Abstract: By using cultural interpretation method in reference to the cosmic belief of the Akha at the Sino-Myanmar border, this paper analyzes the Akha people's view on illness and their corresponding treatment practice in order to understand the integration of medicine and rituals and the operating mechanism of this system. The finding points out that the Akha people believe that humans possess both body and soul. Some illnesses are physical and can be healed by drugs, while others involve the soul, ghosts, spirits, deities and the Supreme God, and need to resort to ritual treatment. Ritual therapy in a set of socio-cosmological rules called "Li", is closely related to the Akha's cosmology, social organization, kinship system, temporal and spatial arrangements, behavioral norms and so on.Li defines the overall cosmic order of the Akha, coordinates the rules of interaction between people and ghosts, gods, spirits and other living things in the universe, as well as regulates the life of the human world. In this intermingled world, manifested in illness, human body is the carrier of messages given by nonhuman beings. Such illnesses are regarded as punishments from the divine for discordance with the socio-cosmological order and a call for people to correct mistakes and restore harmony. Therefore, the proper way to heal illness is to remove physical discomfort by taking medicine, and to satisfy nonhuman beings with sacrificing rituals. In so doing, the collective socio-cosmological morality is internalized into the individual through uncertain ailments and healing rituals that repeatedly confirm and maintain the authority of the social-cosmic order. It is this pluralistic medical practice of combining medicine with rituals that keeps the Akha Li alive.

Key words: Li, body, illness, order, socio-cosmic moral power