Good teachers, like good doctors, are not always warm and fuzzy. From the age of 15, I’ve had six major teachers, and five mentors. Those who taught me the most were not gentle. To put it bluntly, they could be inspirational at one moment and bullies the next. I remember being told that if a top senior leader ignores you or seems distant, there must be something wrong with your faith, seeking mind, or practice. Every word, every gesture or facial expression transmitted the strength of your ichinen. We would sometimes be reprimanded if our voice sounded weak or we didn’t say “Hai!” with enough determination. All the old timers know what I’m talking about. My teachers were important to me and I don’t regret a second of the way it was. This may be a long accounting, so please, feel free to use a stimulant to stay awake.
Teachers are indispensable to our growth. From toddler to decrepit, we should learn all there is to know, and realize that there’s always a new teacher. Sometimes it’s a person, at other times it’s circumstance. Death is the greatest teacher of them all. Outside of my family, there were five people and one mystery teacher that directly trained me. One blog would be too long to go into any detail for each one. Suffice it to say that each teacher was integral in my development.
My five teachers are my high school basketball coach, Buck Sayre, my Army drill sergeant, the occult master Israel Regardie, psychedelic expedients, SGI senior vice general director, Richard Sasaki, and SGI vice general director, Joe Firoved. Although Mr. Sasaki and Mr. Firoved would probably reprimand me for my positions on doctrine, perhaps accuse me of betraying the SGI, etc. Nonsense. No matter what, I still respect and admire them as my great teachers. The Lotus Sutra and Nichiren are quite clear about the role of bodhisattva Superior Practices, by virtue of the small amount of sutra text that actually mentions Jogyo and the other three mahasattva leaders of the jinyo bosatsu. Great confusion and error can emerge when some priest, scholar, and/or lay organization reads "between the lines" of the sutra to reveal a new true Buddha and various directives. Nichiren made it clear what his order of devotion was: The dharma/daimoku of the Lotus Sutra, Shakyamuni Buddha, and the Gohonzon. Further, Nichiren never declared himself to be the true Buddha anywhere. It's a doctrinal creation of latter priests with empty bellys and too much time on their hands. For this reason, my beloved past teachers would attempt to refute me and guide me back to correct understanding. Imagine the fun that would be! It would be so great to hear from them again. Thank you, one and all.
The great mentors and shapers of my worldview are Shakyamuni, Nichiren, Krishna, Aleister Crowley, Joseph Campbell, and Daisaku Ikeda. These men are the bedrock of my moral and spiritual education. Of the ancients, Shakyamuni Buddha is the supreme source of truth for me, and from a contemporary standpoint, Professor Joseph Campbell is the voice that most accurately clarifies the reality of the world’s religious mythologies. Perhaps one day I’ll devote a blog to these great gurus, but not today.
On our journey through samsara, we encounter mentors, teachers, trainers, and coaches at uncanny moments in our development. As the say, when the student is ready the teacher appears. I have found this axiom to be true. What is rare is to find a master that will guide you to mastery, rather than one who seeks to keep you the eternal apprentice. History has clearly shown us that it is also common to have a master who will bring you to ruin. Religious literalism, greed, “the god complex” (for lack of a more accurate term), and the flames of inflated ego, are the usual the culprits for a master gone off the deep end, taking his disciples down with him. This dynamic is also found in the training ground of business and politics. Protection from masters gone awry is obtained through centering on the dharma of the Lotus Sutra, first, and foremost.
When it comes to teachers, we are taught in three ways: hard, soft, and passively. Hard training is emotionally painful, severe, and perhaps even physical. Think of your daddy’s belt across your bottom. In your face training breaks you down so as to build you up into the desired creation. Boot camps, serious athletics, the martial arts, old time gakkai training, and even the mean streets are good examples of hard training.
