Talk:Soka Gakkai International/Archive 5

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Excommunication

Article said: "This culminated in the unprecedented and unilateral excommunication of the SGI and its 10 million members worldwide."

Problems:

1. How was Soka Gakkai/SGI's excommunication "unprecedented"? Several organizations have been "excommunicated" in the past; given all the Soka Gakkai's provocations in the period up to the excommunication, it is also difficult to see how it was "unilateral."
2. Except for those in Soka Gakkai or Soka Gakkai-back publications (such as Daisan Bummei), I find little evidence that NS excommunicated all SGI members. Indeed, NS was specific in excommunicating the organizations but not the general membership, and only Ikeda Daisaku and Akiya Einosuke (IIRC) were specifically removed from the NS believers roster.

Article also says: "Another group which has formed as result of a split from Soka Gakkai is I-Chinen-Sanzen. The lay organization owes its allegiance to Nichiren Shoshu."

1. )What is this "I-Chinen-Sanzen" group? In any case, it is not the same as the Hokkeko, nor was Hokkeko formed as a result of "a split from Soka Gakkai": Hokkeko's existence predates that of Soka Gakkai by several hundred years.

Jim_Lockhart 07:50, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

Jim, do you mind if you chill and read a bit further. I-chinen-Sanzen is what SGI calls the group of believers who went and join Hokkeko group after the excommunication. That is why I wonder if it should be linked to the Hokkeko article. Gammadion 03:50, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

What is this I-Chinen-Sanzen group?

I can find no evidence of this I-Chinen-Sanzen group purported at the end of the article to "owe allegiance" to Nichiren Shoshu and would like to remove the statement if no one has objections.Jim_Lockhart 15:41, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

Ok with me. Know the concept, but never heard of a group...

According to my information from inside SGI, they are former Soka Gakkai members who decided to leave Gakkai and join the Hokkeko lay-believers(Temple group lay believers) in the excommunication event(A.D. 1992). Technically treated as official public cannon in discussion meetings which public members do attend.Gammadion 03:13, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

I-Chinen Sanzen group: But there is no group that calls itself I-Chinen Sanzen, right? (Must be some sort of local joke somewhere, though. I can imagine that it's meant to be funny in a derogatory manner.) I know from personal experience that ex-Soka Gakkai members in Japan are subject to some quite nasty harassment (usually borderline legal, and the leadership of course absolves itself of all knowledge and encouragement), with the particularly nasty stuff reserved for people who joined a temple group. But this is all irrelevant to the existence of a real group that calls itself I-Chinen Sanzen. Fwiw, in Japan Soka Gakkai members referred to people who quit and went to the temples as danto (which is an old word for people who are temple patrons or parishioners), and I've seen this usage in Gakkai (SGI) publications from the US and Europe as well. SGI has given the word a particular negative connotation.

On your word usage: True, you don't mince words, and that (as well as being bold) is fine; nonetheless, Wikipedia is not supposed to be a soapbox or pulpit. Further, sometimes your writing is unclear, so some people are not sure of what to make of it and therefore hesitate to edit it. For example, above you write, "Technically treated as official public cannon in discussion meetings which public members do attend"; I think what you mean is "In practice, people who have left SGI for the temples are open game as cannon fodder at SGI discussion meetings, which are also attended by members of the general public." In this sense, "R" (Ruby?) has some very valid points. Make your writing less open to misunderstanding and umbrage, and you will do better.

Here's a suggestion: When you write a contribution, don't just post whatever comes to mind and out the end of your fingertips. Slow down a bit, go back over what you've written (print it out if you can), view it a few times in preview (press the "Show preview" button) and makes minor changes to improve it then, before you make your final save (even after that, you'll still find stuff to change, but save it for another session). Your contributions will come out all that much better and, if you can tone down the rhetoric and stick to verifiable facts, your contributions will be more credible.

Some details on SGI's excommunication for you: Nichiren Shoshu's governing board issued a public statement on November 11, 1991, urging Soka Gakkai to disband on grounds that Soka Gakkai had lost its stated reason for existence (which was, until Soka Gakkai changed its kisoku and kaisoku [basically, the governing rules and charter-like document it had to submit to the Ministry of Education when it incorporated] in March 2002, to spread and uphold the teachings and practice of Nichiren Shoshu); this was called kaisan kankoku (解散勧告). There is an English version floating around, but the translation is very poor. The "excommunication" (hamon, 破門) itself took place on November 28, 1991, and applied to only the incorporated entities Soka Gakkai and SGI, but not to individual members themselves. Daisaku Ikeda was personally "excommunicated" (actually, his name was struck from the roster of believers, an action called shinto jomei [信徒除名]) on August 11, 1992, after he had demonstrated (from the priests' perspective) that he had no intention of following their admonitions. The definitive actions cited are that Soka Gakkai changed the content of the silent prayers practioners offer when doing gongyo, and that Soka Gakkai had established in own kind of memorial book (kakochō, 過去帳), things normally done only by the priesthood. The real shock to the priests came a year later when Pres. Akiya announced at a leaders meeting on September 7 that Soka Gakkai would begin distributing its own home-made gohonzons that were copies (with a few minor alterations) of a gohonzon inscribed by 26th High Priest Nichikan (mid-18th century)!

Meanwhile, have fun. :) Jim_Lockhart 13:20, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

Okay, got to agree with Jim on the Ichinen Sanzen part. I go see what more I can dig up on the danto(which had been referred before in discussion meetings.Gammadion 08:11, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

Discussions continues at Talk:Soka Gakkai International/Archive06