Establishing a Correct View of Life and Values (Part 2) (2012-09-02)
Establishing a Correct View of Life and Values (Part 2)
Xu Wenbing
2012.9.2
Studying TCM Starts with Recognizing Characters
In 1996, on the anniversary of Beijing TCM University, we invited the elder Qi Gong to inscribe a plaque for Beijing University of Chinese Medicine — the yi he wrote was the traditional 醫, in marble on the gate. Soon a man from a language-and-writing committee came and said it was illegal. They chiseled out those two characters and patched in — (the simplified yi) from one of Qi Gong's other writings. Do you not find this saddening? More: in 2007 I published Yi in the Characters (Zilizangyi), explaining Chinese characters. I asked whether the book could be set in traditional, vertical type. The publisher said: this violates the State Language and Writing Work Law. I said: do we live under Han rule? It is illegal to publish my book in my ancestors' script. In 2011 a Taiwanese publisher noticed the book, bought the rights via Xiamen, and published a traditional-vertical edition in Taiwan. It was named one of the China Times Ten Best Books last year.
I urge those who would study TCM: first, recognize the traditional characters. The simplification has more or less wiped out half of Chinese culture. Some say this is alarmism — let us try.
Zàng (脏), of zàng-fu. The character also reads zāng (dirty). With high blood-lipids, high blood pressure, high uric acid, so many tumors — I say the Chinese character did it: the inner organs are made dirty, the sight of the character nauseates. Where did it come from? Two characters merged into one. 藏 (zàng — store) is the old form, or even without the moon radical, 藏; this is our old zàng (zàng — viscera). 臟 (zāng — dirty) is zāng. Reading the old books these two are crystal clear.
Another: xī (溪 — stream). TCM has acu-points named xī — Taixi, the third point of small-intestine channel Houxi. Studying needling we ask: what is Taixi? A great little stream? Cannot be parsed. The teacher said: the ancients named it — I do not know. From where simplified? 谿. Set against what character? 谷 (gu — valley). Huangdi Neijing: "The great meeting of flesh is named gu; the small meeting of flesh is named xī (谿)." In thickly muscled places, a wide groove between sections is gu; a fine narrow groove is xī. It speaks of qi.
Chinese characters may be simplified — for private letters, vernacular — but for serious official matters, things representing the wisdom of one's people, how casually to simplify? Traditional characters, after thousands of years' sedimentation, oracle-bone, bronze, various scripts down to today, have their reasons. They are mostly six elements: pictograph, picto-phonetic, ideographic, transferred-noting, borrowed, indicating. The Six Books. Traditional characters trigger a holographic image in the mind — the great feature of Chinese thinking above phonetic-script peoples. Phonetic-script thinkers think single-direction, fixed-logic — logic-OCD. 1+1 must equal 2; say greater than or less than and they crack. But in TCM, 1+1 has 100 possibilities. When I have to translate these via English in the US, I suddenly see how brilliant our ancestors were.
For example, 靈. It depicts a wu (shaman), with mouth chanting, communicating with heaven and earth, calling rain, and the rain falling. TCM finally is grasped by the heart; with simplification the heart is cut out. 愛 — has heart. Now love (爱) has no heart. 應 — has heart. Now should (应) has no heart.
Another: 頭 — why does head carry the ye radical? 頂, 額, 顏 (face) — all have ye. Pronounced xiè, ye indicates the skull. All characters relating to the skull bear ye. So I urge: recognize the characters — surely no harm.
After recognizing, 識.
The ancients spoke compactly. Why? Inscribing oracle-bone or bamboo slip is labor — say in one character, do not use two. The brevity and precision of the ancients. The vernacular? We baby children: don't say put on shoes, say putt-on shoe-shoe. For the immature, baby talk. The vernacular turns high language into baby talk. Putting two similar words together — jījīwāwā — annoying. Worse: in use, ambiguity grows; finally no one knows what the character means.
E.g. qiong — poor. Now it means no money. Why so? Because the two characters pin-qiong (poor and qiong) are paired. Anciently pin (貧) meant no money — house bare, washed-bare poor. Qiong meant at the end of the road. Shan qiong shui jin. Going to the watery edge. Do not chase the cornered foe: the foe with no money, don't chase him? No — when a man is cornered he turns and fights to the death, so surround three sides and leave one open. Qiong qie yi jian, bu zhui qingyun zhi zhi: I have come to the road's end yet I do not lower my high ambition. Now read by vernacular: when I have no money I still.... Now everyone reads it as money.
