Tsunesaburo Makiguchi
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Tsunesaburo Makiguchi (牧口 常三郎), Soka Gakkai's first president, was born in Kashiwazaki, a small village in Niigata Prefecture, Japan, on June 6, 1871. Adopted by the Makiguchi family, he moved to Hokkaidō, Japan's northernmost island, at the age of 14. Working his way through school, he graduated from Sapporo Normal School (today's Hokkaido University of Education). First employed as an assistant teacher at a primary school affiliated with his alma mater, he later taught high school and served as a dormitory superintendent. After moving to Tokyo, he served as principal in six primary schools, from 1913 to 1932.
During those years, he devoted much consideration to the relationship between life and education, developing his theories on the creation of value, the happiness of the individual, and the prosperity of society at large.
Typical of his work is his first book, Jinsei Chirigaku (A Geography of Human Life), published in 1903. In it, he developed unique and progressive ideas on the relationship between people's lives and their geographic location. For over a period of five years from 1930, he also published the 4-volume Soka Kyoikugaku Taikei (The System of Value-creation Pedagogy). Based on his long career as an educator, this series of books sets forth his astute observations and far-thinking proposals for reforming the Japanese educational system.
An example of his proposals was the creation of an educational system comprising a partnership of school, home and community, each of which had responsibility for a specific part of the educational task. In this system, a child would spend half day in school and the other half in apprenticeships and other types of work activities at home and in the community befitting the nature and needs of the child. Mr. Makiguchi felt that implementing his proposed system would change bored, apathetic learners into eager, self-directed students.
The theory and practice of value-creating education, which aim to instill in an individual an appreciation for the highest values, have attracted the attention of educators outside Japan as well. The Soka Kyoikugaku Taikei, has been translated now into English, Portuguese, French and Vietnamese.
In 1928, Mr. Makiguchi and his close friend and disciple, Josei Toda, began to practice the Buddhism of Nichiren Shoshu. Mr. Makiguchi's encounter with this school of Buddhist thought took his life onto an even deeper and broader dimension, resulting in the establishment of the Soka Kyoiku Gakkai (Value-Creation Education Society), the predecessor to today's Soka Gakkai. It can be said that Mr. Makiguchi created and developed a grassroots movement as the foundation of a lasting peace, an objective he perceived at the very heart of Nichiren Buddhism.
During World War II, he staunchly opposed Japan's military government because it sought to impose the doctrine of State Shinto through strict control of religions and thoughts inimical to its war effort. Moreover, he was particularly severe in his remonstration with the Nichiren Shoshu priesthood for cowardly compromise of its faith in face of governmental pressure.
In 1943, he was arrested and imprisoned as a "thought criminal." Yet, in spite of being subjected to harsh interrogations, he never retreated from his beliefs; indeed, the 72-year-old former principal continued to assert the value of freedom of religion, the most fundamental of all human rights. On November 18, 1944, the anniversary of the founding of the Soka Kyoiku Gakkai, he died in prison.
Mr. Makiguchi is remembered and revered by members of Soka Gakkai International to this day. During morning and evening gongyo members take a moment to remember the first three presidents of Soka Gakkai: Tsunesaburo Makiguchi (President from 1930 to 1944), Josei Toda (1946-1958), and Daisaku Ikeda (1960-Present).
