Healing Art for Tomorrow Part Ⅱ
Written by Mokichi Okada, 1943

It shouldn’t be overlooked that present medicine doesn’t admit what is actually happening. Regarding this, let me tell you my own and others’ experiences. As for mine, I was suffering from chronic toothache more than twenty years ago. My four teeth kept hurting for more than a year. As I felt pain so much, my mental condition was affected. I thought that I would go insane. In the end, I tried to commit suicide several times. So, you would understand how terrible my pain was. I finally found that the pain was caused by toxic medicine. A certain incident revealed it after I suffered from pain for more than a year. At that time, I exhausted all possibilities and was desperate for any help. Then I heard that an ascetic in a certain Buddhism sect healed diseases very much. I immediately went to see him. He said, “You will be cured in a week but don’t go to the dentist all that time. That disturbs my practice.” So, I stop going to the dentist, where I went almost every day.

Three or four days passed since then and I surprisingly felt that my teeth didn’t hurt as much as before. At that moment, I felt as if I had an awaking. I found what caused toothache. That was the medicine used every time I went to the dentist. Looking back in that sense, everything came to my mind. At first, only one tooth hurt. After a while, another one started to hurt. Then the third one started to hurt and so on. The symptoms gradually got worse in that way. The first tooth was hard to heal so that it was pulled out. Soon after that, the tooth next to the pulled out one started to hurt. I finally had my four teeth pulled out. Even so, I had the other four teeth hurt. It means that I had eight bad teeth in total. I even thought that nothing was more painful than my toothache in the world. Under such conditions, I went to the dentist every day of the weak for more than a year. I had no days without medicine applied. It sometimes had medicine applied several times a day. I also went to see some famous dentists in Tokyo but my teeth couldn’t be cured. I went to the dentist at Imperial University and Tokyo Dental College but my symptoms didn’t get better or rather got worse. Then I met the ascetic as I described above. I luckily knew that going to the dentist itself worsened toothache. I was surprised at that fact and stopped going there. I left my teeth as they were and then they gradually got better. This incident told me the harmful effect of medicine for the first time.

In this way, I ended up suffering from a terrible chronic toothache. That happened because the dentist ignored what actually happened to me. I want to tell you this fact. First, I found one of my front teeth got a cavity. I went to the dentist as I had to have the dental cavity filled. Then the dentist said, “Your tooth should be completely disinfected.” So, he disinfected my tooth several times. As I recall, a very strong disinfectant was used so many times. The dentist overdid it. That was the original cause of my chronic toothache. My tooth started to hurt because the toxic medicine penetrated its root. The dentist filled my tooth with cement before that pain had gone. Soon after that, therefore, I felt intense pain. I went to the dentist the next day and asked him to remove the cement as I felt severe pain probably due to that. However, he replied, “That cannot happen. I filled the cement after fully disinfecting the tooth.” So, he never listened to me. I wondered why he said so. I did feel pain. That actually happened. However, he said, “It cannot be true.” He chopped the logic. He denied the truth by logic. The dentist said, “In any case, you cannot feel pain. Please leave it until tomorrow. If you still feel pain, come to see me.” I had no choice but to follow his words. However, I still felt pain or the pain got a little severe the next day. The dentist said, “I tried to examine your case with German dentistry books but I couldn’t find a case like yours. I don’t know why.” He just tilted his head in confusion but reluctantly removed the cement. The pain was reduced very much but I still felt mild pain. To eliminate that pain, I went to the dentist one after another as I described above. Then the pain gradually got severe and finally became incurable.

You cannot understand why the dentist denied the real pain with the logic as above. As a matter of fact, such a case often happens. I heard many similar stories from my patients. For example, a person who had had an appendix operation still felt pain there even though it was supposed to be cured completely. In that case, the doctor said, “You cannot feel pain because I removed your appendix.” However, the person actually felt pain there. Another person told me a very interesting experience he had. He was about fifty years old at that time and suffered from chronic dizziness. He went to certain famous neurosurgery. The neurosurgeon told him that he would be completely cured in two months. He believed his words and kept going there. Two months passed but his symptom never got better. So, he complained to the doctor. The doctor replied to him, “Please give us one more week.” He accepted his request but nothing changed after a week. He got very angry and pressed the head doctor. The head doctor said, “You no longer suffer from any disease. We won’t find any symptoms no matter how many times we medically examine you. So, you don’t have to come anymore.” He finally became unbearable to listen and said to him in a firm attitude, “That is extremely deceptive!” The head doctor finally apologized to him and refunded all amount treatment fees that he paid.

I will give you another story. A woman, who was around forty years old, had a problem with her brain. She felt that something existed in the centre of her brain and it interfered with her thoughts. Therefore, she always kept talking loudly not to be disturbed by it. I felt really sorry for her. She trusted a certain doctor. He has already passed away but was an authority in the field of neurology at the Imperial University. She had got medical treatment from him for about a year. One day after a year or so, he said, “Your illness is healed. So, you don’t have to come anymore.” She said, “Something still exists and interferes with my thoughts. Nothing has changed.” He replied, “You will be naturally healed when you take your mind off as much as possible.” He said such an unreliable thing and pushed her away. When she was troubled in such a situation, she came to see me.

There are many examples like those. Every time I heard such a story, I sympathize with doctors. They learn the latest medical theories and methods and try to put them into practice. Despite their effort, it didn’t work and their patients complain. They would have to be pessimistic. No matter how I think of that, they are apparently innocent. Then why does that happen? It is because doctors think that medicine is progressing. As a matter of fact, it is not. They just haven’t realised this truth yet. Therefore, the more the doctor work hard, the more they lead their patients to unfortunate consequences. That is almost unbelievable but always and countlessly happens.

Some time ago, a certain medical doctor expressed his true feelings to me. He said that he as a doctor was always struggled to cope with the patient’s relatives when the patient’s symptom was getting worse. He always tries to find what kinds of explanations can convince them. Things like that could really happen. On the other hand, Johrei is effective almost without exceptions. Therefore, not only patients but also their relatives are profoundly moved. I always hear from my disciples that they are weeping for joy.

Translated by N.H.