Treating Acute Renal Failure with a Spiritual Talisman: One Case

A piece from 2011, originally written on Sina Blog and moved here.

More than a decade ago, this poor priest was just beginning to practice Daoist methods; his attainment was incomplete, only an inch or so of skill. During Spring Festival that year he went home to reunite with his parents. One day a friend suddenly called on his mobile: the friend’s mother had been hospitalized for vomiting and diarrhea. After being transferred through several large hospitals, none could find the root cause after days of tests. Later she was moved to a small Chinese-medicine hospital; a senior physician saw the reports and was shocked—this was poisoning. Upon questioning it was fish-bile poisoning, and she was rushed to the city’s key hospital.

After admission, because so much time had been lost, her kidney function was already damaged and shrinking; she could not urinate and could only rely on dialysis to filter toxins from the blood. Her condition had become uremia. According to the doctors’ diagnosis, she would need dialysis for the rest of her life to stay alive.

Hemodialysis was expensive; at that time the vast majority of people simply could not afford it long-term. Many patients, for lack of money, effectively went home to wait for death.

He was only just beginning to practice Daoist methods and naturally dared not claim any special power to heal her. Still, having come to this pass, whether or not there was a method he had to try. He saw his friend’s mother: tubes had been inserted, and every day she had to go for dialysis several times on a fixed schedule.

After repeated analysis it occurred to him that conditions like uremia are essentially blockage of the excretory route, while the body’s toxins are all expelled through stool. Dialysis merely replaces the kidneys’ function with a machine—replacing the “outer kidneys.” Antiquity did not subdivide as the modern age does; diagnosis was largely by presenting signs. The sign of “urinary toxin” was blockage. If he treated it with a laxative-opening talisman, he wondered whether it might work.

Holding to the idea of trying, after carefully choosing the hour he performed the rite that night at xu time (7–9 p.m.). Entering the ward, he laid a small formation of copper coins under the friend’s mother’s mattress to stimulate kidney qi, and burned a laxative-opening talisman into water (the paper ash was not put in the water) and had her drink it.

The whole procedure took less than three or five minutes. His heart felt empty—he did not know whether it would work—and he thought to take an external omen for divination. Seeing a nurse walking over he asked which way was north; the nurse pointed casually and her finger landed right on the window by the bed. Finding the window open, he walked outside it.

Looking up: though it was night at xu time, the moon was bright enough to still show the clouds. A thin layer of cloud, like a veil of mist, was slowly drifting overhead toward the distance. He was greatly overjoyed—this would surely succeed.

The next day he phoned to ask; there was no real change. He grew still more uncertain about the situation, and before long felt disappointed.

On the third day his friend called to say that his mother had begun to produce a little urine—the first sign of improvement.

On the fourth day the volume gradually increased, and over the following days it kept rising.

Urine output kept rising for two weeks, even exceeding the normal standard, then slowly came back down and eventually returned to a normal level.

After discharge—perhaps because of the prolonged poisoning that year, or for other reasons—two years later his mother developed poor memory and easy forgetfulness, though everything else was in good condition.