Tenrikyo Dynamic Mission                                                                               Illness and Trouble - Parental Truth - pg.5

It is natural for a child that is in pain to pleadingly hold out its arms with the expectation that its parent will make the pain stop and as we know from our interaction with our own children it is natural for parents to want nothing more than to do just that. Sometimes a reassuring kiss and a hug is all that it takes to make it better but sometimes it is not. As adults we sometimes find ourselves in the same situation and appeal to God our original parent to make the pain stop and restore our health. In such circumstances the Tenrikyo Dynamic understands our point of view as being the point of view of a child. In the teaching that is the Tenrikyo Dynamic the point of  view of our original parent is intended to be understood by us as being a model of perfect parental love.  The point of view of our original parent is then the point of view that tirelessly tries every means possible to relieve us of our suffering, answer our prayers and make the experience of life joyous for us. 

When we look to the story of Miki Nakayama's awakening we see the kind of immediate, to our minds miraculous, relief from suffering that is most attractive to us. A closer look shows Miki, acting as an intermediary in a healing ritual, sincerely obeying the instructions to empty her mind. And in so doing allowing the causality ("Innen") of the single-hearted salvation of all kinds by awakening from the dreams of the self-centered imagination to single-heartedness. Which is the return of the mind to its original and natural state of  being one with the original parental mind of God ("kami ichijoo"). We are all invited to cure all of our illnesses and troubles just as She did, by following Her example and emptying our mind so that the true satisfaction of single-hearted salvation is all that remains.

Unfortunately, though we may sincerely want to enjoy single-hearted salvation we find following our original parent's instructions extremely difficult to understand and to do. That being the case our original parent provides a sure path of ordered step by step instruction for us to sincerely follow so that we can quickly awaken to the an understanding of God's free and unlimited workings, the single hearted salvation of all kinds. That sure path is a sincere expression of perfect parental love that is intended to employ all means appropriate for each and every human mind that wants it, to calm and settle their self centered imaginings and set up the causality of single-hearted salvation regardless of our time, place and maturity.

When, from our child's point of view, we think of obtaining a miraculous cure for our illnesses and troubles very few of us I suspect think that knowing and understanding the original cause of all things by sweeping our mind completely clean will do the trick for us. Our often deeply held traditional leanings being more toward the magical and mysterious.

Perhaps as regards cures for illness and bodily disorders our self centered imaginations and expectations are just naturally more in tune with the expectation of cures flowing from miracles and magical rites. After all the long history of our species has been one of a steady flow of unexplained surprises and wonders and our curiosity has allowed us to accumulate a good deal of worldly truth ("sekai no ri"). The tradition that I was raised in as a child is full of magical rites, miraculous cures and supernatural wonders. In my culture the miraculous parting of the Red Sea still ranks near the top of  true wonders and as I got older and had more exposure to other traditions I found that instances of true miraculous cures and wonders are common to all cultures both now and in the past.  In this regard those true stories are truths that are common in the world ("sekai nami") and they appear in various flavors in human cultures from all over the world and through all ages. Like human languages they undergo modifications and changes through time and have been readily accessible to human imaginations in all times and places.

In our sincere search for relief from suffering and the hope for a miraculous cure for illnesses, disorders of the body and troubles; the confrontation, misunderstanding, denial and disconnect between our naturally self-centered worldly common child's point of view and the intention of the mind of our original parent to bestow upon all human beings equally the joy that flows from the knowledge and understanding of God's  free and unlimited workings, begins here with our inability to accept what our parent of origin is offering to us. Though our self-centered child's point of view is not wrong it is not the point of view of single hearted salvation and as such our child's point of view has to be either immediately abandoned and surrendered - as was the case in Miki Nakayama's awakening - or gradually matured to the point where it is open to the reason that flows from the real truth of our origin.

What we pray for naturally and self-centeredly - our shallow self centered imaginings, desires and expectations, our point of view as a child - has nothing in common with the new and marvelous salvation that is being offered to all human beings equally by the mind of our original parent. Our ordinary default self-centered mental condition then makes it very easy for us to misunderstand the instructions and intention of our original parent.  The natural self centered condition of our mind serving to cloud our minds with truths, doubts and confusions and in so doing making it very difficult for us as we try to access, know and understand the mind and intention of our true original parent.

 In response to our prayers and pleas for help the mind of our original parent is tirelessly offering us all equally a quick and immediate cure for all of our human sufferings, illnesses, troubles and even a release from death by revealing to any and every human being equally (regardless of the time or place) the truth of our origin, the original cause of all things, the mind of our original parent. The tricky part for us is that we would like the promised revelation to be in the form of a familiar idea or ideas that conform to our already existing truths and expectations. The actual revelation however can only be realized through our own mind when it is totally purified and emptied of all thoughts.

 When we deeply and seriously think about (ponder, "shiyan") the talks and conversations that take place between our human self-centered imaginations and the mind of our original parent we can see that the intentions of the children (what we children naturally want self-centeredly) and the single intention of what our true and original parent is offering, not just for us in our situation of individual need but for all human beings equally, differ entirely.

Certainly among the self-centered human experiences that seem totally lacking in joy are illness, disorders of the body, troubles and death. In dealing with those very real concerns it doesn't take much thought to realize that the point of view of our human self-centered imagination, the point of view of a child,  immediately appears to be the only point of view that is available to us and at first glance the notion that any other point of view exists might - reasonably from the point of view of the human self-centered imagination - seem doubtful or even impossible. The teachings of our original parent of origin then can be represented and modeled as a conversation between the mind of our true and original parent and the doubts and misunderstandings that naturally rise up in our self-centered imaginations as the point of view of a child.

 The willingness of our original parent to enter into whatever kind of  "mud" of our self-centered imaginings and work to make them clear is the very essence of the point of view of our original and perfect parental love.

  The essence then of the point of view of our original parental mind is the willingness to enter into the "muddy water" of our self centered imaginations and work tirelessly to find ways to settle our minds so that we will be able to see things clearly. That is seeing things as they actually are from the point of view of the mind of our original parent as opposed to the way we ordinarily see them through the "muddy water" of our self-centered imagination.  In entering into the "muddy water" of our minds our parent of origin has to speak to us in terms that are  familiar to us in order to calm our minds so that we can begin to enjoy the healing that flows from the true and original parental mind.

The poems contain many metaphors for this clouded "muddy water" condition of mind, sometimes the metaphors "dust" and "debris" are also used. An interesting aspect of the poems is that they demonstrate numerous examples of the sincere mind of the parent in conversation with the point of view of the children. In all cases we children are hastened to let go of our worldly common truths and expectations and by so doing move from the point of view of a child to the point of view of our parent. That point of view is given to the imagination that has melted back into and become one with the mind of the original parent of origin. This return of the mind to its original pure condition is the single-hearted salvation. It is the salvation of all kinds for all human beings equally and it is what the Tenrikyo Dynamic is all about.

How then are we to know and understand that one truth, the original cause of all things, the truth of origin, the mind of God when our imaginations are naturally totally without knowledge of our true origin and instead are full of reasonable doubts and misunderstandings concerning its existence?

The Ofudesaki poems concerning illness and trouble use the experiences of the Nakayama family and the villagers who came to ask for miraculous healing as models of the way in which the human self centered imagination misunderstands the cause and experience of illness and trouble while at the same time the poems hasten us to sincerely perform the service thus working ("tsutome") quickly and sincerely at completely calming and settling our self-centered imaginations so that only the truth of their origin, the original cause of all things remains.

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