Again zou. Ancient zou means run. Zougou (running-dog) — running dog, not the strolling-dog. Bian Que saw Marquis Huan and turned around and zou — turned and ran. That fits the context.
In Shaanxi in the Great Production movement there was a play Husband and Wife Identify Characters. I say wrong — Husband and Wife Recognize Characters. Recognize (ren) refers to the concrete, the pointable. The suspect is set there — do you recognize him? Recognize. Do you know him? Know-the-face, not the heart. Recognize but do not know him. Shi (識) is high abstraction, the grasp of essence, not pointing at the concrete. Random people recognize spring's face — point to spring? Cannot point. But I can feel. Who in the world does not shi you? I have not seen you, but I know you. Since our Huangdi Neijing program aired, all over the country: oh, you are the one who spoke on the Neijing — at least they shi I love TCM.
You recognize this character; through long shallow vernacular promotion you do not shi this character. So we cannot argue properly — seemingly both speaking Chinese, using the same characters, but you mean your meaning, I mine; or I as a teacher want to express my meaning, and at your end it becomes yours. The result: poor study, then TCM has problems. So I urge: each time you meet a compound, please split it — character by character to recognize and shi.
Simple example: cough (kesou). What is ke? What is sou? First, admit the two differ — else why two characters? Second, what is the difference? It struck me in the US: translate ke as cough or translate sou as cough? What is the difference? I checked the dictionary: ke — that is, sou. Sou — that is, ke. Where is the men's room? Next to the ladies'; where is the ladies'? Next to the men's. Cannot go further. Why pursue? Because, as a physician, the pathogenesis of each symptom is not the same; different pathogenesis, different rule of treatment, different drugs. We do not study characters for the sake of study. In college we were told: with phlegm = ke; without phlegm = sou. But there is dry ke — no phlegm — what then? And before a Peking-opera lao sheng enters, he tan-sou's — what is that? Chinese divide it: if vibration of the windpipe expels unclean air, mucus, phlegm from the windpipe — that is ke (cough); if reverse motion expels mucus from the esophagus and stomach — that is sou. So ke is a lung disease, sou is a stomach disease. Treat ke by treating the lung, treat sou by treating the stomach. The spleen is the source of phlegm; the lung is the vessel that holds phlegm.
Again teng (疼) and tong (痛). Translate to English — pain, suffering, ache. None catches the difference. Director Zhang of poetry-and-meter pointed it out: Chinese pronunciation has yin and yang — first and second tones rise, yang; third and fourth fall, yin. Sharp, burning, open sensation — teng; closed, sunken, cold, heavy sensation — tong. Yang — cryotherapy, ice pack — inside teng (疼) is winter (dong). Yin — open-it therapy — inside tong (痛) is yong (path); unblock — no tong; tong — not unblocked.
Another pair: shen and ti. People often ask: Doctor Xu, is exercise good for my health (shen-ti)? I ask: are you exercising the shen, or the ti? What is the difference? In one's 40s or 50s not to know — lived in vain. Anyone here who has lived in vain?
Shen is the trunk, qu is the torso, ti is the branches. Which matters? Si ti bu qin — not moving arms and legs. Can one without arms and legs live? Of course. On TV the round-melon man — only head and trunk — lives well. Poisonous-snake-bites-the-hand, the strong-man cuts the wrist — correct? Then which: keep-fit body (jian shen) or keep-fit limbs (jian ti)? Root important or tip? But all our gyms are jian ti — many sudden deaths happen there. With insufficient qi-and-blood, the body sacrifices peripheral circulation to keep blood in the trunk — self-protection. Then a fool forces qi-and-blood to the limbs; the trunk drains; sudden death. Ericsson's CEO died in a gym. Recently footballer Tao Wei died in a hotel — drinking, then went out to brisk-walk to break down the alcohol. After drinking the heart already beats fast; force blood to the limbs — the heart cannot bear it, collapse. Why does this happen? Because they do not recognize characters. Since 1949 it has been develop ti-yu (physical education), strengthen the people's ti-zhi — and the body has been hollowed out. Why exercise the limbs? It is showy. What is jian shen? Internal-style boxing's first step is standing-stake (zhanzhuang) — limbs unmoving like a tree-trunk; then all the five storehouses and six bowels begin to adjust, the gut starts to peristalse, burping, farting — that is jian shen. Huangdi Neijing: standing alone and guarding the spirit — spirit's root is in one's shen.