Soft training is invaluable. It is an training respite for the undisciplined, whiners, weaklings, and the myriad kotis of career quitters. Soft training also serves the purpose of gentle discourse for leading and guiding people to higher levels of attainment. Not everyone responds to a rap on the knuckles or humiliation in public. An example of soft training might be comforting someone for a failure or transgression, a hug with three quick taps of the back. This human kindness is sometimes necessary, even though what the person really needed, was the harsh truth of the matter, and a good swift kick in the bum. Gentle discourse is the counterbalance to the often severe nature of the more harsh aspects of training. The soft approach is a way of nurturing so the truly promising enjoy the ying-yang of a difficult process and the quitters and the genetically weak-willed, can hang on for another day. At times, I would be reprimanded by a senior over some nonsense, like reporting a lower number of publication subscriptions, only to find solace with another leader who had been through it all before. “Chant more daimoku,” they would say. Good advice. I must have been given that guidance a lot, because by 2002, I hit 75 million daimoku. “Pass the throat lozenges, please.”
Passive-aggressive is the third form of training. Parents do this all the time to guilt their kids into desired behavior. Good teachers employ all three types and other subtle means to raise their protégés. I remember striving to achieve campaign goals or show a top senior leader how hard I was trying. I have felt the pain of being dismissed, ignored, or criticized. To encourage me, my leaders would then retell stories of how GMW’s loyalty and sincerity was constantly being tested by Sensei and how GMW played mind games with the top leaders of NSA, to see what they were made of. In my thirty years of practice, I was witness to a great deal of fawning behavior in obeisance to hierarchical rule. The lesson I learned was not to worry about impressing some leader or even Sensei – it was to live up to the spirit of the Lotus Sutra and expectations of the Buddha.
The training I received between ages 15 to 21 was the hard variety. Once I got into a heated-argument with an assistant coach and quit the team, only to be told by my father to go back and “take your medicine.” I knew what was coming next. My coach took down a two foot long fraternity paddle with holes in it for optimum air flow. The head coach ordered me to pull down my gym shorts and smacked me on the ass so hard it left a welt for two days. It even had the imprint of the paddle holes. I took it without a tear and learned an important lesson – in life, you must pick your fights wisely and be wary of the man with the paddle.
Let me tell you about my beloved coach, Buck Sayre. Our relationship was tempestuous at best. He screamed in my face in front of a thousand people. Spit would fly out of his mouth like an attacking cobra, as he shouted instructions at his team. He hit me over the head with a clipboard before a packed house in the final minutes of a championship game – which we won. He was mean, rough, physical, rude, crude, and he was the best teacher I ever had. If I needed a reminder of who the boss was, he would pinch the nerve between my neck and shoulder to paralyze me, and then he would drive me to my knees as he lectured me on some point. As a good Christian, he would lead us all in a team prayer before games, oblivious to my Jerry Colona eye-roll, then, as soon as his invocation was over, he would become the nastiest man in the building. I could never understand why God cared who won a high school basketball game – or any game for that matter. In my mind, he was asking God to curse the other team into losing. This idiotic, lack of understanding of prayer is timeless. We try to influence the outcome of games, politics, weather, and especially war. As my dad always said, “God doesn’t care who wins the game.”
After coach Sayre finished with me my senior year, my passage through basic training in the Army was like recess in the playground or playing dodge ball with wimps. He was a coach in the tradition of Bobby Knight or Mike Ditka – the kind of rough and tumble coach that is fast disappearing because of namby-pamby, over-protective parents that want to coddle their little brats, trying to shield them from all the grumpy unpleasantness of the world. He was a relentless taskmaster. After losing a football game by 14 points, he made us run fourteen hundred yards of wind sprints with full equipment on, after an hour and half practice for a full week. His conditioning program for the varsity basketball season began at 6:00 AM, before school and required running ten or more full speed conditioning drills. This exercise had us run to the free throw line, and back to the baseline - run to half court then back - run to the far free throw line and back - then run to the far baseline and back. We would repeat this after the last person finished, usually a few seconds after the first person who finished. We did ten in the morning and as many as twenty at the end of the afternoon practice. This was my life – run until you puke. I don’t know what drove me beyond love of the game. There was a thrill and sense of accomplishment when you competed in peak physical form. Little did I know that my path to collegiate sports would be thwarted by a war, a mushroom, and new worlds to explore.
