My wife received a phone call yesterday, from a member who was moving into our area in order to begin a new job. The call and the scenario was a familiar one for us.
She wanted a meeting to attend. We didn’t have one scheduled this last weekend but offered that we certainly would welcome her to our house to chant. A time was agreed upon.
My wife continued to speak with her about housing availability and finally concluded “I really can’t help you find a house, we’ve never rented here”. Encouragement was further offered and the call ended.
We went about our business, planning around the evening chanting “date”. When we arrived home there was a message on our machine, from her. She thanked us again and said that she felt much better after speaking to my wife and also that she found what she needed and was going home tonight (to her previous home in some other city), and therefore would not be making our chanting date.
We’ve been here before, it’s a familiar feeling.
And it’s ok, absolutely ok.
In our years of chanting and leadership often these “gypsies” (I mean that in a nice way) show up looking for support. We’ve learned from experience that there is the right support, and the - uh, less than right support. Often we cross the line a little, but we’ve learned a hard lesson about this Buddhism, specifically as it applies to supporting our fellow members;
The goal here is to chant to change our karma, and become happy.
If you want to feel better, heck, you can take a pill for that. Not that we don’t chant to feel better often, especially in the midst of a challenge, but in the big picture our Buddhism, this true Buddhism, is about changing karma.
I wish her the best. I doubt we'll ever actually meet her.
I’ve returned from my Spring pilgrimage to Japan.
Crap am I tired. Coffee is my savior. Moments ago I drank my first US cup of espresso. Life is getting better. Starbucks in the US switched to cassette Espresso machines two years ago due to disability claims for repetitive motion stress syndrome. Japanese espresso now would KILL American espresso in a fight.
I’m sore. My right arm is wrecked, I have healing sores on my right hand from fast sword drawing. I’m well and not sick however, something significant considering I was constantly bathed in a veritable ocean of colds and flues.
There is so much I could write about, but one subject comes to mind.
Kami. The unseen. Spirits, Gods, Demons, they’re everywhere in Japan.
Years ago a group of Soka Gakkai Youth Division published a webpage report based on their visit to the home temple of the Kempon Hokke sect. In consistant Gakkai fashion they nit-picked and tore the temple and the sect to pieces for the purpose of proving Gakkai supremacy. I’d always found that visit and subsequent report somewhat curious.
It was during this latest trip however that it all came home for me.
The Japanese are clearly apathetic and disconnected from religious matters and true religious conviction, at least the modernly inclined populace. The reality remains however that Japan is an ancient civilization. Shinto, Buddhism and even Christianity are all very muddled in Japanese society. My visit to the Shinto Hachiman Shrine, a wonderful and vast temple grounds dedicated to the war God Hachiman, reminded me that paying faithful homage to Shrines and Temples is largely a holiday matter, something that in America would easily be replaced with a trip to Disneyland.
In the Gakkai report on Kempon Hokke a certain huge temple bell seemed to be of importance. The youngsters that visited the temple (Japanese Youth Division) seemed to focus on this “bell worship” as the central piece of evidence illustrating Kempon Hokke’s heretical stand on Nichiren Buddhism. For decades Gakkai leaders at Shakabuku meetings have parroted the line “some Nichiren sects even worship foxes and stuff”. If you’ve been in SGI for any length of time you’ve surely heard this. It’s “pop-Buddhism” at it’s best. Groundless rumors recycled over and over without any real knowledge of fact.
One thing I’ve come to experience in my numerous trips to Japan is that that Japanese worship all sorts of stuff, and it’s all a mix and match combination of all religions. It’s all Kami, the unseen.
In Noda during one of my final walks, I ventured down a side street where I discovered a small neighborhood shrine which a retired and English speaking Japanese man informed me was the first shrine built for the Kikkoman soy sauce factory. Shinto? Buddhist? Confucius? It so doesn’t matter. It’s a shrine. It’s Japanese. It’s Kami. For them, it's all good.
Understanding how religion actually exists in Japanese society would go far to keep Americans and other non-Japanese from looking like arrogant and elitist pigs. We don’t really understand how things work there and we’re quick to pass judgment on things that are deeply ingrained in Japanese culture, the same culture that brought us Nichiren Buddhism.
My sword teacher, it turns out, was a Tendai priest, but apparently some years ago switched to Shingon Buddhism because Tendai just wasn’t working for him. His parents, it also turns out, were Nichiren Shu believers. His mix of Tendai and Shingon Mikkyo Buddhism, centralized on Fudo Myo is an extremely rare mix of Buddhistics, perhaps completely unique in Japan, certainly not something found outside of Japan.
SGI is a great place to be in you want to think you’ve got it all figured out. I admit I chant “only Nam myoho renge kyo“. Playing with different practices in a reckless manner is, in my experience, better left to the pagans and witches.
The thing I will support in the future however is the elimination of the “holier than thou” attitude we have towards the Japanese and their Buddhism. The Japanese have been worshipping Kami, the unseen, before Caucasians had barely left the caves. I’m not suggesting that every sect of Buddhism has the juice to save anyone from suffering, but clearly your average Gakkai member doesn’t know crap about how this stuff actually works in Japan. Is it important? I suppose that is a question that is best answered individually.
It’s great to be back. Again.
Rev. Greg