The Late Aming Tu on the Inspiration for Mindfully Facing Disease and Death

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POSTSCRIPT BY AMING TU 1

When I was first diagnosed with cancer and had to be hospital­ ized, I was shocked to discover that, out of the thousands of books in my collection, I could not find a single book that I could bring with me; in spite of having read countless books during my life, there was not a single one that could accompany me in my life’s final journey.

A GIFT IN DISGUISE

Towards the end of 2005 I accompanied my mother to the hospital for a health check. Because it was taking quite a while, I took the opportunity to get a check-up myself. As soon as an ultrasound scan was performed, something wrong was detected in my liver. The doctor immediately scheduled an MRI scan and made arrangements for my hospitalization. I remember that the day I was diagnosed with cancer I went to the Yángmíng mountains for a walk, just as I always had, to enjoy the flowers and eat some local vegetables; emotionally I didn’t experience much of an upset and was able to enjoy a serene afternoon. Yet after that I quickly wrote down my will and wrapped up as many engagements as possible before taking ten days of leave for my upcoming hospitalization.

1 In this postscript Aming Tu explains what led to the writing of this book; see also above p. 6.

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Being hospitalized is a bit like going on a retreat; one is left to face oneself and come to terms with life and death. I was to go on a ten-day voyage of the body and mind. Bringing with me a small bag, I entered the hospital ward and began an encounter with my life and this sickness. From one point of view this was a precious opportunity; I could no longer use my busy schedule as an excuse. This ten-day retreat was an invaluable chance for me to calm down and reconnect with my own body and mind.

MIND AND BODY DURING MY TEN-DAY “HOSPITALIZATION RETREAT”

Because this was my first time being hospitalized, everything was new to me, and these experiences are indeed quite different from one’s daily routine. The eyes could only see people, events, and things related to illness; the ears for the most part could only hear moans and sorrowful sighs; the nose was filled with the scent of medicine and disease; the tongue could only taste flavourless and bitter substances; and the body experienced the cold surfaces of medical equipment or the piercing sensation of a needle. The mental and physical experience of the five aggregates of bodily form, feeling, perception, mental formations, and consciousness was equally alien and unpleasant.

I experienced much anguish during this period, but the most unbearable aspect of the ordeal was the physical pain. This kind of pain doesn’t let you sit, lie down, or sleep and, at times, even makes breathing difficult; the feeling of trying to catch one’s breath during one of those bouts of intense pain can hardly be put into words and describing the sensation to the doctor proved challenging. This kind of unspeakable pain was akin to that expressed by the venerable Khemaka in the Saṃyuktaāgama: “It is just as if a cow butcher with a sharp knife were to cut open a living [cow’s] belly to take its internal organs. How could that cow endure the pains in its belly? My belly is now more painful than that cow’s.”2 When I first read this passage I

2 See above p. 91.

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was deeply moved; I was shocked to find in the discourses such an accurate and vivid description of my predicament.

THE KOAN OF PAIN

This kind of unbearable pain led me to ask myself: what kind of teaching could help me overcome this intense suffering? Apart from the physical pain, finding a way of facing the feeling of uncertainty brought about by my illness was also a question which troubled me deeply. In the newspapers and magazines cancer was presented as leading inevitably to death; for this reason the problem of death would often surface in my mind, bringing with it much unease and worry. It is perhaps fair to say that this feeling of pain and helplessness cannot be fully grasped by the sympathetic observer by means of mere empathy.

In this situation, as I started to look for ways of facing pain and death, I also began a deeper reflection: what teaching could I find refuge and guidance in for the remainder of this life? How did the Buddha guide the ill and the dying? How did he teach them to face death? These questions would keep swirling in my mind just like a “head phrase” (huàtóu), the word or short sentence one contemplates in Chan practice, also referred to as koan (gōng’àn).

FINDING INSPIRATION IN THE SCRIPTURES

After leaving the hospital I started surveying the discourses in search of methods of practice suitable for the ill and dying.

Eventually I came across a group of discourses in the Saṃyuktaāgama which offer a detailed account of the teachings given by the Buddha to his disciples on practices for facing illness, pain, and death. These texts provide a record of how the Buddha taught disciples who had fallen ill, including both senior and novice monks, as well as elderly and young laymen.

As I started perusing the discourses, I discovered to my great surprise that, even though the discourses from this collection had been delivered haphazardly in response to particular situations, one could find in these neatly arranged, concise, and simple discourses a systematic and profound exposition of the

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practice and its conceptual framework; the more I read and analysed the contents of these discourses, the more appreciative and filled with joy I became.

As I worked my way through the Pāli parallels, I also found that a comparative side-by-side study of the texts enhanced my understanding of the teachings and helped me identify the essence of the Buddha’s message. My work eventually led me to delineate the teaching’s overall framework as well as identify the sequential stages of practice, revealing the collection as a precious resource for practice.