Crafts may be like mountains apart; medicine especially, Chinese or Western, complex and changeable. Think you can study a few years and treat yourself or others? Hard. But crafts may differ; principle is not separate. Whatever your trade, if you can tell me clearly your thinking and reasoning in treating illness, our thinking can communicate. So studying TCM culture does not mean everyone must become a doctor; but become a person who understands principle. With illness one will have a discriminating attitude, look from both sides, form one's own values and view. Many people lack this cultivation.
Most-asked: digestion. Patient says: Doctor Xu, my digestion is bad. I ask: is xiao poor or hua poor?
Xiao is physical change. Eat a piece of ice — chew, swallow, becomes 0°C water, then body-temperature water — this is xiao. Eat pork — chew, grind in the stomach to paste, still pork — xiao. Steamed bread, noodles — all xiao. But put a bite of bread in the mouth and it suddenly turns sweet — chemical change, starch into sugars. Hua is chemical change — under digestive enzymes, pork broken to its amino-acid units, ready to become human flesh — hua. Zhuangzi turning into a butterfly; eating pork turning to person-flesh — hua. Simply: xiao is mouth-chew and stomach-grind; not xiao — gulping, or stomach disease. Not hua — usually small-intestine trouble. Most digestive enzymes are in the small intestine: pancreatic, protease, lipase, bile. "Small intestine: the official of receiving fullness; substances are hua'd here." All qualitative changes occur in the small intestine. The small intestine is also called the red intestine; people should have a warm heart-and-intestine. Small-intestine temperature dropping — food cannot hua. The first sign of failure to hua is allergy — Western analysis calls it foreign-body protein. Why does milk make some have diarrhea? Not hua'd.
Small-intestine temperature low — a major problem. Look: we drink cold drinks, wear navel-bared tops, run the AC — all cold-heart, cold-teeth, weird illnesses. So digestion bad — I divide cleanly: xiao problem — treat the stomach; hua problem — treat shou-shaoyang and zu-shaoyang, gallbladder and sanjiao.
Last example: kuai-zhi (膾炙). There is a phrase kuaizhi renkou (on everyone's lips). What is kuai? Zhi? Kuai has the meat radical (月); zhi has fire above meat. Both are meat. The difference? Kuai is raw fish slices — sashimi. The ancients ate raw meat. Confucius said "kuai bu yan xi" — when eating sashimi, the finer cut the better. Xin Qiji: "Speak not of the fine perch — when the west wind comes, has Ji Ying come back?" — at autumn when perch arrives, I resign and go home to eat sashimi. But raw fish is cold and hard to hua; how eat? First, dip in wasabi. The saying "green onion stings the nose, garlic the heart, wasabi shakes the demons" — it rouses sanjiao yang and yuan-qi; raises hua. Second, under sashimi a green leaf — TCM calls it suye (perilla), pungent-warm, resolves fish-and-crab toxin. Many get hives or diarrhea after seafood — TCM sees as crab-toxin. Eat with suye — toxin resolved. If already hives or vomiting/diarrhea — boil a pot of suye. Third, the sashimi plate has white shredded radish. For digestion-resolving. Last, a small dish of red pickled ginger. See: a cold raw food is paired with four pungent-warm, digestion-resolving, toxin-resolving items. There is a formula for cold-phlegm wheezing, Sanzi Yangqin Tang, also good for food-stagnation, containing baijiezi, suzi, laifuzi. White-mustard root is what wasabi is made from. Suzi's leaf? Suye. Laifuzi's root? The white radish. So the three ingredients with sashimi are in fact our TCM cold-phlegm-resolving herbs. The Chinese — do drug and food divide? Eating thus, can one not be healthy? But now: a plate of sashimi — where is suye? A plastic leaf as decoration. We eat crabs with ginger, vinegar, yellow wine. Now: chilled beer and crab — not get gout? who else gets gout! Lack of culture is fearful!