Teaching and training often require severity to knock the goblins out one’s fuzzy brain. But don’t mistake abuse with strict training – they are quite different. Abuse is pathological and without redemptive qualities. I’m also not a fan of spanking kids and only used that technique a couple of times when raising my daughter. She responded best to soft teaching and reason. Still, never take a good rap on the rump out of your disciplinary repertoire. Cruelty as a teaching tool is crude and unnecessary. It’s a weapon of terror for the ignorant and impatient. It seems as if we’ve gone too far in the wrong direction of discipline, cultivating an environment that lacks order and softens repercussions. We see this parental hypersensitivity in child rearing and especially in our public schools where you can’t lay a finger on someone’s misbehaving little darling. Schoolteachers are in many cases being held hostage by wayward youth. As they say, the inmates are running the asylum. Because kids are getting little in the way of remedial discipline, the classroom has truly become the “asphalt jungle.” What’s needed to turn bad behavior around is a modest dose of corporal punishment, some Buddhist wisdom, mandatory public service for a couple of years for all kids of 19 except those in college and their public service would begin after they graduate. The re-empowerment of teachers is crucial to our survival as a nation. And in every school, there should be an enforcer of wisdom, fairness, and discipline, like the sensei in your local dojo. Isn’t it about time the concept of karma was taught alongside the Golden Rule?
Sorry, IMHO, life isn’t about everyone being a winner or creating some make-believe world where we play games but don’t keep score, so as not to discourage the kids. When my coach smacked me upside the head or verbally humiliated me in front of the team or in public, I never whined to my father and said, “Coach is being mean to me.” My dad would have said, “Tough shit, Chuckie. Suck it up and be a man. You’ll thank him later.” He was right – I owe my powers of self-discipline, my writing career, my ability to endure and transform whatever life has had to offer to my parents and my hard ass coach.
In the same way, my father had a regular line that he would tell my instructors at the annual parent-teacher’s conferences. His attitude speaks of a different age and whole other system of morals and values we have somehow lost to the ultra liberal, foolhardy coddlers of this new age. My dad would tell my teachers, “If my kid gets out of line, hit him with a stick, and when he gets home, I’ll hit him with a bigger one!” My father liked my coach because Buck Sayer was reality. Thank you Dad and thank you Coach.
As a teacher, there is one cardinal rule that I abide by and it is this: Be strict with yourself and merciful to others.
Charles Atkins "If You Want to Do Shakubuku, STFU!"
from August 23, 2007 - Best Blog of the Year Award - Rev. Greg
Shakubuku. It seems as if I was designed to transmit the Lotus Sutra. In the old days of the NSA shakubuku campaigns in Chicago, I was a champ. We pioneer NSA members did lot’s of shakubuku. We talked to family, friends, co-workers, and we approached strangers in malls, on the streets, and once, door-to-door. Friends got sick of hearing us talk because everything boomeranged into Buddhism. I am guilty as charged.
Numerical goals were all important. Shakubuku was presented as the fastest way to change your karma. Life has revealed to me that the pursuit of new shakubuku is inferior to the attraction of seekers. This same principle applies to people of your own faith looking for a true teacher. It applies to business and politics as well. But how does one attract people rather than chase or long to find them? Discovering the law of attraction in your life is not difficult. I would like to share a few shakubuku experiences of then and now.
First, for you anal-retentive dharmanic hair splitters, I use the term shakubuku as a generic term for broadcasting the daimoku of the Lotus Sutra. Shakubuku translates roughly into “to beat or flatten.” The idea is to slice, dice, sauté, and consume someone’s mistaken views, then lay out the feast of the great dharma. Yes, there is the kinder-gentler shoju, and geshu.
“Golly gee, Beaver, have you ever heard of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo?”
“Crime Annie crickets, Wally, that sure sounds swell. Maybe you should tell Eddie”
Back in 74’, I was an acid dropping, pot smoking, seeker of all things mystic and magick. I had hundreds of friends and every one of them got the NMRK rap. The ranks of our youth division grew to more than 70 new youth division in our district. Only a few kept it up. I remember trying to shakubuku a car full of teens at a stop light. I passed them a copy of the World Tribune, and the cops pulled our car over to see if we might be passing drugs. The cop smiled, and then warned us that what we did wasn’t safe. Fair enough.