Later on, having been in and out of hospital several times already, these discourses not only proved to be a precious companion for facing my illness, they also became something that I would share with people around me, whether it be in the classroom with my students, or in casual conversations with friends. My sharing of these texts slowly aroused the curiosity of various people around me. Yet, perhaps because for most of us death feels like a very distant prospect, the people I encountered did not take the time to look more closely at the discourses. I felt as if I had failed to help people understand the significance of these teachings. For this reason I decided to sort the texts into a book with the hope that, with my preliminary attempts at analysing and classifying the contents in hand, it would be easier for me to share the teachings with others.

THE STORY OF ANĀTHAPIṆḌIKA

In all my readings of this collection, the most moving story was certainly that of Anāthapiṇḍika. Ānanda and Sāriputta visited him when he had become very ill. When the two monks asked Anāthapiṇḍika how he felt, the householder said, “My affliction is now extreme and there is little to rely on. I experience an increase, I do not experience a decrease.”3 Then Sāriputta offered him guidance to help him face pain and death.

At that moment Anāthapiṇḍika burst into tears; this strong emotional reaction was triggered by Sāriputta’s exposition of the wonderful Dharma. Indeed, Anāthapiṇḍika had practised 3 See above p. 138.

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the Dharma for more than twenty years and had, as a result, been able to face the growing pain with great courage. I was deeply moved when I came across this passage. It also made me think, “I have studied the Dharma for so many years. What really have I learned?”

Over the course of my twenty to thirty years of study of the teachings, my main area of research had revolved around textual study and the digitization of Buddhist scriptures. Yet this illness had drawn my attention back to a more fundamental question: what is the core of the Buddha’s teaching? Was it not his encounter with old age, sickness, and death that led the prince Siddhartha to leave his palace and begin his quest to find freedom from this suffering?

It was only then that I truly understood the following two passages: “There are these three things which the whole world does not like to think about. What are the three? That is, they are old age, disease, and death” and “Because there are these three things in the world that one does not like to think about, that is, old age, disease, and death, therefore Buddhas, Tathāgatas, appear in the world and the world comes to know the teaching realized by Buddhas, Tathāgatas, being widely taught [to people].”4 I understood that this cultivation and this realization are truly at the core of the Buddha’s message. In a way, this sickness allowed me to rediscover the Buddha’s teaching.

THE DISCOURSES AS MEDICAL RECORDS

As I first read the discourses on illness, it struck me that each small discourse resembled a kind of condensed medical record of the “treatment” undergone by the person receiving the teachings. During my hospitalization I had learned a bit about how doctors fill out patient-information forms to help me understand my own medical history sheet. I learned that often doctors will use a framework called SOAP (Subjective,

4 See above p. 116.

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Objective, Assessment, and Plan) when creating the medical records of patients.5 Later I made use of this SOAP model and created a “patientinformation form” for each one of the discourses on illness with information on the patient himself, the time and place of the teacher’s visit, the subjective description of the illness by the patient, the observable symptoms, the prescription, the prognosis, and so on. Using this method to analyse the discourses allowed me to identify a comprehensive set of practices.

In my experience, this kind of SOAP framework, which closely resembles the structure of the four noble truths described in the discourse on the Buddha as a physician,6 is especially well suited to modern people. By presenting the contents of the discourses in this way, people, and doctors and carers in particular, are able to look at these texts in a different way, giving them a fresh outlook on illness and death. Having sorted, compared, and analysed the contents of this corpus, I arrived at the following list of people who could benefit from these teachings: • patients could rely on them for their personal practice as well as for recitation; • doctors, carers, and chaplains could use them as a supple­mentary reference book in their interactions with patients; • people in good health might use them as a guide or an introductory exposition to be used in one’s daily practice to prepare for disease and death.

In short, I believe the selection of discourses in this book is especially well suited to those with busy lives who do not have the time to study all the discourses extensively. As such, this collection constitutes very good introductory reading which

5 “Subjective” refers to the patient’s subjective description of the ailment, “objective” documents the results from the medical check, “assessment” corresponds to the physician’s diagnosis, and “plan” delineates the prescribed treatment.

6 See above p. 9.

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also provides precious guidance for meditative practice as presented in this book.

LAST THOUGHTS

“Today is the last day of my life.” Since the onset of my illness, I have used this phrase as a guiding principle for my life: I have viewed every class, every meeting, every get-together, and every conversation as a farewell ceremony.7 With this attitude, the mind is filled with gratitude and a deep appreciation of each moment. Each morning is like the beginning of a new life: “Today is the first day of my life.”

Having read the discourses on illness after a new close encounter with death, I felt that it was truly a shame that this treasure had been buried deep in the vast Buddhist canon for so long; few had ever taken notice of it and even fewer had used it as a guide to their practice. I am grateful for venerable Anālayo’s dedication in carrying out the selection’s translation and writing accompanying explanations. I feel deeply blessed to be able to finally hold this book in my hands, a book that can accompany me in this life’s final journey!

7 See above p. 203.

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