The Mind Alone Is Ours

In the Osashizu, one of the three Scriptures in Tenrikyo, we are taught:

With human beings: the body is a thing lent by God, a thing borrowed. The mind alone is yours.

Osashizu, June 1, 1889

With human beings: the body is a thing borrowed. The mind alone is yours. From just one mind, any kind of truth will appear daily. I accept any kind of truth. You must understand the truth of free and unlimited workings.

Osashizu, February 14, 1889

Human beings are endowed with the free use of the mind. Whereas the human body is the physical entity that is being lent to humankind by God, the mind alone is that which is ours. Through the free use of the mind, then, we are able to use the human body--that which appears to be intrinsically linked with the mind. Yet exactly because of its intrinsic characteristic, one tends to identify closely with the human body as one's own instrument and use it for self-centered purposes.

The workings of the human body, however, are proof of the complete providence of God, and free and unlimited workings are shown only when the mind is capable of seeing the free-flowing blessings at work in it. In other words, the living of the Joyous Life becomes a reality in one's everyday life when the mind is able to perceive the body and the world as being generated, sustained, and embodied by God.

The true self of a human being is the mind in its immaculate state of being. At the beginning of time, when God the Parent drew forth the various instruments for creating humankind, there were what we symbolically refer to as "loaches" swimming about in the muddy waters. These loaches later became the first seeds of human beings.

An observation concerning the character of loaches may shed some light on the true nature of human beings. That is, despite the fact that loaches swim about in "muddy and chaotic" conditions, their inner physiological substance is clean and pure. Human beings, with the mind as their own, may indeed be fused with the chaotic and often messy circumstances of the self-centered imagination but their inherent quality is to become immaculate and without a stain. The jewel or gem of this original state of the mind is likened to this clean and pure state of loaches and, when uncovered, enables us to live the Joyous Life.

Furthermore, just as an apple seed becomes an apple tree, loaches, which were the seeds of human beings, were transformed into human beings. One scholar has pointed out that the Chinese characters for the word seijin, which is often translated as "spiritual maturity" in Tenrikyo theology, literally signifies "becoming a human being" (Matsumoto 1981, 17). It is therefore worthy of note that the process of spiritual maturity is intrinsic with the process of becoming more human. That is, making efforts in living out the original mode of human existence--becoming more human--signifies that steps are being made to make spiritual growth.