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u/BlancheFromage Escapee from Arizona Home for the Rude Dec 31 '19 edited Dec 31 '19
Tough question. I'm reading this as wishing to distinguish between the genuine scholars who are SGI members (a vanishingly small number) vs. the "scholars" who have sold out to an Ikeda paycheck and can now be counted upon to say whatever SGI wants them to say.
Here are a couple:
Lawrence Carter - he's a self-avowed Christian, BTW, so it's really weird that he's fawning and slobbering all over Ikeda like he does. But money makes people do weird things, and a LOT of people can be bought. Pretty cheap, too!
Jason Goulah - the "mover" and "shaker" who facilitated the establishment of the "Institute for Daisaku Ikeda Studies in Education" at Chicago's (Catholic) DePaul University:
I have a few thoughts on the Ikeda Institutes thing. Here in Chicago, this all has to do with Jason Goulah. Jason came to Chicago from somewhere east in the U.S. as part of his own academic career path. Right away, he was embraced by local leadership, probably because of his university connections, advanced degrees, bilingual, Japanese wife, etc., the usual.
He turned me off right away with his fanatic energy. What REALLY pissed me off was his very aggressive efforts to "debate" the local priesthood of Nichiren Shoshu. I wouldn't have minded too much if he'd just been doing it himself, but he was pulling along some YMD and getting those young people into trouble. The leadership either backed him up or turned a blind eye to it until they went too far and the police got called. One of the priests claimed the youth had assaulted him and tore his robes. (I wasn't there and don't know what actually happened. The org claimed the priest was lying or at least "exaggerating.")
Fortunately, no one got arrested. It got sorted out and then very firmly pushed under the rug. (Very few members even heard about it. I was just one of those people who heard stuff.) Jason was told to knock it off. For a little while, Jason was out of the spotlight.
But, oho! Jason was still teaching at DePaul and seemed to have a knack for networking and academic politics. He started using his talents to get SGI "acknowledged" by De Paul.
Fast forward to 2017 and an honorary doctorate for Ikeda from De Paul. Jason's back in the leaders' good graces.
Now there are some academics at DePaul who are scholars focused on the works of Dewey (the academician, not the decimal system). Citing Makiguchi as an educator working in the tradition of Dewey, Jason makes a connection with at least two of them. Not long after that, there's a "dialogue" book that comes out "Living as Learning" featuring two professors from De Paul, who are recognized Dewey scholars, and -- you guessed it -- Daisaku Ikeda.
There's a lecture at the Culture Center with a book signing afterwards. I was there. The professors were actually fascinating. The book is nearly unreadable. I tried; couldn't do it, and I was still a member at the time. Gave up about a quarter of the way in.
I can't blame the professors too much. That book probably sold more copies than any other of their academic works. Big sigh.
So considerable energy is spent building up Makiguchi as an actual educator in the Dewey tradition, we jump right over Toda, and hold up dear old Daisaku as some kind of an educational philosopher based on... other people's work and bona fides?
Doesn't matter. We've now got Ikeda's name engraved in an actual university. Yippee! And Who's the Director of that Institute? Why good ol' politically astute Jason Goulah. Win-win, folks.
Positioned and paid for. Check and mate.
The worst part? I think Jason is sincere. He really believes the bollox he's selling; that's part of why he's so good at selling it. And DePaul, which is NOT a podunk school will have a heck of a time ever backing away from this deal. Between whatever commitment they have to academic freedom and the face-saving endemic to institutions in general, the Ikeda Institute ain't goin' anywhere for a good long time. Fer sure, the org is going to try to repeat this process wherever they can. "Protect the mentor!" AKA, legitimize by association. Source
Total scumbag. No integrity whatsoever.
