A Byrd's Eye View

Wow. Strong move, but I don't believe it's a bad one. Ram Dass is right. It has to work for you.

In my sangha, none of the newer people have even asked about getting a Gohonzon, although several have altars. Those of us who are more old-school, our altars are getting more idiosyncratic. Some of us have more than one.

Changing it up is good - otherwise it gets stale. Even Nichiren Shu made us chant without gohonzon for six months before letting us join. Personally I missed it terribly. But I have a new one (kept the old). And I've been rearranging and adding statues recently.

I love your blog.
-Dave

Thank you, Dave! You know, the funniest thing happened tonight. I decided to check out Ram Dass's website. His first book, "Be Here Now," was the first dharma book I think I ever read, way back when... I have been feeling drawn to him again. So I went to his site and was clicking around and went to the "gifts" section. There were only a few items for sale, but one of them was the exact same Buddha bag that I put in my Budsadan this morning. (And no, my sister didn't get it from there.) Talk about synchronicity... It was like the universe was giving me a "thumbs up!" Weird!

Congratulations! And may your search bear fruit....

Namaste, Engyo Mike Barrett

I've been watching a peony bud beginning to open in my garden. For 8 years I've nurtured those plants in our sandy soil. Finally, they're responding with blossoms. When it blooms I'll add it to my altar in a crystal vase.

My own life opened when I decided to look closely at why I sat down twice each day to reflect on my life and praise the Dharma. I'm
glad I took the first step to find my way to the Buddha's teachings.

Don't believe any 'curses' you may have heard about mandalas. You have to give 'curses' power if they're going to work. Superstitions are only words and opinions, smoke and mirrors.

Can't wait to hear your unfolding story! Patty

Thank you, Patty. I have a garden, too. It's just a small one, surrounding my brick patio. First garden I've ever had. I go out there every morning and feel AMAZED. In truth, that space is more of an "altar" to me than anything I have indoors.

When I decided to try the Nichiren Shu, I was given a "temporary" Honzon to use for six months and then received my official Honzon. I still have the temporary one, as well as my Nichiren Shoshu honzon. I also have statues of Shakaymuni that I place with the altar. Dave in Ks.

'What Dave Said.' I have three altars set up right now. I like the Mandala Honzon. Counting small ones, I have 10 enshrined. Plus one pictoral mandala. I prefer paintings or pictures of statues to statues.

robin

HRH Queen Lolo:

You must follow your own path. Your comments sound exactly like what my wife said. She loves daimoku and chanting, but cannot relate to the Gohonzon. This has taken some adjustment for me, but I'm cool with that now.

For me, the Gohonzon is a perfect match, but I do now truly understand how that is not the case for others.

Walk your new path with pride and honor.

Charles

Your creative ecclecticm is enchanting and inspiring. I'm just coming out of a very rigid, paint-by-numbers (for me) approach to practice, so you're fortifying me by your example.

Gabrielle

Oops, I meant "ecclecticism." I'm not very well slept these days, hence the wonky editing.

Gabrielle

I chanted myself into "smrti" {tranquil mindfulness}this morning. Then for 2 hours just quietly contemplated the mandala. I was using my 8 X 10 framed 1280 Nissho daimandara.

I used the digital image from GohonzonInfo, printed it onto a yellow gold back ground. The frame is fake redwood. It is very easy on my eyes.

I got into samadhi, and the kanji starts coming to life. The characters looked the deities they represent. I like the calligraphy mandala.

To be honest, I do not well relate at all to the SGI Nichikan knock-off. It is like I used to tell my daughter -- even though she didn't like the vegetables, maybe it was the way they were cooked.

Niko had a pictoral mandala painted, it was one of the things that got Nikko ticked off. Mike Barrett sent me some pix of picture mandalas, and I have a couple more as well. I made a stab at making one with word, and plan to try again, now that I know how to use paint. I was thinking I would use lucifer to represent Mara.

Actually, I have found pix of every character on the Nissho Daimandara, except I am not sure on Miao-lo. The one I think is him looks like Ted Osaki.

robin

Beyond the pale: excessive self-indulgence

No this is beyond the pale. Of course there aren't going to be thunderclaps or earthquakes because of a de-enshrinement of the Gohonzon. Something far worse: namely a descent into complaisance, excessive self-sufficiency in one's own beliefs, and worst of all, the absence of a real social context to one's spirituality. Without that chanting becomes so atomized: and in this case, Ratzinger's description of Buddhism as a spiritual auto-erotism is absolutely true.

In this context, Kosen-Rufu is meaningless. That is ultimately what attracted me to Nichiren Buddhism - that it was part of a wider social project for a better world. If that is to be replaced by a voluntarism where everyone decides on their own object of worship (whose only grounding is their own life experience which is just as likely to be banal as illuminating) - then everyone - will remain in their own rut - condemned to their own horizons.

I have found some real insights in these blogs - but I find this one just to be a means of eliminating all moral purpose from Buddhism.

Steve

Steve,

Do you really believe that without a Gohonzon, one cannot make a valuable contribution to society?

I believe I am doing more for world peace by raising self-motivated,compassionate, pro-active children than by sitting in front of a certain piece of paper and saying certain words. I feel that making environmentally-aware choices in terms of what we buy and use and discard is what makes one moral. How we talk to our families and friends and neighbors... The attitudes we bring to the workplace and to the bank and the post office and dry cleaners... these are what makes one moral and changes society. How we deal with others, the decisions we make on a moment-to-moment basis, how we deal with ourselves... this is what matters. NOT what we sit in front of how we practice Buddhism.

It's what we DO with that practice that impacts the world.

That's my two cents.

Queen Lolo,

In raising a family you are doing a damn sight more for society than me, so I applaud you for that!

But my point being, on our own we can only do so much to change society, and moreover, it is very easy to slack off. That is why laws enforcing environmentally-aware behavior is more effective untimately than hoping everyone does indeed recycle or abstain from dumping etc purely from their own individual viewpoint. While they might wish to do so, laziness, inertia is bound to overcome them at certain moments.

I personally am an SGI member, though I find the current Ikeda-centrism intensely irritating. Ultimately in all associations we make compromises: we avert our eyes from what displeases us because we believe that our greater numbers will ensure greater impact. Moreover we have an, however imperfect, support network which can sustain us during periods of weakness.

That ultimately is my beef with extreme pick-and-mix buddhism. While someone might wish to chant to a purely individual object, through a purely individual faith, when times get rough, when the inevitable struggles on the way to enlightement occur, what kind of support network can a person in their utterly-individual practice rely on? Could a comrade say, "you're not chanting to your fishtank/eminem-poster/laura-bush-poster/jack-daniel's-bottle/television correctly"?

If everything is so individual, how can, putting it very bureaucratically, "spiritual performance" be evaluated? (I know there are some people who might think that is a sacriligious formulation - but sure it is true that our prayers have different levels of efficacy - determined, lazy, absent-minded etc). Only with some agreed framework, which implies social organisation, can a slackening buddhist be properly taken to task! (For their own good of course).

It is for these reasons that I disapprove of excessive individualism in one's practice. However this leaves open the larger question of how to behave in organisations (like mine) where one is not hugely in sympathy with the way the organisation is going - where one's samgha has gone funny - where there is a bit of a dislocation between reality and the words to describe it?

So if anyone has any ideas about how to be a loyal opposition within SGI - I'd like to hear it.

Steve