Japan preserved the Tang-Song culture they learned from China. If you hear my lecture and still say sashimi is Japanese, I will be cross. The Japanese feature is axial — they do not play tricks, do not toy. The Japanese studied Shanghan Lun and analyzed all 113 formulas precisely. But they do not understand the spirit behind it — they study word-count: gancao appears how often, raw gancao how often, raw fuzi how often, processed fuzi how often. Read like that, you go dumb. Chinese aim is meaning beyond words — the characters are guides for feeling. "The world's best writing is in Zhejiang; Zhejiang's best is in my hometown; my hometown's best is my brother; I correct my brother's writing." What word says the best in the world is mine? None. The atmosphere created by four sentences — other peoples cannot grasp it.
Zhi — roast meat? Roast, bake, zhi differ. Roast — in the fire, directly touching flame; bake — radiant heat from flame's periphery; zhi — the heat above the flame tip. Zhi expels water and oil. A pan-fried steak — half fills you; zhi meat — you can eat several. Why? Zhi meat is slightly black, slightly bitter. Burnt rice resolves digestion; the black on roast meat resolves meat-accumulation. Meat is salty; bitter drains heart. This is TCM culture.
So having studied characters, you cannot but respect the ancients, and cannot but reflect that we live too coarsely.
On the basis of recognize-and-shi we form zhi (knowing). The sum of zhi is zhi (智, wisdom) — the first stage of TCM study: at the conscious level you have some understanding. But this is far from enough. Why? You still lack hui (慧).
What is the difference between zhi and hui? This brings us to a TCM fundamental, long denied as idealism: the heart-vs.-no-heart issue. We say five storehouses, six bowels, but it is in fact six storehouses, six bowels. Why six storehouses? Because there are two hearts — shou-jueyin pericardium (xin bao) and shou-shaoyin heart (xin).
Difference between the xinbao and xin? All storehouses have the flesh radical: wei, shen, chang, sanjiao's jiao (in traditional). Then xinbao? Our textbook says xinbao is the fat membrane wrapping the heart — the gao-huang of the disease has entered the gao-huang. Why is TCM not spreading? Because translators of TCM books do not understand TCM. Let me say: xinbao is the fleshly heart-organ. Only one character has no flesh radical — xin — and this xin without flesh is the form-beyond-form of the fleshly organ: the shen (spirit).
Chinese never separate xin from shen. There is a Zen story: wind moves, banner moves. A young monk says the wind moves the banner; another, the banner moves. They argued; the teacher came: your hearts move. Many hearing this skip past. Who makes the wind move? The earth's rotation. Who makes the earth turn? The sun. Who makes the sun shine? The galaxy. Why does the galaxy too turn? The cosmos... back to the end, jingqi-shen. The meaning of shen is that which gives forth the myriad things. Not me — Shuo Wen Jie Zi says so. What is gives forth the myriad things? The cosmos and all its things come from there. Translate: the Creator, God. China was anciently called Shenzhou — Land of Spirits! So the master says: hearts move. To discuss the existence and motion of the myriad things, finally one reaches shen. So TCM says the heart stores shen.
There is another character: yi. We say fits-the-heart-as-one-wishes (yi). Xin and yi differ.
Another Zen tale: a young monk grew up in the temple. One day taken to town, he saw a girl. "Master, what is that?" Master: "That is a tiger. Tigers eat people." That night the boy could not sleep. Master: "What is it?" "I keep thinking of the tiger." Human nature, basic instinct — a man liking a woman — that is the basic heart (ben xin). Master taught: women are tigers — later-acquired conscious knowledge. The boy tossed because heart and consciousness fought. Modern people suffer for the same reason: the education we receive contradicts our basic heart, and we put on one face in public and another at home — those weaker in psyche collapse. So what fits the heart often does not fit the will; what fits the will often does not fit the heart. Follow the basic heart, and life is easier. Now we live at the yi (consciousness) level, putting on for others. Some women wear unhealthy clothes — I say take off the tight, the slimming; in winter, don't wear skirts — be more comfortable, healthier. She says: only when others find me pretty am I comfortable.