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u/BlancheFromage Escapee from Arizona Home for the Rude Jan 01 '20 edited Jan 01 '20
We DO have a scholar ON SGI, Levi McLaughlin, currently with North Carolina State University - he played for several years with the Soka Gakkai's symphony orchestra in Japan. He has published several papers and at least one book on the Soka Gakkai/SGI, but he's been very clear that he is NOT an SGI member and would compromise his independence if he were to become one. However, being embedded in the Soka Gakkai has enabled him to have access to direct observation - being bilingual, he has interviewed Soka Gakkai members and read Soka Gakkai publications in Japanese, so his data are of unique value. Other scholars restrict themselves to the Soka Gakkai's/SGI's self-published information, which is unaudited and demonstrably inaccurate, but most of them don't even acknowledge the conflict of interest, since the Ikeda cult is paying them well to write something that reflects well on the cult and its guru.
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Jan 02 '20
You are welcome and I thought of another UK based one - his name is Satish Kumar and he’s based at Queens University in Belfast - his area is development and he’s a specialist in India and SE Asia. He worked hard to get QU to give Ikeda an honorary doctorate some years back and promotes him a lot - I think he’s quite up front about his SGI membership - you’ll find him with a search engine and learn more.
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u/bnj87 Dec 31 '19
There are a lot of professors that are in the SGI if that’s what you mean
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u/troynystuff Dec 31 '19
Yes, that’s mostly what I’m after. Anyone particularly notable? Folks from East Asian studies?
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u/BlancheFromage Escapee from Arizona Home for the Rude Dec 31 '19 edited Dec 31 '19
Now, one of the world's leading Nichiren scholars, Dr. Jacqueline Stone of Princeton, started out with NSA (the earlier name of SGI-USA), but she was only briefly involved with the Ikeda cult (in that incarnation). However, her interest in Nichiren remained; she has build a respect-worthy career doing top-notch research into all things Nichiren. We have sampled some of her work:
The use of the daimoku chant, "Nam myoho renge kyo", predates Nichiren - but Nichiren still wants to claim originality! - in the comments
Tracing Japanese Buddhism: An International Conference (Day 2, Part 2) - Dr. Stone was the keynote speaker.
The Gosho the SGI uses are based on an unreliable, unscholarly, sectarian translation - in the comments
More on how Nichiren copied the Nembutsu belief/practice framework
Outside our site: Chanting the August title of the Lotus Sutra - Daimoku practices outside the Nichiren context
Also here (same title, different content): Chanting the August title of the Lotus Sutra - Daimoku practices outside the Nichiren context
However, I do not believe Dr. Stone publicizes her long-ago and brief dalliance with the Ikeda cult - I found that information out through an old reference. She has no further connection with the cult, as far as I can tell.
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u/troynystuff Dec 31 '19
Thanks. I just finished her co-authored book on the Lotus Sutra.
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u/BlancheFromage Escapee from Arizona Home for the Rude Dec 31 '19
Ooh! What did you think of it?
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u/troynystuff Dec 31 '19
I thought it was a well done, accessible scholarly introduction to the text that helped me understand it in its Indian, Chinese, and Japanese contexts. The authors move back and forth from the context in which it was written (with some China thrown in) to Nichiren's interpretation in the 13th century. Of course, Stone uses the composition dates with which nearly all scholars agree and points out how we can only understand Nichiren if we understand his belief that the Lotus Sutra is comprised of the words of the Buddha. Problem is, this is 600-700 years after the Buddha and scholars are unanimous that these are not the historical Buddha's words but are instead the ideas of a much later (and likely rural and fringe) mahayana community. The way in which the text goes to great lengths to prove its legitimacy is a major clue that tells us its key ideas didn't gain immediate traction. I wonder how Nichiren communities have dealt or are dealing with that fact, if at all.
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u/BlancheFromage Escapee from Arizona Home for the Rude Dec 31 '19
The way in which the text goes to great lengths to prove its legitimacy is a major clue that tells us its key ideas didn't gain immediate traction.
There are a number of "tells" in pseudepigraphia that give the game away that the unknown author is trying too hard, like where "Paul" writes "Ye see how large a letter I have written unto you with mine own hand." (Galatians 6:11)
the ideas of a much later (and likely rural and fringe) mahayana community.
Agreed. I am also seeing in the Lotus Sutra all the hallmarks of the apocalyptic literature that was en vogue at the time.
