Daisaku Ikeda and the Great Arrogant Brahman

“There was a man in India known as the Great Arrogant Brahman who was born with innate wisdom and was widely read. Both the exoteric and the esoteric teachings of Buddhism were stored up in his breast, and he had both the Buddhist and the non-Buddhist writings in the palm of his hand. Even the king and his ministers bowed their heads before him, and the common people looked up to him as a teacher and guide. But in the excess of his arrogance, he went so far as to make himself a dais supported by four legs representing the deities Maheshvara, Vishnu, and Narayana, along with the World-Honored One of Great Enlightenment, four sages whom the world holds in great honor, seating himself on it when he expounded his doctrines. He was like the True Word priests of our time when they spread their mandala with its representations of Shakyamuni and the other various Buddhas and perform their ceremony of anointment, or like the Zen priests when they declare that the teachings of their school represent a great Law that steps upon the head of the Buddha.

At this time there was a humble monk called the Scholar Bhadraruchi who declared that the Brahman should be corrected, but neither the ruler and high ministers nor the common people would listen to such a suggestion. In the end, the Brahman charged his disciples and lay supporters to go about spreading countless falsehoods and abusing and beating Bhadraruchi. But Bhadraruchi, disregarding the danger to his life, continued to denounce the Brahman until the ruler, coming to hate Bhadraruchi, arranged for him to debate with the Brahman in hopes of silencing him. Contrary to his expectations, however, the Brahman was the one defeated in the debate.

The king looked up to heaven, then threw himself upon the ground lamenting, and said, “I have been privileged to hear your words on this matter firsthand and to free myself from my erroneous views. But my father, the former king, was completely deceived by this man and by now has probably fallen into the Avichi hell!” So saying, he clung to the knees of the Scholar Bhadraruchi and wept in sorrow.

At Bhadraruchi’s suggestion, the Brahman was placed on the back of a donkey so that he might be led in disgrace throughout India and shown to all. But the evil in his heart only grew stronger than ever, and in his living form he fell into the hell of incessant suffering."

"The Chinese Meditation Master Sanchieh, stated that the Lotus Sutra, which represents the teachings of the Buddha Shakyamuni, is a doctrine suited for the first and second stages of Buddhism, which correspond to the Former and Middle Days of the Law. For the Latter Day of the Law, however, he asserted that one should adopt the “universal teaching” that he himself had set forth. He declared that, if one should try to practice the Lotus Sutra in these present times, one would surely fall into the great Avichi hells of the ten directions because its teachings do not accord with the nature and capabilities of the people of the latter age. He carried out prostrations and penances at the proper hours six times each day and observed the four daily meditation periods, conducting himself like a living Buddha. Many people paid him honor, and his disciples numbered more than ten thousand. But one young woman dared to recite the Lotus Sutra and to censure him for his doctrines. As a result, he lost his voice on the spot and was reborn as a huge snake that devoured a number of his disciples and lay supporters, as well as girls and young women. And now Shan-tao and Honen, with their pernicious doctrine that not even one person in a thousand can be saved by the Lotus Sutra, are just like this man San-chieh.” — On The Selection of the Time

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Is Ikeda and his followers different than the Great Arrogant Brahman and Jikaku? Now, the Fuji Taisekaji Master Daisaku Ikeda, not only teaches that the Lotus Sutra has lost its power in this Latter Age but he uses the very Lotus Sutra that he deprecates to fool the people. Nichiren, refering to such men and their teachings writes, “And yet there is something that is more evil than these three teachings, so evil that it is a hundred, thousand, ten thousand, million times more difficult to believe…”

He concludes this point in this, one of his most important treatises:

“It is only reasonable to assume that, whether good or evil, the greater the portents, the greater will be the occurrences to follow. Now we have seen huge comets of a magnitude never known before in the 2,230 or more years since the Buddha’s passing, and have experienced earthquakes such as were never encountered before during that time. In China and Japan in the past, sages of outstanding wisdom and ability have from time to time appeared. But none, as an ally of the Lotus Sutra, has faced such powerful enemies within his country as have I, Nichiren. From the facts present before your very eyes, it should be apparent that Nichiren is the foremost person in the entire land of Jambudvipa.”

Now too, at this auspicious time of the propagation of the authentic and true teachings of the Lotus Sutra and Nichiren Daishonin, having witnessed the great portents in Japan and elsewhere and the reality that only we are squarely facing the powerful enemies of the Lotus Sutra [the Soka Gakkai, the Nichiren Shoshu, the Christians, Hindus, and Muslims], it is clear that we are the true disciples, believers, and allies of the Lotus Sutra and Nichiren Daishonin. It should be apparent that we are the foremost persons in the entire land of Jambudvipa, few though we may be.