a means of political protest. They attracted consider-
able attention to their cause by performing public self-
immolations in protest against the Diem regime,
which had imposed restrictive measures on the prac-
tice of Buddhism and the activities of Buddhist monks
and nuns.
When its sacrifice for the sake of others is advocated,
the body is clearly an essential element of religious
practice. However, even putting such heroic measures
aside, one cannot embark on the bodhisattva path
without regarding the body as an essential means of
fulfilling one’s bodhisattva vows. One of the central
vows of the bodhisattva is a statement that one is ea-
ger to undergo billions of repeated embodiments in
the cycle of REBIRTH(samsara) in order to help others
achieve awakening.
In contrast to the Mahayanist emphasis on post-
poning final awakening for eons and eons, Buddhist
tantra (VAJRAYANA) stresses speed of attainment,
promising the achievement of buddhahood in one
lifetime. The body is said to contain the seeds of bud-
dhahood, the prerequisites for achieving full awaken-
ing in this lifetime. Hence the human body as a focus
of practice is central to Vajrayana Buddhism. Practi-
tioners regard the body as a microcosm of the universe,
with all its gods, goddesses, and other powerful beings.
Such beings are invoked and their powers harnessed
for the goal of full awakening by touching various parts
of the body using special hand gestures and by chant-
ing MANTRAs or sacred utterances.
See also:Anatman/Atman (No-Self/Self); Buddhahood
and Buddha Bodies; Gender; Sexuality
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cine in the Buddhist Monastery.New York: Oxford Univer-
sity Press, 1991.LIZWILSONBONBon (pronounced pön) is often characterized as the in-
digenous, pre-Buddhist religion of Tibet. While not
entirely untrue, such a description is misleading. There
are clearly indigenous Tibetan elements in historical
Bon, and some of these elements likely predate the ar-
rival of Buddhism in Tibet. But because there was no
effective Tibetan literary language before the intro-
duction of Buddhism, there is scant evidence from
which to reconstruct pre-Buddhist Bon. Moreover, be-
cause the Bon that is known from later sources (and
exists to this day alongside Tibetan Buddhism) is a
highly syncretic religious complex, deeply conditioned
by its encounter with Indian (and probably other)
forms of Buddhism, it cannot rightly be considered ei-
ther indigenous or pre-Buddhist.
Historical Bon itself claims to be a direct descen-
dant of—indeed identical with—a religion known as
Bonthat existed during the centuries before the intro-
duction of Buddhism to Tibet in the eighth century.
The few extant sources from the royal dynastic period
in Tibet do suggest the existence during this period of
a religious formation that may have been known as
Bon, whose priests were called bon po,and perhaps also
gshen.As reconstructed from these sources, this early-
or proto-Bon seems to have included a strong belief in
an afterlife and to have involved a system of funerary
rites, animal sacrifices, and royal consecration cere-
monies as primary foci. It thus bears little resemblance
to later Bon.
There seems to have been some friction between
proto-Bon and Buddhism in the dynastic period. Later
sources from both traditions tell of Buddhist PERSE-
CUTIONSof Bon, which the Buddhist king Khri srongBON