Nichiren, Soka Gakkai and Komeito - Religion and Politics in Contemporary Japan - page 42

also cast further light on the excommunication of Soka Gakkai by Nichiren
Sh - sh - in the early 1990s, something Shimada (2007) concludes as Soka
Gakkai becoming a religion without a holy land. First, let me discuss further
Nichiren

s political attitude.
When we compare Nichiren

'

s critical attitude towards political power in
other works, the interpretation of Nichiren as advocating institutional uni-

'

s political system with a state-sanctioned religious denomi-
nation is contradictory. If the Three Great Secret Laws is read as the proposal
for future generations to

fication of Japan '

find the Land of Eagle Peak in Japan (WND-2, 987),
the place for establishing a high sanctuary as a kind of national religious
institution where Nichiren Buddhism becomes the state religion expresses the
superiority of worldly power over religious power. On closer examination, as
also argued by Sueki (1999: 271), the Sandai hih - sho does not di er sig-

ni s authentic work.

That is, if Nichiren had thought that worldly authority was superior to the
Buddha Dharma he would not have cited a story in which a king dies pro-
tecting the Buddha

cantly from works that have been established as Nichiren '

s true Dharma. Upon closer reading of such seminal
works as the Rissh - Ankoku Ron, the main political idea in the Three Great
Secret Laws is similar in that the ruler of the nation must govern under the
guidance of the

'

ideas expressed in the Lotus Sutra. If this is taken
to be the primary political idea, how we evaluate Nichiren

' religious '

s understanding of
the superiority of religion to politics should be the focus of discussion. Sueki
argues that rather than looking at Nichiren as part of the

'

' '

new Buddhism or

' ' '

the he is the pioneer of a new attitude

toward politics from the religious standpoint

heterodox over the kenmitsu system,

(Sueki 1999: 272). The goal is
not to become a religion aligned with the state, or that upholds state power, but
to rule according to the philosophy of the Lotus Sutra. This political attitude
was a fresh idea in the medieval period in Japan. Almost 700 years later, this
interpretation of Nichiren

'

first Soka Gakkai
President, Makiguchi Tsunesaburo, remonstrated with the ultra-right-wing
government during World War II. In the next section, we shall see how this
interpretation took shape during the post-war period of Soka Gakkai

' s attitude was central to why the

' s rapid

development.
Sueki points out that at the core of Nichiren s political idea also exists

ambivalence about religion on the one hand becoming a resistance to an
obstinate establishment while on the other a principle for oppression of a
di

'

erent religious sect (or another political party in modern times). This ten-
sion exists in Soka Gakkai s philosophy in wider

society. Nichiren Buddhism stands within the wider Mah - y - na Buddhist tra-
dition, and as a development based on a religious worldview derived from the
Lotus Sutra. Yet, there is also a renewed political aspect, which steps outside
the tendency within Japanese Buddhism more generally to have weak con-
ception of social justice. This does not, of course, mean they are not political:
they are, but in a way that tends to uphold socio-political hierarchies rather
than challenge them.

' s attempt to realise Nichiren '