A Japanese Frame

	Book review on Near-Death Experiences by Corrazza, Ornella (2008) Reviewed by David Lorimer, 2009 published in Network Review No 99
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Most readers of this Review will already be familiar with at least some of the literature of near death experiences, which now dates back over 30 years. The focus of this new book by Ornella Corazza is the mind-body connection, introducing Japanese perspectives on this issue and contrasting them with our own Western understanding. A quotation from William Blake provides the thesis of the book: 'Man has no Body distinct from his Soul: for that called Body is a portion of Soul discerned by the five senses, the chief inlets of Soul in this age.' Ornella tries to steer a middle course between mind-brain identity and dualistic theories separating mind and brain, proposing 'a non-dualist, non-reductionist view' that is strongly influenced by Japanese theories of mind-body relations which reject any version of dualism, insisting that although mind and body may be conceptually distinguishable, they are not ontologically distinct. She stresses the importance of what the Japanese call 'between-ness', which has much in common with a Western phenomenological approach.

            The book gives many examples of the afterlife journeys from different cultures, at the same time analysing the nature and prevalence of the NDE, drawing on many examples. She cites OBEs from Hiroshi Motoyama, introducing the idea of Place as a core aspect of the NDE, which is developed in later chapters - experiencers travel to another place. It becomes clear that these afterlife journeys are culturally structured, which is equally true in the Japanese cases. Ornella describes the results of a small study she carried out in 2004, noting their salient features and the fact that every experiencer interviewed was sure that it was more than a dream. She puts these Japanese cases in the context of the myth of creation and comments on the significance of the river as a point of no return. Reflecting the integration of mind and body, Japanese culture makes no clear distinction between life and death, an interesting example of which is the Cherry Blossom Festival, one of the most important events of the year. It serves as the ultimate reminder of the beauty and impermanence of human life.

            The next two chapters report on experiences involving ketamine, comparing them with NDEs. The populations are very different, but there are many similar features in the experiences, for instance in connection with time, vision, the light, peace and joy, and unity with the universe. The reader gains a vivid appreciation of ketamine experiences through many examples, while some of the after-effects are also similar. Using the NDE scale and developed by Bruce Greyson, all the features are present in the ketamine experiences, although not all users have experiences similar to NDEs. Ornella then compares the two sets of experiences. Fewer ketamine experiencers report encounters with other beings or a vision of the Light, but more ketamine experiencers report being one with the Cosmos. Does this mean that both these sets of experiences are created by the brain? Some researchers suggest that both events involve NMDA receptors, but this in itself may be a facilitating condition rather than a cause. The findings are not conclusive in this respect, but they are consistent with the idea of the brain as a transceiver. Ornella considers the three main forms of explanation -- reductionist, psychological and transcendental, criticising each in turn. The transcendental hypothesis, for her, loses sight of the wholeness of mind and body. In this connection, she quotes from a document by the Church of England Doctrine Commission that the essential human being is an embodied whole so that our ultimate destiny must involve the transformation of our entire being rather than a separable soul. For me, the limitations of this way of thinking lie in restricting the notion of body to physical body, rather than envisaging other forms of body, as indeed St Paul does in his letter to the Corinthians when talking of a spiritual body. In any manifest world there must be distinct forms, so that body represents the outer form of the inner principle of consciousness. These things, however, are seen differently by the Japanese.

            For the Japanese, the word place (basho), underpinning their understanding of space, indicates the ground of our being, like a tree in the garden. Nishida explains that the 'basho wherein the object is implaced must be the same basho wherein the so-called consciousness is also implaced.' At a deeper level, basho becomes a container or envelope for various kinds of experiences, including the NDE. Intriguingly, Swedenborg, writing in the 18th century, described changes of state in the invisible world as corresponding to changes of space in the physical world; hence motion takes place at the speed of thought and the mind is immediately in the place imagined, a pattern confirmed by more modern experiencers such as Sir Auckland Geddes. In a world of thought, to think is to move.

In the last chapter, Ornella invites us to reconsider our notions of embodiment. Already, Rupert Sheldrake's work suggests a mind extended beyond the body has a field, while the work of Yasuo Yuasa regards the living body as a system of information (here, Western phenomenology comes in again) at different levels or expressing itself in different circuits - external sensorimotor, the combination of somesthesis and kinaesthesis (coenethesis, the system of self-apprehending sensation in one's body), and emotional- instinctual. To this, Ornella adds a fourth circuit which she calls the unconscious quasi-body, a path of emotional energy flowing in the unconscious. Within this general scheme, ki or chi energy is an intermediary psychophysiological form that arguably mediates between what we call mind and body. This is a mind-stretching stuff, but a hugely valuable exercise in moving out of one's habitual thought patterns. For Ornella, all these experiences are indications of a deeper intelligence that is immanent not only within ourselves but within all creation. A highly stimulating read.

 

 

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