Our TCM textbooks translate the heart stores shen as mind. Wrong. Mind is yi — changeable. Make up your mind, change your mind. But xin is innate, unchangeable. Many never know there are two selves — one innate, one made by upbringing. Born in Palestine, you may want to become a human bomb — taught.
A young woman seeks a partner; she seeks who makes her heart leap. Her mother seeks for her — yi is at work: that boy's income? Has he a house? Married before? Divorced — with children? All later-acquired. What suits the mother-in-law often does not move the daughter; what moves the daughter often does not suit the mother. Many family tragedies thus.
To live wholly by the heart is hard; we can only seek balance between heart and yi. To live wholly for love, do not marry — marriage is wholly yi, peculiar to human society. So find balance; know yourself.
These three — recognize-know-learn — are still at the yi level, one critical step from real TCM mastery: moving the heart. The next three enter the hui level — awaken, feel, comprehend.
A Higher Level of Comprehending TCM
I tell many patients: first restore your sense (zhijue). Zhi is the basic principles of disease-prevention and yangsheng; jue depends only on yourself. What is jue? Whether the water is cold or hot, whether the food feels good in the stomach — you should jue it. Animals lack zhi but have jue, so most live healthy. Now: no zhi and no jue — cold drink before meals, no longer knowing tasty or not, no longer knowing fullness. Look at the obese Americans — no jue. Treating stomach: I do not fear the patient who says I have stomach pain, reflux, distension, burping; I fear the one who feels nothing — abdomen ice cold yet says I eat everything with relish. Go get a gastroscopy. The house is on fire and the alarm rings; this person does not fight the fire — he removes the alarm. Likewise, injury and ice — no longer hurts; jue gone, but the wound is there. See athletes — Liu Xiang this Olympics. Pain is the alarm; rest. He gets a numbing injection and runs on. Tired and ought to sleep — drinks a Red Bull and stays up. Recently a 20-year-old girl died, running a Taobao shop all night.
A Houpu student's father-in-law, 72 years old, came for gout. On examination, the area around his navel was icy — gloomy cold, a hard cold mass from middle-cavity to lower-cavity. I asked: is your stomach uncomfortable? "I eat much fruit, no restrictions in eating; my stomach is fine." I gave two weeks of medicine; after, a little warmer, but the mass did not scatter. I said: go for a check. The old man stubborn, refused. After the second course of medicine he started stomach pain — gastroscope: first time, color wrong but biopsy negative; second time, took 9 samples near the pylorus, still negative; the doctor responsible — said third time: stomach cancer. Cancer not caused by two weeks of my medicine. Two weeks I did what? I cleared the yin-cold blocking his stomach; his jue returned. He felt wrong — but the check was already late.
We are over-scientized today, trusting only instruments. Han Fei said: a Zheng person wanted to buy shoes, measured his own foot, then forgot to bring the measure. He got the shoes but said I forgot my measure; went back to fetch; by the time he returned, the market closed. Asked: why not try them on? "I trust the measure, not myself." We today trust the instrument over our own feeling. A strange present phenomenon: a person feels wholly ill, checks reveal nothing. Why not treat by feeling rather than indicator? Why apply Western blood-sugar, blood-lipid, blood-pressure indicators to Chinese bodies? How many people live by such indicators?
If you believe that Heaven, making us, gave us a good jue system — care for it, cherish it. So many sweat profusely and dump cold water on themselves; TV ads show children pouring cold drinks — these are subliminal poison ads.
Chinese stress diet. People now obsess on what to eat — analysis, lab work. Yet a Chinese saying: what the stomach likes is supplementing. From childhood — where you grew, what habits, what enzymes and flora in you — formed your system; you eat differently from others. Now we eat by science — so many grams of protein powder a day, so many vitamin pills — eat to a life with no flavor. Because this is base need; what controls it is po (the corporeal soul).
Po is a nerve-spinal reflex system. Compared to shen, lower-level, but indispensable for self-protection. A pan of boiling water; the hand goes on and lifts off at once — instinctive po reflex. If you raise it to consciousness: "that water is 100°, will burn epidermis and dermis, blister, scar" — by the time you act, the hand is gone. I treat many patients: "I used to eat cold things without trouble; now even a little, uncomfortable." I say: congratulations, you have become a noble.