One of the things I remember most was chanting in an out of the way place in our hometown park. All the hippies hung out there. A fast moving stream ran along its outer edge. Two foot bridges allowed people to cross over into the park. One particularly nasty, alcoholic that I knew since childhood began to mock me because I was chanting. I asked the Gohonzon to show me proof of its power. Then, right in front of me, some of his drunken friends happened by. For whatever reason, the biggest guy picked up the mocker, and dangled him over the bridge, but he lost his grip. Falling about six feet onto some slimy boulders in the creek, the mocker broke his leg in three places. Cool, I thought.
At that time, Gohonzon were being handed out to anyone who came to the chapter house or kaikan, sat through a meeting, had five bucks, and would actually sign the application. Hippies, dippies, yippies, hookers, winos, and average kids got seduced by the ephemeral aura of Japanese wisdom, The high energy of our shakubuku meetings was, for the most part, irresistible. They would get the Gohonzon, we would try to get it enshrined right away, most often we would lose touch and never see them or the Gohonzon again. We planted a lot of seeds and allowed countless Gohonzon to the fate of people who didn’t have a clue as to what they now possessed.
During that time, I debated with born again Christians whenever I had the opportunity, while approaching complete strangers in all kinds of social settings with the message of daimoku and NSA. Being the studious type, I restudied the Bible and various explanatory texts. By the time I became a member, I had already been completely schooled in the Christian doctrine. Moreover, I had studied and practiced Kundalini yoga, pondered the Vedas, knew kaballah, had achieved several grades of initiation in magick, and was adept at tarot divination. One of my trusted leaders told me that all of my old karma of dealing with the occult and lesser spirituality would be put to good use for kosen-rufu. My leader was right in that my esoteric knowledge and experience did eventually serve the Buddhadharma. From my early studies and strict training, the Law of attraction dawned in my senses, allowing me to ceaselessly transmit the Mystic Law. This was not always so.
The pained melancholy of late February 1987 comes to mind. Our chapter was fighting valiantly to achieve our shakubuku target. Each member, whether individually or in small groups would disburse into the Chicago suburbs to introduce people to the SGI. At the time, I was waiting to hear from my doctor why I was so sick and crippled with pain. I had lost forty pounds, the lymph nodes on both sides of my neck were enlarged, I was struck by fits of nausea and vomiting, and exhaustion gripped me like an ocean riptide. Even though I had chanted more than one million daimoku during the past two months, debilitating illness and instinctual fear of the unknown had me in its clutches. The thing that mattered most to me was doing shakubuku and building our chapter. My leaders encouraged me to challenge my weakness and make a powerful cause for my eternal life.
It was a Sunday after our chapter meeting that I drove to a drab, desolate shopping center to pass out flyers. Our intention was to lead people back to impromptu meetings. It was a dark, dank, incredibly cold Chicagoland February day, with gale force winds. I was bent over from pain, not knowing then that I had a golf ball size tumor eating away at my lower spine. People tried to avoid me. Snot froze in my nose and after a few hours, tears from the cold wind ran down my face, freezing on my cheeks. After several hours of futility, I ended my austerity.
I drove back to Waukegan, feeling like a complete failure. Forlorn, freezing, feeling like I was 80 years old, I went to the Lake Michigan shoreline – a place that never failed to renew my spirit. Before me, on that mighty inland ocean, were enormous waves slamming the shore like a titan’s fist. Waves of ten feet smashed into the icy breakwater, with myriad spindrift flying in every direction. I looked upon the turmoil of the lake, seeing the oneness of my tumultuous inner life with the tempest outside. Enraptured by the turbulent waters and my own angst, I chanted gut-wrenching daimoku to the elements to transform my life. Little did I know that in just a short few days, I would walk into the abyss of end-stage cancer, not knowing whether I would live to see another day - let alone accomplish my mission for kosen-rufu.
Without the challenge of cancer, that I believe was granted by the Buddha Himself, I would not have been able realize in my life what the New Age neophytes now call the Law of Attraction. With all due respect to the modern day proponents and the author of the Law of Attraction, it is in fact a shallow concept in that any yahoo with Will and intention can attract various phenomena into their life. Those who adhere to the Law of Attraction are those who have success, love and “things.” Because they have them, through no cause deeper than right place, right time, and right karma, they expect others to believe that they can attract whatever they need. It’s an absurd idea of New Age thinking for ego driven people justifying how they have what they have.
