Great Construction
The True Substance of Sickness
In the first place, what is disease? It is the suffering caused by an unusual condition in a part of or in the whole of the physical body. Why does such an unusual condition appear? According to medical science up to the present, this is not known. I would like to make public the result of my own research in this area and ask for the responses of specialists and other intelligent individuals.
Primarily, all living creatures are composed of the spiritual and the physical bodies: The power of life is generated by the inseparable union of the two. What governs the spiritual body is the will and consciousness, which come from the mind, the heart and the soul. Western medicine, however, has completely ignored the spiritual body, making the physical body its main subject, studying it, analyzing it in the minutest detail until it has reached the present point of knowledge. This cannot be helped because it is a product of materialism. But the true substance of disease, its real cause does not lie in the physical body but in the spiritual body. Sickness first appears on the spiritual body and then reflects on the physical body. Therefore, the cause of sickness lies in the spiritual being and the physical condition is its effect.
I affirm that unless the relationship between the spiritual and the physical bodies is understood disease can never be healed, although who knows how many years from now medical science will still be researching for the answer? As long as the advancement of science is at the present stage the existence of spiritual energy, of vibrations cannot be measured, so this cannot be helped. The world at present is in about the same stage of civilization was in before the discovery of atmosphere. But we cannot say that the science which succeeded in discovering the components of atmosphere cannot also discover the reality of spirit.
Just as the discovery of atmosphere contributed to science’s making a sudden, big leap, when the existence of spiritual energy is discovered and the true art of healing, the true way of treating sick people is established science will make another giant leap ahead. That will be the time when spiritual work and scientific work unite. The conflict between materialism and spiritualism will also completely disappear.
Working on the principle of treating human illness with the spiritual body as the main object of healing, I am seeing wonderful results. Those who also observe the results of healing we see every day are amazed and call them miracles. However, when they come to understand the principle of our treatment without medicine, without material science, they will know this is a matter-of-course truth and nothing over which to feel surprised. By the same token, if someone should be completely healed through a method which treated the physical body as its main object, we would feel it was indeed strange.
Please know that I am pointing out the errors of medical science but am not blaming science. I say this because through its progress humanity has been given many benefits which are indeed immeasurable, and it should advance more and more in the future. Our sincere desire is that it will advance to the point where it will attain the level of religion.
However, we must know that something serious lies hidden which can easily be a grave mistake. That is, a magician called science makes machines work like living creatures; indeed, it can make them work in the place of human beings. Even so, living human beings cannot be treated as machines. This is because a machine has no spirit, no will or consciousness, whereas a human being has both.
A machine is a material thing, so it is a matter of course that when it is damaged it can be repaired with parts or oil or grease. But there is no way that parts or oil or grease can be applied to an illness which may be called damage to a human body. This is not made up of material parts alone; it consists of blood, nerves and living cells which are in perpetual motion, being constantly renewed. It is indeed a mysterious and marvelous being, an X. Needless to say, a human body is not something which was created with material parts according to a theory. It is a great mystery—a product of the Creator. It is also entirely different from vegetation, birds, beasts or fish; it is a spiritual being on a much higher level.
Medicine for Tomorrow—Okada-Style Spiritual Finger-Pressure
Therapy as the New Japanese Medicine, May 15, 1936
translated by KH* * *
“Byōki no Hontai” is the ninth chapter of the 1936 Okada-shiki Shiatsu Ryōhō (Okada-Style Spiritual Finger-Pressure Therapy) publication titled Myōnichi no Ijutsu—Shinnihon Ijutsu to Shite no Okada-shiki Ryōbyōhō (Medicine for Tomorrow—Okada-Style Spiritual Finger-Pressure Therapy as the New Japanese Medicine). This publication requires the long title to distinguish it from the 1942-43 publication Myōnichi no Ijutsu (Medicine for Tomorrow). “Byōki no Hontai” has previously appeared in translation. Citation is given below for reference.
“The True Nature of Illness,” True Health, 1987, page 27.