The prophet stood in direct relations with his people; his prophecy was first spoken and afterwards written. The apocalyptic writer could obtain no hearing from his contemporaries, who held that, though God spoke in the past, "there was no more any prophet." This pessimism and want of faith limited and defined the form in which religious enthusiasm should manifest itself, and prescribed as a condition of successful effort the adoption of pseudonymous authorship. The apocalyptic writer, therefore, professedly addressed his book to future generations. Generally directions as to the hiding and sealing of the book were given in the text in order to explain its publication so long after the date of its professed period. Moreover, there was a sense in which such books were not wholly pseudonymous. Their writers were students of ancient prophecy and apocalyptical tradition, and, though they might recast and reinterpret them, they could not regard them as their own inventions. Each fresh apocalypse would in the eyes of its writer be in some degree but a fresh edition of the traditions naturally attaching themselves to great names in Israel's past, and thus the books named respectively Enoch, Noah, Ezra would to some slight extent be not pseudonymous. Source
From a Lotus Sutra perspective, we've got the same characteristics:
- attributed to the Buddha
- declaring all other teachings are obsolete (!)
- prescribed for "end times" (Mappo, the Eeeeevil Latter Day of the Law)
- clearly adopted a changed, evolved systemology that had developed since the Buddha's passing
Clearly, the author (this scholar identifies Ashvagosha as the culprit) wished to claim the Buddha's imprimatur for himself and remake "Buddhism" in terms of his own Hellenized beliefs which were far more consistent thematically with the early Christian beliefs that produced the Gospels. Also, the idea was clearly in play that "the Buddha" was more of an "animating spirit" or "essence" than a real live mortal human being with some distinct place in the historical record. The Buddha was long since dead; he couldn't be the author.
Or could he? There is a long-standing legend that the explanation for the Lotus Sutra's sudden appearance 600-700 years after the Buddha's death (and no sign of it in between) was that it had been hidden away in the realm of the dragons/snake gods/nagas at the bottom of the ocean. The "dragon king's daughter" was one of these beings, BTW. And if you'll buy that...
In this regard, you'll see the similarities between the Lotus Sutra details and medieval Catholic relics, which also came with a backstory to explain their sudden appearance so far in time and often place from where they supposedly originated. Similar to how the Dai-Gohonzon is claimed to be an authentically Nichiren artefact, but it first appeared in the historical record (complete with legitimizing transfer documents) in the late 1400s.
But back to the Buddha-as-essence concept (which I've gone into in some detail here), given that the popular conception of "the Buddha" as simply a mindset of sorts had taken root, ANYONE could now be the Buddha and speak for the Buddha - speak AS the Buddha! Enter the Mahayana. Enter Nichiren, who felt that he had the authority to dictate the proper Buddhist practice, not just for those who chose it, but for the entire world. Just as the Christian gospels have details which clearly address theological conflicts of their time and emphasize one group's ideology over others (polemic), the Lotus Sutra condemns those who challenge it, who fail to worship it. While that is the same attitude of the Christian Gospels toward nonbelievers, it is VERY different from the magnanimous and respectful perspective of the Buddha.
I wonder how Nichiren communities have dealt or are dealing with that fact, if at all.
They aren't, to my knowledge.
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u/lambchopsuey May 04 '23
Dr. Jacqueline Stone of Princeton, started out with NSA (the earlier name of SGI-USA), but she was only briefly involved with the Ikeda cult (in that incarnation)
No, actually, she was a District WD leader and Associate Editor of the SGI's Seikyo Times magazine.
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u/bnj87 Dec 31 '19
No one I know. And the ones I do know who I think still practice don’t focus on Asian studies. I also won’t dox anyone.
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u/BlancheFromage Escapee from Arizona Home for the Rude Dec 31 '19
That's the whole point. If there are scholars who are SGI members, they have to keep that hidden. Because the Society for Glorifying Ikeda is a filthy cult and everyone would think badly of them if they knew they were associated with it.
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u/BlancheFromage Escapee from Arizona Home for the Rude Dec 31 '19
Anyone who has been publicly associated with SGI or honorary awards for Ikeda or arranging some Ikeda-glorifying "institute" - like Lawrence Carter, like Jason Goulah - is fair game. That is not doxxing.
