buddhism
When the issue of science is raised within the context of Indian Buddhist thought, there are no more advanced or comprehensive matrices of theory and practice than those presented in the literature ...
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When the issue of science is raised within the context of Indian Buddhist thought, there are no more advanced or comprehensive matrices of theory and practice than those presented in the literature of the Kālacakra tradition. A textual study of the Indian literary sources of this tantric tradition reveals that when Brāhmaṇic formal education in eleventh century India was exclusively theological and disdainful of technical knowledge, north Indian Buddhist monastic education incorporated training in nontheological skills that required knowledge of medicine, alchemy, mathematics, artisanship, and even weaponry. The sharp split between theological and scientific education, which impaired the Brāhmaṇic educational system of that time, was absent in Buddhist monastic education owing to the prevailing Buddhist view that theological knowledge and technical and scientific learning are not only compatible but complementary. The literature of the Kālacakra tradition with its diverse and well‐integrated topics and applications of diverse fields of knowledge attests to that fact, and has its roots in the Buddhist monastic, educational system. This chapter presents examples of science from the Kālacakratantra and other Kālacakra literature; almost half of it is devoted to the Buddhist tantric medicine, which integrates classical Āyurdevic medicine, alchemy, and magic.Less
When the issue of science is raised within the context of Indian Buddhist thought, there are no more advanced or comprehensive matrices of theory and practice than those presented in the literature of the Kālacakra tradition. A textual study of the Indian literary sources of this tantric tradition reveals that when Brāhmaṇic formal education in eleventh century India was exclusively theological and disdainful of technical knowledge, north Indian Buddhist monastic education incorporated training in nontheological skills that required knowledge of medicine, alchemy, mathematics, artisanship, and even weaponry. The sharp split between theological and scientific education, which impaired the Brāhmaṇic educational system of that time, was absent in Buddhist monastic education owing to the prevailing Buddhist view that theological knowledge and technical and scientific learning are not only compatible but complementary. The literature of the Kālacakra tradition with its diverse and well‐integrated topics and applications of diverse fields of knowledge attests to that fact, and has its roots in the Buddhist monastic, educational system. This chapter presents examples of science from the Kālacakratantra and other Kālacakra literature; almost half of it is devoted to the Buddhist tantric medicine, which integrates classical Āyurdevic medicine, alchemy, and magic.
