Intangible Culture ISSN:2799-3868(Print) 무형문화연구

The Suvarṇabhāsottamasūtra (Sutra of Golden Light) was one of the popular Indian Mahāyana Buddhist scriptures widely circulated in both Central and East Asia. In this text, “Vyādhi-praśamana parivarta,” the “Chapter on Eliminating Disease”(除病品), while relatively short, contains some fundamental Indian medical knowledge that can be estimated to have circulated in India before the 5th century. Through translations of this text, the knowledge was transmitted to the East Asian countries Korea, China, and Japan, and later, by the various commentaries and their cross-references made by the eastern Buddhist scholars, the Indian medical knowledge was discussed in more detail. This “Chapter” addresses the change of seasons, the arising of disease, and the quality of food. As the “Chapter” shows, in ancient India it was understood that the material worlds all possess three energies, or “Tri-doṣa,” which assigned distinct qualities of all living beings based on a certain composition ratio. These energies could be correlated with seasons, the human body, and the qualities of food. Furthermore, as seasons changed, imbalance in these energies within the body arose and could lead to illness. Treatment was based on the intake of foods to complement these imbalances in accordance with the constitutional qualities of one’s own body and the seasons. The “Chapter” conveys the fundamental principles of Indian medicine regarding the causes of illness and their remedies. However, it seems that the Indian medical knowledge has not been well accepted into the East Asian countries or understood without confusion to the translators or the scholars. This is due to the fact that their own medical system, established on the basis of the concepts of Yin-Yang(陰陽) and the Five Phases (五行, Wuxing), was flourishing for centuries in East Asia, and thus the people have their own understanding of the causes of diseases and their treatments. The Indian medical knowledge likely was compromised or even nullified through the channel of the traditional Chinese medical system. Understanding the Indian system of nutrition for treating diseases or identifying a food’s qualities was also deemed challenging. Wonhyo, the eminent Korean Buddhist scholar in Silla, for example, sought to interpret the causes and treatments of diseases in terms of the Yin-Yang and Five Elements theory in his own commentary on the “Chapter,” which can be evaluated as a very proactive, yet almost inevitable, choice in his era.