Reverend Greg

Fundamentalism in all it's myriad diversity

This is a reprint from something that was written on another forum. I though it appropriate as we seem to have a wave of true fundamentalism on FWP right now. Most people think of fundamentalism in terms of religion, specifically Christianity or Muslim, but fundamentalism is a human function.

It's curious to me that people like this could claim divine punishment in a largely Christian nation. I think the Born-agains and Evangelicals would disagree with this, and perhaps another post currently showing on FWP.

Once a fundie, always a fundie. Once a cultie ALWAYS a cultie. Many of those who once drank the koolaid forever lament it and will never be free.

It's just an energy taking thing to continue, I really have no
concept of what you people seem to be 'debating' about.
What "Scholarly" community did you refer to? What I found amusing is
that Ikeda ranted for so long about his "Historic" meeting with the
now deceased Arnold Tornybee,[and now deceased Carl Sagan, and new
deceased.....etc. Everyone who ever met him is 'now deceased'.] -
that the biographer hardly gives Ikeda a paragraph of a 900 plus page
authentic biography - which is a completely different concept to
former NSA believers who simply gobbled up Ikedaisms through book
sales and memorized them until nothing else would fit into their
heads. My practice of over 25 years has helped me to see the forest
for the trees. After the 1992 split, America has had nothing but
hardships, we owe nothing to those people of the SGI. We can thank
them for Katrina, flooding all throughout the mid-west, Missouri
Flooding, Tennesse Tornadoes, including the unprecidented flooding in
England, where virtually everyone gave up their practice to follow
that person, and so forth. Everywhere where there are temple members
as well as correct Gohonzon, is relative calm, normal weather while
elsewhere is a mess. The inability for Ikeda to accept "Guidance"
from the High Priest, while they so quickly dispensed same to
thousands of people daily without regard to personal circumstances
tells me, and others, that he felt he was above listening to anyone
else but himself. One of the first great splits in Nichiren Shoshu
was when the Five Senior Priests left Minobu to do their own thing.
They established their own school and wore purple robes, whereas,
Nikko decided to stay and carry out the Daishonin's written will.
It's really a question of choice to follow one creed over another.
For decades fanatics defended Ikeda's every word and movement;
running around wearing little two-way radios - taking care
of 'traffic control' calling him Sensai and bowing and scraping at
the mere mention of his words. Members were encouraged to 'memorize'
President Ikeda's words and quote him, we watched as male and female
members of NSA stumbled over his concepts using pidgin to talk to one
another until finally, after all of that crap and almost having to
sing Beethoven's Ninth Symphony - a completely Christian performance -
it was time to say so long. In the 10 years that I practiced with
NSA I had gone on nearly every major Convention, but was never
allowed to go on a Tozan as all seats were reserved for the so-
called "Leaders". When the leaders of the 21st Century in NSA
stumbled and fell; I was able to attend all temple activities and
interesting was finally able to attend Tozan on several occassions.
If you want to sit at your stupid computer and call Taisekiji names,
while at the same time calling yourself a scholar then I'm sorry, you
will have to find a different audience for your outpourings.

The Buddhism of Omission

I just came in from my cold windy coastal back yard. Around to the back of my home I planted the giant Japanese Vivax bamboo. The plot where the bamboo is planted is not huge, but nonetheless significant for sitting by, and listening to the wind blow through. Wind blown bamboo, along with my collection of wind chimes, makes for a nice backdrop for study.

I’m studying Living Buddhism, Mar-Apr 2008, section (12), page 64 which is the study for April. It’s amazing to me how dualistic SGI can be at times. As others have noticed our study lectures are really quite high level, especially in contrast to past era’s Gakkai study efforts.

“Earthly desires are enlightenment, and the sufferings of birth and death are Nirvana” is the overriding theme of this section. I’ve been fortunate to have a WD member come into my district that has stepped up to become our study liaison. She presents very mainstream views on the material at district meetings, which leaves me free to present what I want to present. Without her I find myself grudgingly having to represent the party line more than I am comfortable with.

My Gakkai Buddhism is a Buddhism of partial omission. I simply omit cultism when I run head-long into it. In my area there is virtually none of this function, at least in view of my personal sensitivity.

I believe that the Buddhism of the Soka Gakkai is valid, and real. It’s easy to discard something that appears brand new (in the Buddhist-anthropological time line anyway). This is an important point about our Buddhism.

Mahayana, in terms of scholarship and research, did not come into being until long after the death of Shakyamuni Buddha.