The First Noble Truth declares that all life is suffering. Unless one has the power to attract and to positively transform circumstance, their ketai-based philosophy wrapped in a kutai faux fur is just temporary bragging rights.
Based on my dismay with the shallow passing for the profound, I will rename these phenomena as the Law of Mandara or the Law of Abundance, because fortuitous benefits naturally rain down upon us, causing sprouts, robust growth, then flower and fruit, all in perfect accord with our whole life needs. The right teachers appear, financial and material abundance manifest with impeccable synchronicity, and healthiness takes root.
The reality of this Law of spiritual gravity, operating freely in my life, enables me to do quality shakubuku with one person or rivet the attention of a large gathering. This benefit also makes it possible to transmit the daimoku of the Lotus Sutra on a global scale, in perfect accord with the Will of Buddha. This Law is so marvelous and compelling, that even a rough-hewn, uneducated man like me can teach and touch the hearts of all types of people.
The present moment is where I exist.
For me, shakubuku has evolved into action that occurs naturally, rather than the bosatsu evangelist, preaching to anyone who would listen – always presuming that the doctrine that I espouse is supreme. No longer do I begin with the presumption that my engagement with other teachings - other faiths - is an honor or service to them. I no longer have it in the back of my mind that at long last, “they” will ultimately be saved, because I have shown them the correct teaching. How it happened that I lost self-righteous delusion, I’m not exactly sure. But people of all walks-of-life, and of various religions have taken notice and seek me out. Just within the last few weeks, there have been several examples.
As you all know, by vocation, I am now the manager of the most popular restaurant in Champaign-Urbana, a stone’s throw from the University of Illinois. This work puts me in the public eye and under a professional microscope for every shift. A couple of weeks ago, the U.S. Congressman for our district, called me to his table. He said that there was a light about me and he wanted to know which area church I belonged to. I told him I was a Buddhist and let it go at that. The Congressman then handed me a twenty-dollar bill saying that this was for being so kind to him and his family and that I was the best restaurant manager in the twin cities. That’s high praise from an archconservative republican lawmaker who only tips our servers 10%!
A week later, a well-dressed woman called me over to her table to tell me that there was some energy about me that impressed her deeply and she was going to write the owner and tell him what a great manager he had. These and other similar comments are what we used to call doing shakubuku with your life. I didn’t have to preach or promote Buddhism. My life conveyed the essence of why we practice. If those people want to go further, there would be a time and place for that discussion.
But not all encounters can be instant esho-funi. There are people who have their own ideologies to spread, their own ministries to hawk. They are no different than I was trying to do shakubuku to anyone who would listen. Last week, a man engaged me in discussion about his religious philosophy. Let me explain.
After my semi-annual VA check-up and certification of robust, good health, I drove across Chicago to my favorite Greek diner to feast on a gyros and monster onion rings. I first discovered this place called Kings, located at Milwaukee and Foster Avenue back in 1974 when I was a YMD traveling to brass band practices.
While standing in line, waiting for my order, a man of about 40 noticed my U.S. Army hat. He said his name was Mike and asked about my service. He then asked directions to a location where he had a new construction job. When the food was up, he invited me to sit with him and his co-worker to break bread. After a minute of more small talk, he asked me, “Have you been saved?”
It would be pointless to try to re-create the entire conversation like a screenplay, so let me summarize the high points, with a few memorable quotes. My response to Mike was, “Saved? Like you, Mike?” And then I smiled, waiting for his response.
For more than thirty years I longed to be questioned or challenged about religion. Because I wanted to debate someone - anyone, the universe made sure that it rarely happened. As time marched on and my doubts about the Taiseki-ji-shu doctrines solidified into outright disbelief, the magnetism of my life force grew in power.
Mike went on to tell me that he read the Bible on his breaks at work and that he believed in every word from Genesis to Revelations. To him every word of the Bible is literally true. He said that God had told him to spread His word. This, of course, was too good to be true, but I didn’t get excited. I remembered my cat, and how her tail would swish up and down, then side-to-side, while it stalked a wild critter. It was interesting that I wasn’t even intrigued when this man approached me, nor did I feel any particular desire to refute his primitive theology. I just wanted to eat my gyros.
