Feb. 2, 2008 - Buddhism and the Plastic Body Exhibits

Regardless of what others say, what are your feelings about seeing this exhibit? Are you open to the experience of seeing the physical attributes of what makes up a body or are you repulsed? Either way, ask yourself, why? Before viewing the exhibit or dismissing it as ghoulish, lean into your thinking of death and your reaction to it.

Traditionally, in western culture, the deceased is prettied up after death, displayed as if asleep, placed in a bedlike casket and placed in the ground. In Tibet, the ground may be frozen and rocky so the deceased is chopped up in pieces and taken to the charnel grounds where vultures feed on the remains. Today, in Redding, we can view the third path of preserved bodies placed in lifelike settings and opened up for viewing. It is really all the same thing? The difference is your reaction to it.

The three methods — burial, food for birds, or plastic-preservation — all deal with the vehicle one uses during this existence; the spirit that animated and infused it has moved on. It is your attachment to the idea of death — that the bodies represent — that causes suffering. Rather than viewing the exhibit solely from an educational model or not viewing it at all because you are disturbed by it, take some time to examine the impermanence of life and what death means for you, then go see it — or not.