This is a hard thing to grasp as Nichiren fully bases his entire life’s work on the Lotus Sutra as the Buddha’s final and ultimate teaching.

The reality remains that Buddhism can certainly not be viewed as being limited only to “the Buddha”. The teachings of the historical Buddha Shakyamuni continued to evolve and develop long after his passing. In fact it continues to develop today. This is perfectly acceptable to myself in light of the vast socio-political changes through centuries of human devolvement. We simply live in a vastly more complex and complicated world today than that of Nichiren, and certainly then that of prehistoric India.

The Buddhism of the Soka Gakkai remains, in my opinion, the newest and most applicable evolution of those teachings for today’s world, at least the omitted Buddhism of the Soka Gakkai.

What I define as the omitted Buddhism of the Soka Gakkai is primarily our tradition of practice. What I omit is the parts I simply don’t understand, which is the emerging dark cultism of M/D and exclusivism.

Enough has been written about the M/D thing, so let me elaborate on my idea of exclusivism. What I mean is our “we are number one!” mentality. Page 65 of the Living Buddhism states “The Soka Gakkai alone has inherited the ultimate law of life and death from Nichiren, correctly upholding and practicing his teaching and spreading it widely throughout the world in accord with his instructions”.

I have my own personal feelings and beliefs regarding this hard-lined stance. First, I know a lot more about other Nichiren sects than the SGI wishes I or any other member did, which makes it difficult to subscribe to such an exclusive belief.

This paragraph is italicized for the simple reason that it contains two key principles;

1) “belief”

2) “exclusive”

Number one addresses how I feel about much of the cultism that is emerging from SGI. It’s one thing to sincerely believe SGI is the one and only Nichiren sect fulfilling Nichiren’s will. As a personal conviction, epiphany or inspiration, this belief creates powerful images and feelings. As a published doctrine, it’s ugly.

Ugly - “Displeasing to the eye; unsightly. Repulsive or offensive; objectionable: an ugly remark”.

This kind of exclusive group doctrine has not played out well for the Jews. I’m at a loss as to why we continue to push this agenda, in public, for all to see. It’s the kind of thinking that is acceptable among the Japanese perhaps, but not throughout the free world.

I object. I will continue to object. My objection has nothing to do with my personal opinion of whether or not this claim is true, rather with the reality that we, as a Buddhist lay organization, shouldn’t be talking like that. For one thing, there is no metric available to prove it, and therefore it remains a belief, not a fact.

Our cult brothers the Scientologists at least have a metric to gauge one’s progress toward “clear”. They have their E-METER used in their practice of auditing, or “clutching the cans” as I have heard it called. We have no “B-METER” or Bodhisattva-of-the-Earth meter or any other method of proving our claims as fact.

I want the SGI to stop talking like we are the Jewish Buddhists. Please.

Number two is that ugly word exclusive;

Exclusive - Excluding or tending to exclude: exclusive barriers. Not allowing something else; incompatible: mutually exclusive conditions.

This is what we are becoming - exclusive. In western thinking exclusive usually denotes something valuable, such as an “exclusive club”. What good is a club that lets just anyone in? As Woody Allen once said, “I would never want to be a member of a club that would have me as a member”. Exclusive can be a powerful marketing tool, but for the Buddhism of ultimate human freedom, it blows.

We’re Buddhists, not the Freemasons. We should be inclusive, at least in some ways, or to some degree. Instead SGI, in my opinion, is becoming exclusive.

I don’t know why these things are happening. Perhaps we are losing members to the temple groups of Nichiren Shoshu. Problem is, the more we behave like we are, the more we will lose. "Anyone can join" you say? True, but if you aren't with us, you're against us.

MY Buddhism omits these ugly things, and so I won’t discuss them at the next study meeting - this Saturday.

My Buddhism is what I believe to be the real Buddhism of the Soka Gakkai. It’s the Buddhism of daily practice. It’s the Buddhism of “Earthly desires are enlightenment, and the sufferings of birth and death are Nirvana”. The SGI’s Buddhism is the Buddhism for those who never desired to be Buddhists, rather just wanted to chant to be happy. THAT’S what I mean by inclusive Buddhism. Anyone can chant. Simply stated, this is the Buddhism of the Lotus Sutra appropriate for our current age, an age of global universalism, the Buddhism for one world.

Rev. Greg

P.S. I'm still not signing.

Prove your loyalty right now

Sign this paper!, recite this pledge!, do the ceremonial handshake!, flash your gang hand sign! Human beings are tribal to their core. Always have been, I suspect we always will be.

