Shirota Goes to Jail

Shirota Goes to Jail (62 – midcol 1 64)(1421 – 1427)

     ‘It might have been a discussion meeting in hell. Fujiya Shirota, a twenty-five-year-old missionary of kosen-rufu, began to deliver an elaborate discourse.’

     In February, 1955, R Temple demanded that all Gohonzons that had been bestowed on Sokagakkai members be returned. The Head Temple admonished R Temple for its unreasonable request. R Temple later seceded from the Head Temple. Some YMD members encountered Priest S in the suburbs of Osaka one day and asked him to explain his preposterous demand. The priest tried to avoid the YMD. A scuffle ensued and the priest filed a complaint. The police interrogated one of the young men but no further investigation followed.
     In May, 1955, a woman member of one district recanted and allowed the members of another sect to take away her Gohonzon. Goro Sagawa managed to negotiate the return of the Gohonzon, but there was an altercation between a YMD and several followers of the other sect resulting in a police investigation. After interrogating the YMD, the police declined to continue the investigation.
     In January, 1956, members of a group gathered at the group chief’s house for a New Year’s party. Two former members crashed the party. In a drunken rampage they turned over tables and broke the glass doors. The members got together and ejected the two, one of whom fell at the entrance and got a lump over his eye. There was no police involvement at the time.
     Now the local police had resurrected these cases in an apparent attempt to discredit the Sokagakkai. Six men were eventually detained.
Fujiya Shirota, a leader of the YMD corps staff, was rousted from a sound sleep early in the morning of May 15th by several plainclothes detectives and escorted to the police station. But Shirota insisted on doing gongyo before he would leave his apartment. His interrogation lasted into the evening and it was decided that he would be detained at the police station. As usual personal effects were collected but Shirota rebelled when they demanded his omamori Gohonzon. They settled, finally, for the attached cord. Shirota kept the Gohonzon safely in his shirt pocket.
In the detention room inmates stared at Shirota malevolently but he resolved to remain calm. He did evening gongyo in spite of the jailer’s admonition. Then, the next morning, after he had done gongyo, the senior inmate of the cell, the “boss”, questioned him about reciting the sutra. There followed an impromptu discussion meeting.
Shirota asserted that his was the only religion in the world that could make anyone happy. “You have been branded bad men because you did something against the law”, he said. “I admit that it is absolutely wrong to violate the law of the land, but there is one thing I want to ask you. Why did you become so wicked as to violate the law? It is because of your destiny – because your lives are terribly and fundamentally poisoned by the false religions which have been handed down from generation to generation in your families. Therefore, what should be blamed are these false religions, not you yourselves.”
The dumbfounded inmates had never heard anything like this before.

Points to ponder

     Imagine Shirota’s plight as he was unceremoniously h auled off to the police station and detained overnight. Yet he kept his cool and never missed gongyo.
     What must the other inmates have thought about Shirota’s actions?
     How should we deal with unfounded police charges?