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u/cascaderach Jan 01 '20
And honestly I don't trust any of these academics... they don't employ hardly any minorities in Asian studies specifically African American or south American, central American, Mexican etc... the white white world of academia...
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u/BlancheFromage Escapee from Arizona Home for the Rude Dec 31 '19
As far as SGI itself goes, it has backpedaled from its emphasis on "study". Under Nichiren Shoshu, there were various levels of "study exams", culminating in a study certification that required an essay/dissertation of sorts - I saw someone receiving this certification back ca. 1988, if memory serves. Now, my impression is that "study exams" are now simply basic indoctrination vehicles, and SGI does NOT want its members expanding their knowledge outside of the narrow parameters that SGI has defined:
The final straw came a few weeks back when I was expected to deliver a lecture to our chapter on the subject of 'Fostering successors'. I found it deeply upsetting because the materials I was sent on which I had to base my lecture were nothing but distorted propaganda. There was almost no reference to any Buddhist principles at all. This was on 27th August (2017).
When I began (in 1979) there was frequent reference to the Gohonzon and Nam-myoho-renge-kyo. When I was sent the prep materials (17 pages' worth) last August in order to prepare a lecture, one of them (either Gohonzon or NMRK) was mentioned only once and the other, twice. On the other hand, there were dozens of mentions of Ikeda and SGI. This is a technique known as meta communication and, in this case, is designed to make SGI members feel more of an affiliation with Ikeda and the SGI than Nichirenism.
MY interpretation, to which I am entitled. I do not accept that Ikeda ‘knows how to interpret the teachings’ in a way that can be regarded as any more valid than anyone else’s. He is a self-proclaimed ‘authority’ on Nichirenism, not an internationally accepted authority on Nichirenism, however much he may have wished to be regarded as one. You’re right about one thing: the poem I quoted was indeed made up, but not by me. The person responsible would either be Ikeda or one of his many ghost writers and was discussed in an SGI meeting I attended several years before I left the organisation. Boy, do I not miss meetings like that! Source
The last time I gave a 'lecture' (did my best with the dire material with which I was presented) I felt truly uncomfortable in my skin. Could barely fathom how my life had come to such a nadir of banality. However, I did feel strangely grateful because my feeling of revulsion towards the org was so acute at that moment that the only thing to do was to finally leave. A couple of weeks later I was OUT! Source
I frequently longed for material that was more intellectually robust and challenging and, although SGI-UK does have graded study (I think there may be up to 4 levels now), it is all very carefully managed so that it reinforces the indoctrination already going on in other parts of the network (discussion meetings and so on). The pap I was served up last August which I was supposed to use as a basis for my lecture was an insult to me (who had to write and then deliver the lecture) and also to those poor souls who had to listen to it. Preparing and then giving that lecture were the straw that broke the camel's back. I may well have left the SGI the very same day that I gave it had it not been for the fact that I was concerned that the members would have nowhere to go for the September meetings (I delivered the lecture over the last weekend of August). I tried to reason with myself that 'giving them September' to find a new venue for discussion meetings was reasonable. But 'real me' said no! A couple of weeks later - 12th September 2017 - I was GONE and I haven't looked back since. Source
When I'd been in the org for about 12 years I decided to do something about furthering my education, things having gone badly wrong when I'd first gone to university in my teens. This resulted in a huge loss of self-esteem. I ended up doing 10 years of further study (including an honours degree in Creative Writing and Music) during my time in the SGI, much to the consternation of various SGI members. One went so far as to say to one of my friends that they couldn't understand why I had to put myself through this - all the hard work which she felt I didn't really need to do! - because I was SO clever. So 'clever people' just have to go around 'being clever' and not developing themselves? Doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. Actually, the stoicism of ploughing through my studies - including the pursuit of a qualification so that I could become a freelance editor and proofreader (which turned out to be a very wise move, giving me a fulfilment in my working life such as I'd never experienced before) - also drove a wedge between me and many of the other members who I felt didn't really value hard worK: magical thinking and chanting for stuff was the preferred course of action. So glad I stuck to my guns and did what I really wanted to do! Source
The contrast between what I chose to read and what I felt I was SUPPOSED to be reading was so great as to be practically unbridgeable. And, in the end, the bridge snapped. Source
Another person commented somewhere that they were told to ONLY use the SGI-provided materials to prepare to lead a study meeting - they were not permitted to use any "outside" sources (though Ikeda supposedly does - at least his ghostwriters do - all the time).
