Posted on: Saturday, December 7, 2002

EXPRESSIONS OF FAITH
Relating flesh and spirit

By Jay Sakashita

And the word became flesh."

This well-known biblical passage not only conveys a central Christian belief but also underpins wider notions of skin and self.

Body markings establish codes of religious and cultural coherence. The body has been slashed, pierced, burned and branded in order to express a spiritual state.

The Buddha had special markings on his body at birth, Christ at death. In contemporary society, too, the skin is used to reveal bodies of faith: Jews and Muslims are circumcised; many Christians and Hindus mark their foreheads with ash and powder.

The relationship between flesh and spirit is also clear to followers of Mahikari, a Japanese religion in Wahiawa, in which boils and skin disease are understood as the product of spiritual toxins. Through a form of exorcism, one can then remove the spiritual pollutants and remedy skin conditions as a result.

At the Jade Buddha temple in Kapahulu, Yin Jue, a humble and unassuming Buddhist nun, has taken the bold step of burning incense into the front of her shaved head. The painful ritual lasts about five minutes but the burning is made bearable by calling on the name of Sakyamuni Buddha.

Poul Andersen, a religion professor at the University of Hawai'i-Manoa, suggests that the incense marks burned into the scalps of monks and nuns transform their entire bodies into sticks of incense offerings to the gods. Like the biblical prophet Isaiah who had hot coals sear his lips, Yin Jue's faith is burned into her skin.

The prevalence of body piercings and tattoos in popular culture has noticeably increased over the past 10 years. For many, tattoos and piercings are simply the result of getting caught up in fashion trends. For others, however, body modification practices have meanings that are more than skin deep.

Piercings and tattoos bring the internal image of the self closer to the external image. This is clear at Leeward Community College, where Asian studies professor Raymund Liongson has seen an increase in the use of a particular style of tattoo, Alibat, an ancient Filipino writing system, on some of the second- and third-generation Filipinos.

Scars tell who we are and what we mean. Some students tell me that their tattoos and piercings provide an intimate glimpse to an inner self.

Indeed, people pierce their tongues and lips, eyebrows, noses, ears, navels and genitals, at points that allow passage between the physical world and the spiritual body. This is appealing to those who are increasingly dissatisfied with the apparent spiritual desolation of modern society or who view the risks and demands of modernity as overly stressful and empty of meaning. The skin, then, protects and exposes our sense of self and functions as a bearer of meaning.

The skin is open to being read. We show ourselves in and on our skin through circumcision and incense marks, tattoos and body piercings, and by way of dieting and plastic surgery.

Through such body modification practices, the skin becomes text, the body a language, and the flesh becomes word.

Jay Sakashita teaches religion at Leeward Community College. His body is not pierced or tattooed.