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The Gosho Game!!! Who knows 'the'Gosho best? Have you ever known an sgi, nichiren Buddhist, or fanatic to conduct ‘serious research’ into what they are ‘practicing’? Can you expect a sgi member to know what ‘the three objects of devotion’ are? Do they know what Buddhism is? Cult.org (sic) is a manipulation on some very potent history and our common identity with that of spirtuality i.e. buddhism/christianity/judaism/ikedaism/ism-ism… etc.
You know how the "three pillars" are supposedly "faith, practice, and study"? They don't want you to study too much. I always studied more than anyone - I read wicked fast, you see, and when I was doing the Byakuran phone toban at the kaikan (don'tcha just *love* all the cultiespeak??), I'd bring along the Gosho Reference and just start reading.
Disturbing facts:
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Those who wish to uphold the True Dharma should arm themselves with swords, bows and arrows, and halberds, instead of observing the five precepts (against killing, stealing, adultery, lying, and drinking alcohol), and keeping propriety. ... Therefore, those laymen who wish to defend the True Dharma should arm themselves with swords and sticks in order to defend it just as King Virtuous (who killed numerous monks) did.
One who kills an ant will fall into the three evil realms (hell, the realm of hungry spirits, and that of beasts and birds [aka hell, hunger, and animality]) without fail, but one who eliminates a slanderer of the True Dharma will reach the stage of non-regression, and eventually will attain Buddhahood. ...
King Virtuous, who killed slanderers to defend the True Dharma, was reborn in this world as Shakyamuni Buddha.
Emperor Hsuan-tsung of T'ang China was a wise ruler who protected Buddhism. He executed 12 Taoist masters, eliminating enemies of the Buddha and restoring Buddhism.
If you wish to bring about peace in our country and pray for happiness in this life, as well as in the future, then waste no time. Think hard and take the necessary measures to thoroughly deal with slanderers of the True Dharma.
That's from Nichiren's Gosho "On Establishing the True Teaching for the Security of the Nation" or "Rissho Ankoku Ron."
Do you think this is an appropriate perspective for a modern person to hold? Notice that Nichiren defines "slanderers of the True Dharma" as "anyone who preferred a different flavor of Buddhism." Naturally, "the True Dharma" meant "Nichiren's own interpretation." Nichiren obviously wished harm on the competition; he just wanted OTHER PEOPLE to do it. He wants fascism - he wants the government to adopt and enforce his own personal intolerant attitude (and make him famous in the process).
The SGI also acknowledges #3 of the Four Noble Truths: "Attachment leads to suffering." So lip service is paid to "attachment needs to be transcended". But all of this "evil priests" "slanderers of the True Dharma" etc. - it's completely based in attachments and delusions! Nichiren wanted to bend reality to his will - a most UN-enlightened, UN-Buddhist attitude - and sought to persuade, even pressure and coerce, others to agree with him. This is not Buddhist behavior! It is disrespectful and arrogant, which are both the antithesis of Buddhism! The Buddha was able to see from the perspective of eternity, and knew that each person was already doing his best, so the best course of action was to accept and encourage each person, trusting that, in the fullness of time, he would walk his own path as only he could.
The Buddha never presumed to tell other people what to do - when you see people ordering other people to do this or that, it should be a flashing red light that what you're reading or hearing is *NOT* Buddhism! And it gets worse:
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All the Nembutsu and Zen temples, such as Kenchoji, Jufuku-ji, Gokuraku-ji, Daibutsuden, and Choraku-ji, should be burned to the ground, and their priests taken to Yui Beach to have their heads cut off. If this is not done, then Japan is certain to be destroyed! - Nichiren, THE SELECTION OF THE TIME
Guess what? That wasn't done. Yet in spite of The Powers That Be directly disobeying Nichiren's orders, Japan still exists as a country, doesn't it? Japan never became a Mongol vassal state, as Nichiren predicted. Clearly, Nichiren was WRONG. NICHIREN WAS WRONG! So WHY should we pay any attention to him? He was an intolerant, narcissistic prick with delusions of grandeur!
If we're talking about someone who's chanting to win, whatever it is he hopes to win, we're looking at someone who is not enlightened, who is *trapped* within his attachments and delusions. Earthly desires are most definitely *NOT* enlightenment for this individual!
"Winning in the end" = delusion + attachment. There *IS* no "final victory" as a goal in REAL Buddhism.
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ALWAYS remember that victory or defeat in our battle to accomplish kosen-rufu depends upon a tremendous, diamond-like sense of indestructible determination engraved deep within the heart of each and every one of us. After all, Buddhism is "win" or "lose". - Daisaku Ikeda [
dailyguidance.blogspot.com]
That's right! STRENGTHEN those attachments!!