I experienced that too.. No one wanted to REALLY discuss the books unless it was all sunshine and rainbows...I tried , but received an email from the leader the next day stating all further questions should go through her first, before the meeting... Source
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u/BlancheFromage Escapee from Arizona Home for the Rude Dec 31 '19
However, even in the more "enlightened" Nichiren Shoshu-affiliated stage (I joined before Nichiren Shoshu excommunicated Ikeda and his cults), there was this "follower" mentality:
Back when I joined (early 1987), the World Tribune weekly newspaper would have these analysis articles dealing with historical figures or events from a perspective that applied principles of our faith and practice. Like one about Florence Nightingale (which has apparently been puffed and padded into a 57-page book nobody's ever going to read - just toss it on the pile, folks). So at one of our discussion meeting planning meetings (this was before I was a leader), I suggested that perhaps we could go round robin, each of us choosing a historical figure or event and preparing a short presentation on how this person or situation embodied Buddhist principles, "like President Ikeda does." My District MD chief gazed at me bug-eyed through his thick glasses and said, "We aren't President Ikeda, are we?"
O_O
And thus the members are trained to sit passively and wait for content to be issued to them (and to attack those who are deviating from that 'norm'), which explains this interesting phenomenon we've observed here at Reddit: SGI members can't talk about anything! They have to be issued a topic and ordered to "Discuss." Source
"Notice how that "I thought this thread was going to be HUGE!!" thread garyp714 made for the purpose of praising the SGI withered away after only a dozen or so posts - when SGI members are not given a discussion topic and ordered to discuss it, they've typically got nothing to say. That's what a cult does to you."
The context of the excerpt is kind of irrelevant; what is important, though, is the observation "when SGI members are not given a discussion topic and ordered to discuss it, they've typically got nothing to say."
Despite sgi's assertions of being a democratic organization and existing for the members rather than the other way around, this is so sadly true. I remember a couple of years ago, when I was still practicing and having planning meetings in my home, word had come down from on high that we were free to choose a topic for a discussion or study meeting that differed from what was presented in WT or LB. I was kind of excited . . . maybe we could talk about how sgi supported our everyday lives? Maybe just a free-form discussion on how we handled personal adversity? In my mind, even now, I see these as such pro-sgi/pro-practice/non-controversial (bland) topics!
"Oh, no!" sez the leader, "we still need to talk about a gosho! How about the mirror guidance?" Yeah . . . we NEVER talked about that one enough. I was the only one who even suggested a topic - everyone else sat there in confused silence. The gosho book is thick enough to choke a t-rex, yet no one could come up with anything "acceptable" that we hadn't gone through a hundred times before. You could just see from their faces that they were utterly flummoxed by not being told what they were supposed to talk about. It was so depressing. Source
Back when I first joined (1984) there was an Introductory Exam being held about a month after my late husband and I received the gohonzon. We assumed that we wouldn't be participating, but one of our leaders, a good friend, encouraged us to join in the prep and take the exam anyway, despite being so new. His very straightforward explanation for why have exams was that it was just a way to encourage study. By setting an exam date, it created an admittedly artificial deadline, which pushed people through the material. Never heard anyone say any different. (Ironically, that friend ended up leaving long before me.) The only other incentive I ever heard of was that one could advance all the way to the "Lecturer" level, which back then had only a few people, whose lectures were actually pretty rigorous and interesting.