Through standing-stake and sitting meditation, one can jue the running of channel qi. From the recognize-know-learn layer this cannot be conveyed. You have not eaten a pear; I say pear is sour, like preserved plum plus sugar. After all this, do you have an impression? Red-cooked pork — taste it! This jue can perceive the running of channels. Initially, the 12 channels; with practice, the 8 extraordinary vessels. The Gansu Health Bureau chief once spoke of opening renmai and dumai — outrage, pseudo-science. So TCM is noble — only in small circles can it spread; speak to the lower form-level, and they jump to curse.
We want to jue qi; at minimum, your hand is warm. So a standard to tell true TCM from false: the doctor's hand on your pulse is warm — qi can come through. What state is the penis when filled with qi and blood? Compared to empty. Same principle. So I hope you recover jue; on jue, experience the qi TCM speaks of.
A level higher — gan (feel). Not low-level neural reflex, but moving the heart. Tong gan, holographic — one leaf reveals autumn, a glance through the spot sees the whole leopard, even crosses time and space. Deeper still — sounds superstitious. By a few words, a little information, I can know your whole state. Not the sixth sense — instinct, in everyone. Only through several millennia of evolution we have over-grown the conscious and lost the innate.
What is the difference between gan and jue? Deep heart-movement. There used to be a joke: touching the wife's hand, like the left touching the right — no feeling at all. I say: wrong character. Touch-jue is still there. But the gan — the heart leaping in love-days — gone. This gan, in clinic, can perceive the pathogenesis behind the patient's bodily signs. Easy to say — but without the recognize-know-learn groundwork, without jue, without rich clinical experience, hard to reach.
My mother's teacher used to live in a courtyard with a screen-wall behind the gate. Patients came in; passing the screen, he knew whether the case was treatable. If, on the patient passing, his heart panicked — incurable, too heavy; however heavy, even on a stretcher, if his heart did not panic, treatable. Sounds superstitious today.
At the gan level one can converse wordlessly, transmit by heart, smile holding a flower — without writing, at this level even language is redundant. Everyone has had this — in real love, that state, that tacit understanding, xin-xin-xiang-yin. Cannot be put in language; near the Way. Love you more than I can say. At this level one can know a patient's hun-po, emotion — the heart in psychosomatic illness — solve cases ordinary doctors cannot, dig out the root, even reach his inner heart, peel away the deep marks of years of feeling-injury.
Some I dare not treat. I clearly remember: a middle-school classmate's wife had schizophrenia, came from far Datong. As they entered the consulting-room, my left cheek went numb. His wife, then abnormal, said: "Heh-heh, Doctor Xu, like other doctors, your face twitched the moment you saw me." That is gan, not expressible by language or logic. Chinese civilization, above other civilizations, has this on top of zhi. But now everyone uses zhi to explain it — unscientific. To accord with science is to be dragged down to lower-level operation — they degrade us. Many TCM doctors want to prove themselves scientific. I say: do you raise yourself or belittle yourself? Science is a method to know truth — not truth itself. TCM too is a method. We can complement and learn from each other; using your criteria to judge me is mad.
The eminent Wu Jieping, later Vice Chairman of the NPC Standing Committee, a Peking Union Medical College graduate, said in youth he denied TCM — disbelieved TCM could needle each malaria parasite to death. Old, he knew: TCM changes the environment in which the body's life takes place; the parasite cannot live there; malaria resolves. He had moved from shu to philosophy — speaking cause-condition-fruit. Western medicine targets the cause; TCM stresses condition (environment). Two trains on different tracks; we abandon our strength and chase Western medicine, spending public money to prove ourselves scientific. We visited a university — to prove spleen brooding knots qi, worry-thought injures spleen, they used a donkey as model; Shennong tasted herbs on the human model for thousands of years, they want an animal model. They put hay before the donkey but out of reach; the donkey broods, then injures spleen, loses weight, the TCM theory is proved. Public-funded; we train master's and doctoral students to fight with white mice and donkeys, not see patients.
Some say TCM is experiential medicine. Sorry, we have theory. Experiential means treated cases can be repeated — that is experience. Cases not yet seen, I can still treat — under theoretical guidance — that is theoretical medicine, not experiential.
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