Kaneko Shoseki Nature and Origin of Man
Turning to the writing of Kaneko Shoseki, who became a powerful healer after a partial enlightenment experience in 1910 after many years of practice of Zen Buddhism, we find further cross-cultural corroboration of the primal role of the Vital Center of Man, and the revelation of a further level of meaning approaching its transcendent aspects:
If one concentrates all of the activities of the mind which are normally directed outward, that is, ideas, judgments, feelings, volitions and even the function of breathing, in fact if all the life energy is concentrated in the center of the body, in the tanden {dantian), a new sphere of consciousness arises within us which completely transcends the opposition of objective and subjective, of outward and inward and even our usual, vague sleep-clouded consciousness. This leads to the absolute and final stage of spiritual experience in which one realizes that God himself lives and works as the highest principle and the Primordial Source of life in every single being, as well as in Nature as a whole. That which reigns in the individual as the unmediated administrator of the Divine Law within every human being is what I call the primordial If or the original One. For it is not only that from which all man's activity, whether conscious or unconscious, proceeds, but also it is the one thing in man which belongs completely and directly to the highest Being. Realization of this is the deepest experience which the human mind can reach.
To every activity of body as well as of mind the function of breathing stands in the closest relationship, a relationship which is not only a physiological one but an immediate essential one. For between the original One and the external ego there are two connecting links, namely breathing and the system of the 14 keiraku (energy channels).
By keiraku I mean those imperceptible fine passages in the body which connect bones, muscles, brain, intestines, the senses, etc. with each other and eventually reconnect them all with the primal Life Force. Like the blood vessels and nerve fibers connecting all the inner organs, they run through the whole body, mostly alongside the blood vessels. But in relation to their function the keiraku are quite different - their function is in the nature of supervising the circulation of blood and the movement of thought and allowing each individual organ to work harmoniously with all the others. They neither nourish the organs nor are they controlled by the brain. They are, so to speak, a network of passages which transmits to all parts of the body the spiritual-physical rhythm of the Life Force. Thus the keiraku working together with the Life Force, which unites them in itself, are the only parts of man which belong unqualifiedly to the universal Life. Furthermore we can apprehend them by this - that in death they disappear completely, that no trace of their existence can be found in a corpse. . .
Apart from the normal communication between men through language and action there is another quite different sort of mutual influence. It is that of the rhythm of the Original strength which permeates all human beings and all Nature. Through it every individual thing in essence and, as it were, underground, is connected with every other. If then one who is further removed from the working of the Primordial Force is close to one who lives more in accord with it, the rhythm of the Primordial Force will certainly be transmitted from the one to the other. The latter, without knowing it, exerts a good influence on the former. . .
The relation between artistic creation and the tanden, the seat of the Primordial, is immediate and essential. Neither the hand nor the head should paint the picture. It is a necessary condition for the expression of the essential in all art that the artist should empty and free his head, and then concentrate his whole energy in the tanden. His brush will then move of itself in accord with the rhythm of the Primordial Force.
When the Primal Force, ever working gradually within us, finally reaches the highest peak of its activity, then out of the thick heavy fog of ordinary consciousness there bursts forth from the eternal Being the clearest possible state of consciousness . . . Here no fixed form is perceptible, neither an object nor an I, neither an inner nor an outer, breathing is suspended, the bodily shell completely vanished. Here no body exists, no mind, neither man nor world. The ego is completely at one with the world. What alone reigns in this experience is Universal.
The primal Force of Life, exactly like water rushing swiftly through a tube, streams from eternity to eternity whirling around in the lower part of one's body....
Reference:
Von Durckheim, Karlfried Graf, Hara, The Vital Centre of Man, Allen & Unwin, 1962.
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