On Yuan Chwang's Travels in India, 629–645 A.D. v1.c8.s6.18.2

v1.c8.s6.18.2

The third group is the I-fang-ming, “Healing-prescriptions Science”, that is Medical science in all its branches. Julien gives as the Sanskrit original for the Chinese name Chikitsāvidyā or Science of Medicine, but this seems to be only a conjecture. The fourth group in our passage is the Yin(因)-ming or the Science of Reasoning. Julien restores the Sanskrit equivalent as Hetuvidyā which, like Yin-ming, means literally “Science of causation”. But Yin-ming is the technical term used to translate the Nyāya or Logic of Indian writers, and Julien learned afterwards that it was Nyāya which was the original for Yin-ming. The fifth is the Nei(內)-ming or "Internal Science"; Julien translates "la science des choses intérieures" and gives as the Sanskrit original Adhyātma-vidyā. This word adhyātma means (1) the highest spirit and (2) belonging to oneself. In Kapila's system adhyātmika means self-caused (in Chinese i-nei 依內), and it is opposed to that which is due to external influences. But in the present passage, as the context shows, and as we learn from other authorities, the nei-ming or Inner science is Buddhism. The son of Buddhist parents went through a course of secular instruction like other boys, and he also studied the books of his religion including the metaphysical and argumentative treatises of the great Doctors of Abhidharma. In these he learned all about the Five degrees or "Five Vehicles, the fivefold gradation of moral beings.