On Anatomical Enumeration and Difference in Early Sanskrit Medical Literature
What does it mean to inventory all the components of the human body, and what do those inventories tell us about medical ideas and practice? I compare the lists of body parts in the sarira sthanas (sections relating to the body) of the Caraka samhita (ca. first century CE) and the Susruta samhita (ca. second century CE) Rather than provide a detailed list of differences, I contemplate what these differences "mean" in terms of counting as a practice and of how we might think about these two texts as articulations of the concerns of the "theorist physicians" of the Caraka samhita and the "anatomist surgeons" of the Susruta samhita. How might a close comparative reading of these passages an "emic" reading, if you will shed light on medical practice in early India and its relationship with metaphysical concerns, issues of selfhood, sexual "difference," and the problem of understanding what cannot be seen with the naked eye?