Looking to the Future

Looking to the Future (pp 91-94, 1479-1485)

“In any event, Nichiren Daishonin states, ‘If Nichiren’s mercy is truly great, Nam-myoho-renge-kyo will spread for ten thousand years and more, for all eternity. His blessings will dispel the blindness of all mankind and block the path to the hell of incessant suffering.’ We must act precisely according to this spirit of the True Buddha, without the slightest deviation. That is the essence of kosen-rufu and the basis of everything. The question is how, on this basis, we should secure the peace of the country and the world.”

President Toda meditated about the recent election campaign. Although he would have preferred to stay away from politics, he felt that one of the important missions for kosen-rufu was to foster capable and respectable statesmen on the soil of the Mystic Law. But he had forced a hard struggle on many members. Some had gone afoul of election laws and were experiencing difficulties with the authorities. Nothing tormented him more severely than the members’ suffering.
Shinichi Yamamoto arrived; he and President Toda engaged in a discussion of future activities for kosenrufu. They agreed that kosenrufu activities had reached a crucial stage and that Shinichi would carry a heavy burden. They were concerned that the general public would think that the Soka Gakkai was acting solely out of political ambition. Politics could not be entirely avoided but the risk of principle being sacrificed and distorted by strategy must be prevented.
In the late 19th/early 20th centuries several groups appeared that transformed Nichiren Daishonin’s Buddhism so that the state could use it for manipulating the people. The Soka Gakkai must not follow that distortion of the Daishonin’s teachings but must be constantly aware that the risk exists.
We need much more than an ordinary determination to reach our goal because we’ll meet head-on with the devilish nature of power.
Toda began to speak of the future in terms of statesmen arising from the awakened masses and echoing their voices. Although they were political novices, the new Soka Gakkai representatives could grow into capable and efficient statesmen. The latest campaign brought many people closer to politics. The important thing is to enlarge the sphere of such people. But statesmen alone cannot achieve anything – the prime point is the human being. Man himself is the ultimate objective.
In the future, the Soka Gakkai could spread into all fields of society providing a powerful force for activating man. A capable and efficient statesman, risen from the soil of the Mystic Law, and supported by the people, could usher in a new era.
To Shinichi, Toda’s remarks sounded like an unwritten testament which the president was bequeathing to him.
Toda continued. The Soka Gakkai will undoubtedly become the crown of the religious world. It will be able to send truly capable people into all spheres of society. That is our mission. For the present, the masses will only take an erroneous view of what we do, but the time will come when they will be able to understand the unprecedented undertaking of kosen-rufu and praise it.
Both President Toda and Shinichi Yamamoto were distressed over the fate of the members who had been arrested for violation of the election laws. Toda instructed Shinichi to do everything he could to help them.