Some things are coming to a head as it were, in SGI-USA. First was the Mentor Disciple relationship. Well, it wasn’t really the thing itself, rather it is the suddenly increased, nearly frantic usage of it. Now it’s everywhere and while official publications and video productions avoid telling us that Daisaku Ikeda is OUR personal mentor, no one is stopping the culties from doing so at meetings both large and small.

This and another issue are subtle to be sure. As I’ve stated before Mentor and Disciple is a viable concept, and something that needs to be reflected on in each of our lives. Are we truly seeking out the teachings of Buddhism or are we “making up our own stuff”? M/D is at the very heart of Buddhism as Greg Martin states, but really M/D is at the heart of every religion equally. In it’s simplest form M/D has to do with our own willingness to learn from another person.

Being dictated just who that Mentor is on an organizational level is another thing altogether. Subtly different, it is in fact worlds apart. When we are told who our Mentor is and to whom we have that relationship, we have clearly taken a big step down the road to true cultdom. The Mentor and Disciple relationship is becoming a vow of obedience, and a pledge of ultimate conformity. Conformity is something that the Japanese culture revolves around at it’s deepest core, but not so with our American culture.

Regardless of what our critics say about SGI being a cult, currently we are not identified as a cult in the public eye. Unfortunately so much of what is happening right now may change that for the future. Once we are perceived in the same ranks as Scientology and the Moonies, we will be unable to change that perception - ever.

This Code of Conduct is another frightening thing for me. Code of Conduct is a long time coming in SGI and I applauded it along with the New Leaders Handbook. SGI addressed issues that have long been ignored. The code of conduct signature form bothered me at first, but I wasn’t sure just why. The Code itself basically says that leaders can’t be assholes in the name of Buddhism and SGI. Who but an asshole would disagree with that?

Yet that one sentence - that one brief little sentence, again as subtle as it is, changes everything. It makes the Code of Conduct “something else”. On page 45 at the bottom of the third and final paragraph;

“Not signing, therefore not accepting the Code of Conduct for Leaders, disqualifies one from leadership in the SGI-USA”.

Not signing, therefore not accepting… You’re either with us or against us…

Only the Sith think in absolutes…

Who wrote this? What jackass decided it was necessary or even acceptable to put in this particular sentence? Was it discussed with the SGI-USA legal staff? As I fear, much of these decisions are being made by rank amateurs and those without real world experience in such matters. Even a greater fear is that many of these new policies are being invented by those truly possessing a cult mentality. SGI is still recovering from the 90’s, if you haven’t noticed, and there aren’t lines full of those waiting to take on leadership positions.

I had a long and profitable career in the Corporate world. Being in corporate, as it were, there were many things I had to sign. Confidentiality agreements became common place in the 90’s. They not only said I couldn’t disclose company technology but also routinely stated that if I invented something really cool while I worked there, the company owned it. These weren’t much of an issue really, we all knew that if in fact we came upon some new technological breakthrough, we’d quit first, invent second. There were lots of ways around those sorts of thing.

Also routine were forms stating that we’d received such and such form, read it and understood it. These almost always had to do with legal issues such as sexual harassment, racial discrimination and drug use. These also were no real problem. I had read it, I did understand it. More importantly we signed these things for the simple reason that we wanted to keep our high-paying, well benefited jobs, and there were plenty of people out there who WOULD sign them in order to have those jobs.

No form I ever signed ever said however “by signing you agree you will not shoot meth during working hours. NOT signing it implies that you are shooting meth during working hours”. Or by not signing this form you are admitting you are a racist, sexist bastard intent on destroying the company. There was always a real choice in these matters. The consequences were apparent, none the less there was a choice. “With us or against us” is never a choice.

Wally George was a patriotic American conservative radio and television commentator. He coined the term “Combat TV”. I watched a few episodes back in the 80's when they aired. In a 1983 show Wally demanded that pacifist Blase Bonpane prove his patriotism on national TV by standing up and reciting the Pledge of Allegiance - right there, right then. Blase refused and ended up overturning Wally's desk before storming off the show.

This is a major and critical feature of living in the USA, we don’t have to prove our loyalty to anyone, anytime.

The truth is that I personally support and agree with the Code of Conduct and I prove it through my continued appropriate conduct toward my members. I will however elect not to sign a form that is truly no choice as I am a Buddhist and an American.

Faith in the Gohonzon of the Lotus Sutra does not equal loyalty to SGI-USA, and faith in general does not equal obedience. If we forget those simple realities we ALL will cease to be Buddhists, and in truth will become “something else."