Deciding how I shall write about the bulk of Chih-I’s section in the Mo-Ho Chih-Kuan has been complicated. There is much in his work that is important especially given his role in collecting, systematizing, and disseminating the full body of Chinese medicine available during his time. He is often referred to as the father of Buddhist medicine and in fact Nichiren referred to him as the emanation of Medicine King Bodhisattva.
Medicine King Bodhisattva appears in Chapter XXIII, titled “The Previous Life of Medicine King Bodhisattva” of the Lotus Sutra. The chapter opens with Star-King-Flower Bodhisattva saying to the Buddha: “World-Honored One! Why does Medicine-King Bodhisattva walk about this Saha-World?” Chih-I in his travels to various centers of learning and from collecting information from visitors to his mountain temple gathered together as if he had walked all over the world a huge storehouse of medical wisdom and practice of his time.
In this chapter of the Lotus Sutra devoted to the story of Medicine King Bodhisattva the Buddha says:
“All living beings will be able to fulfill their wishes by this sutra… just as a patient who finds a physician”
“Anyone who hears especially this Chapter of the Previous Life of Medicine King Bodhisattva also will be able to obtain innumerable merits. …When he obtains this truth his eyes will be purified. With his purified eyes he will be able to see seven billion and two hundred thousand million nayuta Buddhas or Tathagatas, that is as many Buddhas as there are sands in the River Ganges.”
“I will transmit this Chapter of the Previous Life of Medicine King Bodhisattva to you. Propagate this chapter throughout the Jambudvipa in the later five hundred years after my extinction lest it should be lost, and lest Mara the Evil One, the followers of Mara, gods, dragons, yaks, and kumbhandas should take advantage of weak point of the people of the Jambudvipa.’
“…this sutra is a good medicine for the diseases of the people of Jambudvipa. The patient who hears this sutra will be cured of his disease at once. He will not grow old or die.”
In this chapter repeatedly the Buddha tells Star-King-Flower about the merits and superiority of the Lotus Sutra. In seven different ways the Buddha extolls the superiority of the Lotus Sutra. “More honorable than the other sutras”, “father of all the sages and saints”, “superior to any of the other sutras expounded either by Tathagatas or by Bodhisattvas or by Sravakas”, “superior to any other sutra”, are a few of the superlatives given to the Lotus Sutra and leave no doubt about the intent of the Buddha that this Sutra is indeed the most efficacious teaching for all the inhabitants of the Saha world.
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Chih-I is most widely known as the great compiler and systematizer of Buddhism and the teachings of the Buddha which entered into China from various places such as Pakistan, Afghanistan, and India.
Because of the haphazard way in which Buddhism was brought to China due to both physical barriers such as the Himalayas it also was affected by the various languages and cultures from which the sutras were transmitted from. The Lotus Sutra itself is influenced greatly by the emerging merchant class and the impact of trade along the silk road. We see this in various parables told in the sutra. There is even architectural evidence to suggest that the compound of the father in the parable of the Burning House was more representative of Afghan than India. Chih-I though, not only systematized the cannons of Buddhism he also did the same for Buddhist medicine and traditional Chinese medicine.
The section of the Mo-Ho Chih-Kuan dealing with Contemplation on Disease offers very detailed instructions on how to diagnose and treat various diseases. It is with this information I struggled with the most. Not because of its complexity rather on its appropriateness for this book and for the casual reader. My chief concern is the tendency of people to self-diagnose and self-medicate their illnesses. These are tendencies that the readers of Chih-I’s writings would not even consider, knowing full well that these matters are best left to professionals. Professionals who have fully studied and trained with others skilled in the use of these traditional therapies. This book is not intended to be a self-help medical book. Rather the purpose, as I see it, is to offer guidance based on Buddhism in how to live in the presence of disease, what our practice can bring to our lives in disease, what we can gain or loose from our lives in disease, and how to attain enlightenment in disease.
There is much that I will omit from my writing that simply does not belong in this book given my objectives. I do not limit what I am writing about because I don’t think it is worth studying, it is most certainly worth our efforts to study the writings of Chih-I. I omit what I have, even upon careful consideration, with reluctance. My commissions are a matter of editorial selection in order to stick to the parameters of my objective for writing this book.