Mike asked me if I had ever read the Bible and if Jesus Christ was my personal savior. If I were a Christian, then he would have been preaching to the choir, as they say. I finally told Mike that I was a Buddhist and that polytheistic or monotheistic, anthropomorphic tribal deities were regarded as irrelevant to the attainment of enlightenment. In fact, belief in a supreme being outside your own life may inhibit your spiritual liberation. I could hardly get my last comment in that I was somewhat familiar with the Bible and that Jesus was a man who was most respect worthy.
Mike went into preacher mode telling me that every word of the Bible was the literal truth and that there was only one God who created the universe – nothing was uncreated. I waited out his friendly, but emotional tirade. I watched his friend’s eyes as Mike spoke, seeing the absolute anguish of this guy having to work with a 24/7 Jesus freak.
I simply said that no one created the universe or this world and that the universe was a natural occurrence and merely IS. Mike jumped on that. “You see that painting? Did someone create that? Do you see this building, did someone build that? So you see, someone had to create the universe?”
I went back to my childhood logic and asked, “Who or what created God?” He snapped back that no one created God, that God was uncreated. “I thought you said that nothing was uncreated, Mike?” I could see a faint smile come over his friend’s face.
Then I moved on to his literal belief in the Bible, pointing out that the Bible had been changed around, edited, modified, and politicized numerous times since its translation from Greek millennia ago. I asked him if it were possible that the Genesis, Revelations, and other stories in the Bible were a mythology of metaphors? Well, Mike would never be swayed from his strongly held belief, so more power to him. But his friend who listened carefully saw the truth of my words.
Decades of shakubuku experience has taught me that people like Mike believe in their mythos with such conviction that they don’t let facts, logic, or reason stand in the way of their faith. It was a wonderful reminder to me that critical thinking skills, a seeking mind for the truth, and openness to the mysteries of the universe are far more valuable to one’s life than the bliss of ignorance or the folly of blind faith. He did ask me what my personal philosophy was, so I gave him a few pointers.
One, the sufferings of life can be transformed through the cultivation of wisdom. Two, altruism is one of the greatest causes for good. And three, at the core of life is enlightenment, and Buddhism exists to enable people to realize this state of being. Mike's thunderous argument was dissipated like a storm broken up by a great mountain or stronger forces. His friend smiled at me and shook my hand, although he didn’t say a word. In our discussion Mike spoke 95% of the time and yet he was completely refuted by a few questions and well placed facts. Time has taught me that to do shakubuku, don't preach or expound. Don't long to save that poor, deluded, rootless person. Just wait until karma brings you someone to connect with, then STFU and listen. Wisdom will show you the way.
Today, I announce the formation of a new healing movement. Jakkodo means land of eternally tranquil light. This land is your body, your life, and your mind. I have founded Jakkodo solely for the sake of the sick, the suffering, and the forgotten. The disinfranchised should seek reconciliation or find a sangha that serves their needs. Jakkodo is a healing movement to bring peace of spirit and whole life wellness.
Those whom suffer from illness need the medicine of Lotus Sutra that is like the tranquil light of a full moon. Shakyamuni employed the moon loving meditation to cure King Ajasi of leprous boils, thus ensuring the perpetuation of the dharma. Jakkodo now exists for those who are suffering from illness and seek the tranquil light of peace to rise in their lives, like the harvest moon over fields of plenty.
Jakkodo teaches the way of Mantra-Powered Visualization as the means to induce healing and open the path to deeper understanding and practice of the Lotus Sutra. At the root of Jakkodo is the advancement of scientific study and research into meditation and prayer in healing, respecting the healing traditions of all religions and spiritualities. Over the past five years I have built alliances with physicians, scientific researchers, philosophers, and authors, to investigate and promote the efficacy of Modern Buddhist Healing. It is my intention to research the effects of Nam(u)-myoho-renge-kyo on the body in the same way that universities are invesitgating the physiological effects of meditation. We are replicas of the universe, made up of matter, energy, and consciousness. All true forms of spiritual healing are welcome in Jakkodo.
The impetus to found Jakkodo was the growing number of ordinary people who have overcome their illness and those who realized the land of eternally tranquil light in their life, and passed over in peace.
