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The Anticult
Certainly Ikeda is behind everything, in that he created the entire SGI structure, with Ikeda at the top. One can look back decades into SGI, and see Ikeda using crude Stalinist-style persuasion techniques on the SGI followers.
If you look back into the Soka Gakkai's history, it's clear how SGI became the organization it is today. At the end of World War II, the Soka Gakkai, like Japan, was severely damaged. Its first president, Tsunesaburo Makaguchi, had died in prison, and the second president, Josei Toda, had just gotten out of prison. Most other Soka Gakkai members had renounced their faith out of fear of persecution by the Japanese military government. After the surrender, General MacArthur established freedom of religion in Japan -- and all kinds of cults, sects and new religious movements just boomed. People were desperate, looking for something, anything, to help them cope with their loss, defeat, hardship, their struggle to survive, their uncertain future. They'd lost the war; they needed a new cause to believe in.
Toda knew exactly what message would sell in these troubled times, and by the late 1950's, grew Soka Gakkai membership from almost nothing to 750,000 households.
From page 135 of this thread:
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-------Quotes from Josei Toda, second Soka Gakkai president:-------------------------------------------------------
"Your faith has only one purpose: to improve your business and family life. Those who talk about "faith" and do not attend to their business are sacrilegious. Business is a service to the community. I will expel those of you who do nothing but shakubuku without engaging in business."
"A gohonzon is a machine that makes you happy"
----------------------End of quotes, Josei Toda--------------------------------------------------------------------------
So you can see, this emphasis on material gain and making your dreams come true, was always part of the Soka Gakkai, even in the 1940's and 50's --- because it brought in new members! This is what the impoverished, defeated Japanese of the postwar era wanted to hear. The purpose of Buddhism is to improve your business and family life, really? Shakyamuni doesn't say that. Nichiren doesn't say that. The prosperity gospel is not Buddhism. Toda's statement reveals SGI for what is was and would be: nonBuddhism pretending to be Buddhism. It's all about the money. Always was, always will be.
And as Japan became more prosperous in the 1960's and 70's, so did the Soka Gakkai. The Gakkai began taking donations directly from members' bank accounts, and investing in stocks, real estate, and a variety of businesses. The Soka Gakkai still kept its operating costs low, by having members do a considerable amount of unpaid labor for SGI...and also went global, expanding internationally. More workers, more donations, more investment opportunities!
The hostility toward the priesthood was always there too. This is also from page 135 of this thread:
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From Daniel B. Montgomery, "Fire In The Lotus" (book about Nichiren Buddhism)
"Seeing he was getting nowhere, Toda finally strode out, leaving the old priest (Ogasawara) to the mercies of his tormentors. 'if you stubbornly refuse to apologise, whatever may happen to you is no longer my concern. Whatever the youth division members may do to you, I will not take responsibility.' "
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Montgomery is referring to an incident in the 1950's, in which Toda's Young Men's Division Members beat up an elderly priest, Rev. Ogasawara. The YMD leader? None other than our friend Daisaku Ikeda. Surprise, surprise. Toda blamed Ogasawara for his and Makiguchi's imprisonment during World War II. Well, maybe Ogasawara was responsible, maybe he wasn't...but even if he was, do two wrongs make a right? Is it Buddhist behavior for a group of young men to taunt and beat up a lone elderly man? The SGI leaders that I discussed this with, felt that the YMD were justified in their abuse of this old man. There was no question in their minds at all. I couldn't understand it. This, from an organization that says it values human life and peace?
If you look at the history of SGI/Nichiren Shoshu priest relations, it was rocky through the 1950's, 60's, 70's and 80's. SGIkeda clearly was testing the limits, doing things like trying to change the silent prayers, and the high priests weren't having it.
I didn't know any of this in the early 1990's, so the split seemed very bizarre and contrived to me. If Nikken and his fellow priests were really so evil, why didn't SGI know -- and say something -- before this?
I think that the answer is this: SGIkeda needed the priesthood while the Gakkai was in its growth phase. The priesthood made SGI seem like a legitimate Buddhist group. So SGI had to tolerate the priests until SGI was big enough to stand on its own. By the 1990's, it was. Ikeda could say goodbye to those annoying priests who wouldn't let him do what he wanted. So he did.
The split itself proved to be useful to SGI. Having a common enemy united a diverse membership -- the good people of SGI vs. the evil priesthood! Members were whipped into a frenzy of hatred for Nikken, told that they were the ones who would save true Buddhism from evil and corruption! Oh, the drama! Uniting...and Soka Spirit also distracted the members from asking about what the senior leadership of SGI might actually be doing! Double play!
Since the split -- Ikeda has been free to make SGI what he wants, to indulge his insatiable desire for power, money, glory and admiration. Hence the evolution toward mentor/disciple.
When I look back...I can see that Ikeda must have had these plans since the 1950's. SGI did not become what it is by accident. It's been Ikeda's plan for decades. I didn't see this when I was in SGI...or even right after I left. I used to hope that SGI would change, and that I could return. I thought that the problem was just a few clueless leaders, and that members who felt as I did could change SGI for the better.
I've since come to realize that my earlier views were naive. SGI is what Ikeda wants it to be -- he's carrying out a plan that he's had for decades. Either you follow his plan -- or leave. SGI allows no other choices.