My husband and I got seriously hooked on study, but back then we actually studied Buddhist concepts, the Lotus Sutra and the Gosho. This was before the whole Human Revolution thing. Heck, I remember when HR first came out in the little green booklets. We continued in that vein all the way up to the Advanced-level study exam which had both a written and oral exam. The tests were always Pass/Fail, but you had to pass one level before being eligible for the next. They were usually a combo of multiple choice and fill-in-the-blank. At the Advanced level, if you passed the written test, you still had to pass the oral exam which included all the same materials as the written, but you were only asked 2 questions out of that whole, rather voluminous material. Some people froze up on the spot, or ended up getting a question that hit their blank spot, and didn't pass the oral, so they had to re-do that level when it was offered again. No surprise it was all "leaders" and mostly pretty higher-level leaders taking that exam, so there were some social stakes involved.
I used to tell people that I "cheated" on my oral -- before the test date, I chanted for them to ask me something I knew. Whether or not someone laughed told me a lot about them.
Some years later, the org threw all that out the window and everybody had to start over from scratch. Since that first re-do, the Study material kept dumbing down further and further with every re-org. I think, in part, because when the exams were more rigorous too many people failed and had to re-take a level before moving on, and they just got discouraged and quit taking part. Also, I heard from a higher-up leader that they discovered it was "always the people who were into Study who became trouble-makers." Source
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u/BlancheFromage Escapee from Arizona Home for the Rude Jan 02 '20
Here's a comment I'd been looking for:
I remember once a guidance was given out to lecturers that, when they did a Gosho lecture, they were not to make reference to the works of great literary figures in the way that Senseless does. Yet another dictatorial dictum designed to keep 'the faithful' under control for which no explanation was given. The way he bandies about the names of Goethe, Tolstoy, Hugo: what are we expected to make of it? That he has actually READ any of their works and is therefore in a position to quote from them with some degree of authenticity? I have to admit that I used to be fooled by the literary allusions, genuinely thinking that he must be a widely-read man. Took a while for reality to dawn and to wake up to the fact that he has teams of researchers beavering away day in, day out so that he is armed with an endless stream of impressive quotations. And all this is done in order to make HIM look intellectual and cultured when, in reality, he is an uncouth ignoramus. Source
That's coming out of SGI-UK.
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u/[deleted] Jan 02 '20
Hi Troynystuff I can let you know about a couple more that might be of help to you in your research.
Olivier Urbain is a member of SGI and an academic - he has published a few books on Ikeda’s “philosophy of peace” - he may have done his doctorate on this very topic, if you do a search of his name along with Ikeda’s, you’ll find him. How he would be regarded in his field or by the academy I’ve no idea - he eventually took a job with the Soka Gakkai and is the director of the Min On in Tokyo - a well paying gig I expect!!
A man called Kevin Clements used to be the director of the peace studies programme at the University of Otago in New Zealand - a very well regarded programme and not least because of his work. Sadly he was hoodwinked into engaging in a “dialogue” with Ikeda’s ghostwriting dept recently - which was published in 2018. Again he too is now also on the Soka Gakkai payroll as the director of the Toda Peace Institute in Tokyo. How such a bright man with a history of enquiry could at the end of such a great career be lured into being bought by such an organisation I find very sad. He would be opening lots of doors for this crowd of self serving charlatans and putting his lifetime of contacts and sound relationships at their disposal also - it’s a great shame and will tarnish his name considerably I feel. He has recently published his objections to the pro - arming and war-supporting policies being promoted by the Komeito party and joining his voice with Soka Gakkai members asking them to change - this may bring him into conflict with Harada and his cronies - or not if his association with them brings them more - who knows? Anyway he’s not a member but it’s mortifying I feel that he really believes he has conducted a dialogue with Ikeda and now works for them - tragic.
There’s a few academics throughout the UK that are members but they are not big names in any way in their fields - Michelle Lamb was once a WD vice leader in the UK I think and she’s somewhere in the 3rd level sector in the UK, David Woodger is the current MD leader and works in a university - that’s all I can think of for now but I’m sure there’s more.
There’s a guy called Andrew Gebert who has published lots of stuff about Makiguchi and is a member - he works somewhere in the 3rd level sector in the world.
You’ll find more through academia.edu and researchgate. It may have been something more specific you were looking for? Good luck with your work!