Jakkodo is not another Buddhist sect, nor is it an organization. Jakkodo is the rising full moon of internal peace and tranquil light that heals the body, the heart, the spirit, and the minds of those who employ the daimoku of the Lotus Sutra.
There is no membership. If you are a Buddhist, Hindu, Jew, Christian, Muslim, Pagan, Spiritualist, Shamanist, agnostic, unbeliever, or someone without any affiliation, Jakkodo exists to empower you so you can secure wellness through the Lotus Sutra or various dharmanic expedients.
As founder of Jakkodo, I take the name Gakkoren, which means "moonlight lotus." Nikko (sunlight) and Gakko (moonlight) are the two metaphorical bodhisattvas that accompany Yakushi, the Medicine Buddha. If you employ the daimoku of the Lotus Sutra to heal illness, you are one with Jakkodo.
Embrace and support your chosen sect or faith, and know that Jakkodo is a healing movement that awakens the land of eternally tranquil light within us all.
I am a movement of one.
Gakkoren
aka Charles Atkins
Modern Buddhist Healing has guided and helped people all over the world. Nowhere is its reception as strong as with the ordinary people of the SGI. Wherever my books are read, they often confound SGI leaders – not always. I saw a strong reaction in Switzerland, the UK, and a few other countries. The members “get it,” but the leaders are suspicious, even superstitious, since it’s a book published outside the organization. I sense that because it isn’t officially “sanctioned,” it may be construed as heretical, and therefore detrimental to one’s faith.
Just recently, this faith-driven suspicion emerged again, when a member being treated for cancer gave her experience about the book and her feeling of empowerment. The leader questioned the member whether I was propagating the “right” Lotus Sutra, inferring that if I based my teachings on Shakyamuni instead of Nichiren, I would incur punishment. She cited the punishment experienced by president Toda. Yes, I’ve read the story, but here’s the problem, I’m teaching people how to chant daimoku, not what to believe. In the book, contact information for the SGI is provided so they can find a sangha, if they choose. I’m not trying to create a following. I’m transmitting the healing science of the Lotus Sutra, which includes primordial sounds and visualization. This technique of mantra-powered visualization enhances the immune system, manages pain, and imbues peace of spirit.
What I sense from reports like the one above is paranoia - not secure, encompassing, compassionate faith. Wisdom, or even informed, critical thinking are the exception rather than the rule. This leader’s hardnosed reaction was like mocking a physician's medicine and treatment of a sick person. One cannot fault a person for trying to protect another person, religion or no. Yet, who would have the audacity to heap doubt, fear, and guilt on a cancer victim?
Before there’s any more judgment, or even comment, it would behoove any person to read the book before they make a damn fool out of themselves. But just in case they won’t read it or don’t understand it, here’s what president Ikeda and Mr. Tsuji said about Modern Buddhist Healing.
For those who might wonder, President Ikeda sent me a congratulatory message citing it as “your great book.” The manuscript of Modern Buddhist Healing was thoroughly reviewed by the SGI publications department in Japan, receiving a line-by-line edit with corrections, comments, and suggestions by president Ikeda’s own English copy editor - much to the consternation of my publisher. The SGI in Japan was thrilled with the book. At a personal meeting, the head of the publications department that I worked with and who helped me tremendously, had a private audience with Sensei to present a signed copy of my book, along with a synopsis. President Ikeda sent along a message that expressed gratitude and prayers for my “important work.” He also sent me juzu beads and other gifts.
Mr. Tsuji, whose guidance on daimoku and visualization I had used when fighting cancer twenty years ago, had the book read to him by his son. He was amazed and thrilled that the guidance he gave so many years ago was helping people overcome illness. He sent his congratulations as well. Aware that some might try to accuse me of profiting from Buddhism, long ago, I ensured that I never profit from the book or my work in healing, by signing over all the royalties and refusing money for speaking or helping the sick. The blessings I have received from turning away from money, profit, and fame have been staggering. Thousands of people have gained immense benefit in their quest for wellness. My life shines with good fortune and well being. Thus, I encourage anyone to stand alone and heal.
For me, healing is about empowerment - and like prayer, is absolutely free. As I told the member using my book to fight her cancer, "never let religion get in the way of a good healing."