Green Meditation With Bhante

This is the second of a three part series on the Cambodian Buddhist monk, Bante, who taught “green” meditation at Sherborne on my course in 1973.

         “Green Meditation with Bhante” began showing up as part of the weekly schedule on the bulletin board at Sherborne. We could just squeeze one group of thirty into the green meditation room we’d prepared. Bhante intoned prayers and repeated them in English with us joining in. The prayers were short and always repeated thrice.

         “May all Beings be Wheeellll and Huoopppeee.” Was one that he translated into his sing-song English.

         Then we settled down to the business of breathing in the green light of peace, contentment and wheeelllnnessss. Followed by breathing out negative thoughts, anxieties, and toxins. The dim glow of a single bare green lightbulb illuminated the painted green room surrounding us. As we took conscious breaths, sandalwood incense perfumed the air.

         Bhante sat comfortably on his floor cushion, quite at home with all of us clustered in a semi-circle about him. We gazed at the bare green light bulb shining softly in the middle of the room.

         Breathing in— green. Breathing out— toxins.

         At the end of the meditation Bhante said prayers again as we repeated everything three times. While intoning more prayers he sprinkled us with holy water from a kitchen bowl. He sent out little showers with the flick of his delicate wrist from a small branch of boxwood dipped in the water.

        Green Meditation Put to the Test

         Several years after the course, Bhante came to play a much larger role in Jack’s and my life, and of our son’s. At the age of four, our son had crawled into our bedroom one morning unable to walk.

         The doctors at Children’s Hospital in Washington D.C. diagnosed Chris with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis. They suggested we start him on thirty mg of aspirin a day, monitoring with weekly blood tests, before using heavier drugs. Instead, we took him to see Bhante.

          Bhante, who was in his mid-eighties, was living near Washington D.C. with Russ Jaffee. Dr. Jaffee was a physician at the prestigious National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. He was conducting research into Bhante’s color healing techniques, and was happy to see Bhante working with a patient.

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         Jack and I entered Dr. Jaffee’s apartment where Bhante was staying. Jack carried Chris in and sat him down on the floor. The doctor at Children’s Hospital had told us to keep him off his swollen knee. Dutifully, we had been picking him up, moving him from bed to chair to floor, for several weeks.

         After greeting Bhante, we noticed that Chris had pulled himself up using the couch and was hobbling about, holding onto the furniture. As we moved to interfere, Bhante held up his small brown hand to stop us.

         “No, let him be. He is still young enough to know what he can do and not do. He will not hurt himself by trying to walk.”

*To be continued next week.*

In the meantime, if anyone would like to hear Bhante’s voice, and practice a Green Meditation, you are invited to join Kip Page Sunday evenings at 9:00pm Eastern US time. Passcode: 518204