Mudrā:  A Study of Symbolic Gestures in Japanese  Buddhist
"It is  certain that the ritual gesture we now as the mudrā existed even
before the  organization of Buddhism into a religious system.  Its use in the
Veda is attested, while  its presence in the magical rites of primitive
Buddhism is undeniable.  The appearance of mudrā in Tantrism  constitutes, we may
say a sort of renaissance of the earlier gestures, probably  blurred during
the first centuries A.D.  Nevertheless, it is probably that the mudrā was
used in uncodified rites  as early as that period, though the question of its