"Buddhism is win or lose" is *not* Buddhism. Buddhism is about transcending such base, ego-driven competitive ideas as winning and losing. When you chant for an outcome, you're simply strengthening your attachments. Your attachment to a particular outcome, for example. And when you don't get it, you're plunged into suffering. Such is the nature of attachment. Buddhism is about accepting reality as it is, instead of feeling that you must bend it to your will (and "win"). REAL Buddhism, that is.
Getting rid of attachments is the Buddha way. You should ask yourself why President Ikeda is constantly running around, chasing after ever more honorary degrees (which can be had for a fee!), famous people whose spotlight he can squeeze into (and hopefully capture for himself), and monuments prominently named after himself. This is not the behavior of someone who understands Buddhism.
You should ask yourself why the SGI's finances are not transparent and independently audited, with the results published for all to see.
Mark my words - that pasty, do-nothing Hiromasa Ikeda will be shoved into the International Presidency before Daisaku Ikeda's body has even gotten cold. And the succession pageantry will look identical to that of North Korea.
Here's how I explained it on a different message board and I think it is good:
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One of the criteria that qualifies the Buddha for the title of “teacher” is that he taught a way whereby a person could overcome this consuming needfulness. The Buddha never said that he had the only way; just that he had found a way. The potential for anyone to find a new way is always present in the Buddha’s teachings. This is one of the details that sets Buddhism apart from the theistic religions, which so often emphasize obedience and submission to a leader’s dictates.
Buddhism, therefore, is a set of practices that will reliably enable a person to disentangle himself from the sticky web of attachment and the crushing grip of delusion. The Buddhist practice guides a person toward understand himself and becoming aware of where he is placing unwarranted emphasis on things in his environment, believing erroneously that these independently have the power to change his life.
Against this example, the Jesus of the Gospels cannot be considered any sort of teacher worthy of the title. He supposedly explained that he taught using confusing parables because he did not want people to be saved:
Matthew 13:10-16 (KJV) And the disciples came and said to Him, "Why do You speak to them in parables?" He answered and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given. For whoever has, to him more shall be given, and he will have an abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has shall be taken away from him. Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand. And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaias, which saith, By hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive: For this people's heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them. But blessed are your eyes, for they see: and your ears, for they hear.
Really? Is this the best that God Almighty, the Author of All Reality, can manage? It’s so sad that it makes me want to cry! To acknowledge that people have limited capacity to understand, and then deliberately talk over their heads, just so that they will end up being harmed! What’s next, knocking over wheelchairs? Tripping the elderly? Taking candy from babies?
Again, the problem of studying. It's when you actually *READ* the "sacred texts" that you find all this crap in there. Most Christians don't read the bible (which is what enables them to stay Christians, I suspect), and I don't think any more SGI Buddhists read the Gosho.
Having my curiosity piqued, I started studying other sources that were tangential to the Gosho. In particular, I found the idea that we're supposed to "close, ignore, discard, abandon" all the other teachings to be very suspicious. I found that the Lotus Sutra was no older than the 2nd Century CE. Why would everyone wait so long to write down what was supposedly the Buddha's "highest teaching" and why did it sound so similar to Christianity?? It's because both arose from within the same temporal/cultural milieu of Hellenism.
If you truly understand that, per the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism, attachment causes suffering, you will reach the inescapable conclusion that the Buddha's teachings were not meant to be a lifetime habit (which is itself an attachment). The Buddha's teachings - the REAL Buddha's teachings - were designed to help people understand their own thought patterns so that they could free themselves from the products of deluded thinking (which causes suffering) and interact with reality as it is (instead of with their delusion/misconception of it). However, being *attached* to Buddhism is still an attachment, and ALL attachment causes suffering! There is no "good" or "bad" categorization, you'll notice: Attachment causes suffering. So if you're determined to chant Nam myoho renge kyo until the last moment of your life, you will *not* attain enlightenment, and you will *not* be able to relieve your sufferings. The Buddha recognized that, in order to attain enlightenment, one must leave *every* attachment behind, including Buddhism! The Buddhist practice prepares you for the day when you must leave even it behind and step out into the world on your own, because that is the only way you can complete your journey:
“Work out your own salvation. Do not depend on others.”
"No one can save us but ourselves.
No one can, and no one may.
Each one alone must walk the path
But Buddhas clearly show the way."
“Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it.”
THAT is REAL Buddhism. And THAT, gentle readers, is why the SGI doesn't want people to study too much :)