Look, I'm not trying to make a stink; I have been trying to tone down the way I express criticism and limit my sarcasm. But I think I have a point; if I see this situation, then other people probably do too.

It looks to me like the teachings of Gandhi are being stressed more than the teachings of Nichiren in SGI-USA.
If you don't know why I have this perception, please make a survey of the most recent issues of organizational publications, such as the February 2002 issue of Living Buddhism magazine and recent issues of the World Tribune. You'll probably see what I see: article after article praising Gandhi, insisting on nonviolence, promoting dialogue, even likening SGI President Ikeda to Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr.

You may ask, "What's wrong with that?"

Well, nothing really, except that I'm a Nichiren Buddhist who relies on SGI-USA to elucidate and apply the teachings of Nichiren. Especially in this time of war and crisis, we would benefit from exploration of Buddhism, but it seems that the powers that be in SGI-USA want us to explore Gandhi's teachings instead.

I think there's a misplaced emphasis when SGI-USA makes a big deal out of Arun Gandhi, for instance, who appears in the publications frequently, yet prominent Nichiren scholars and teachers like Jacqueline Stone and their books are not even mentioned. If you're asking, "Jacqueline Who?" I've made my point.

Gandhi was unquestionably a great man who made great contributions to humanity. Nevertheless, his teachings do not supplant Nichiren's, and I think this fact needs to be made clear to SGI-USA members.

Dialogue over daimoku?

SGI has adopted this slogan for 2002: The Year of Expanding Dialogue. "Dialogue" and "expanding dialogue" have been ratified into SGI sanctity without so much as a peep of critical examination. Ask five SGI-USA members what our organization promotes. Three are likely to tell you: dialogue. We're all about dialogue.

Who can say that dialogue isn't a good thing? It's great. What I don't like is the emphasis which makes it seem like dialogue is our prime point.

I also dislike the elevated tone of the word. Why can't we say talking with people? Listening to people? It sounds so pretentious to claim that we "engage in dialogue." But that's a side issue.

I remember a time, not long ago, when we were all about daimoku, the chanting of nam-myoho-renge-kyo. No matter how impossible the odds, daimoku was first, last and always the answer. Our basic slogan, borrowed straight from Nichiren, could be summed up as: Chant!

In SGI we're now told that dialogue is the answer. If we want peace, we must dialogue with our perceived enemies. We mustn't get testy or put up our dukes, not even to defend ourselves. It seems like our leaders are saying that we must do as Gandhi instructs, not as Nichiren teaches.

Politics of dialogue

The "dialogue as panacea" rhetoric has me irked because I have different political values than many of the people I practice Buddhism with. "Dialogue" sounds to me like a buzzword left over from the politically correct, diversity-celebrating 1990s. (I feel like Seinfeld, having to say, "Not that there's anything wrong with that.")

Since Sept. 11, dialogue has become liberal-speak for anti-Western sentiments that masquerade as antiwar and anti-violence. I dialogue with leftists only to discover that they don't really disapprove of violence -- they disapprove of the United States using its military power. If someone uses violence against the U.S., leftists imply and often say outright: Oh well, America deserves to be attacked; we brought it on ourselves. So much for nonviolence.

Everyone in my district is sick of hearing me say this, but I am sick of hearing that dialogue will end terrorism. That sounds like an oversimplification to me, like saying "Hitler just needed love."

You know, some people like Hitler are so crazy they don't know they're crazy. Have you ever tried to have a reasonable dialogue with a crazy person?

...Dialogue may be helpful in some situations, but it is not the answer. The answer is Buddha wisdom, which has as many answers as there are situations, and which has the power to cure the madness of the world. The way for people to access their Buddha wisdom is to chant daimoku, a profound form of meditative discipline. Am I right?

And another thing...

This is another side issue, but technically we are always "engaged in dialogue" just by virtue of being alive. If you look at the Buddhist concepts of oneness of life and its environment and dependent origination, you see that we don't exist as separate individual entities that can turn the dialogue switch on and off.

The nature of our life, whether we know it or not, is that we are always sending and absorbing communication, which is all the more reason to chant so we can feel this subtle communication going on. Talking to people is just a fragment of the real dialogue that our life is woven into. As I said, that's a side issue....

What about warriorship?

There is a concept of warriorship in Nichiren Buddhism. Nichiren teaches that nam-myoho-renge-kyo is like a sharp sword, and a sword is useless in the hands of a coward. In Buddhism, there is a time for chanting, a time for talking and a time for going to battle.

I found an interesting passage in the March issue of Shambhala Sun magazine. This section struck me as more in keeping with Nichirenism than with what SGI-USA is teaching about Gandhism.

A Buddhist fellow named Chogyam Trungpa writes:

"In the warrior tradition, fearlessness is connected with attaching your basic existence to a greater vision, or what we call the Great Eastern Sun. In order to experience such vast and demanding vision, you need a real connection to basic goodness. The key to that is overcoming doubt and wrong belief. Doubt is your own internal problem, which you have to work with. But then beyond that there may be an enemy, a challenge, that is outside of you. We can't just pretend that those threats never exist. You might say that your laziness is some kind of enemy, but laziness is not actually an enemy. It would be better to call it an obstacle.

"...You don't kill an enemy before they become the enemy. You only slash the enemy when they become a 100% good enemy and present a real 100% challenge. If someone is interested in making love with you, you make love to them. But you don't rape them. You wait until the other person commits themselves to the situation. Working with your enemy is the same idea.

"When a warrior has to kill his enemy, he has a very soft heart. He looks his enemy right in the face. The grip on your sword is quite strong and tough, and then with a tender heart, you cut your enemy into two pieces. At that point, slashing your enemy is equivalent to making love to them. That very strong, powerful stroke is also sympathetic. That fearless stroke is frightening, don't you think? We don't want to face that possibility."

Interesting, no? Maybe he is referring to a metaphorical sword, not a real one. But then again, maybe the sword of the Lotus Sutra can sometimes also mean an actual sword, not as a weapon of aggression but as an instrument of necessity.

I like the part about looking the enemy right in the face. That rules out bombing, and I say good.

Does dialogue mean shakubuku?

Why the heavy emphasis on dialogue in SGI-USA right now? Has dialogue become a code word for shakubuku? Shakubuku means to teach Buddhism by clarifying which philosophies are beneficial to humanity and which are not. If the Dialogue Campaign is really a Shakubuku Campaign, why don't we just call it what it is?

It's not about shakubuku, for one thing. If it were about shakubuku, we'd see in-depth study articles in our publications that honestly compare different teachings instead of pushing a single doctrinal perspective. A real shakubuku campaign is a free examination of teachings, not a public relations strategy. So what's really going on?

Gandhism is not as explosive and as subject to misinterpretation as what Nichiren taught. Remember, Nichiren never taught that a person has to be good or do good deeds to become a Buddha. This seems contrary to common sense, but really it's not. Gandhism and dialogue have a warm-fuzzy value in terms of rhetoric, whereas Nichirenism is a little more prickly and difficult on the surface. We need to go deeper than the surface.

The SGI's emphasis on Gandhi makes it look like the organization is trying to ride his impressive coattails. Perhaps as an organization we are scoring points with other peacework groups and politicians with our emphasis on Gandhi's ideals. Perhaps the SGI is showing an anti-Western bias. No matter. The major question we have to ask, that I'm asking, is: Are we being true to Nichiren?

Everything written above is in my humble opinion, of course. Please do not shoot the messenger! (But if you must, please look me in the face.)