"The fact is, Jon Petry and Michael McCormick are openly hostile to any sort oforthodoxy in Nichiren Buddhism. They have no interest in the standard interpretations of the doctrinal school they have joined, the "Ichi-Ha" whichis the represented by the Nichiren Shu. McCormick teaches boiler plate Zen based on Original Enlightenment idea’s, rejects the Ichi view of the Hokekyo,and most of all hates, Nichiren as the exemplar of True Buddhism, preferring toelevate a romanticized version of the historical Shakyamuni.
The problem they really have with me is that I know enough about the Nichiren Shu to recognize that they don’t really reflect that sects views even remotely. I recommend to anyone who wants to look into this, to purchase the book "Manual of Nichiren Buddhism" which is the official explanation of that groups theology. Simply compare what it teaches with McCormick and Petry’s views. There is not even a whiff of their Original Enlightenment ideas in that book (that they have kept from their SGI days) and none of McCormick’s Zen-like mind to mind transmission of enlightenment idea’s (McCormick wrote to me on aol that enlightenment is "an inside joke between Shakyamuni and his disciples", which is pure Zen coming from Shakyamuni’s silent turning of a flower, causing Kashapa to have a Grande Mal Kensho). No, what you will find in the "Manual of Nichiren Buddhism", is….. Nichiren Buddhism. A real Eternal Buddha ( "Ji-Butsu"), a faith based religion and Nichiren as exemplar etc. etc. All things that when preached by me, seem to make Petry and McCormick furious.
So the only way they will deal with me is try to give the impression that I am overly aggressive and attack poor Zen Masters like Hakuin. They have done this before when I asked questions about the Ichi-branch Priest Nichiki, even though my questions were the most banal, everyday sort of inquiries, without even the slightest suggestion of personal slander.
Now when I recounted the very most famous story of Hakuin’s so called ‘great enlightenment’ which involved the buzzing of an insect, Petry makes out like I have made up something untrue and unscrupulous and thereby slandered the great man. Jon is ignorant of how Kensho’s are achieved (the Zen idea of sudden enlightenment). It is common to the Kensho experience that a simple word or phrase ("Ananda ! Take down the flag pole") or the buzzing of a fly can trigger a Kensho. Hakuin reported several such experiences. One when he heard a bell ringing and also when he describes his greatest moment of insight, which involved the buzzing of a fly. Here is the story recounted in Heinrich Dumoulin’s "Zen Buddhism: A History" :
"When he was forty-one, Hakuin had another experience, also described in the Orategama, which numbers among the greatest enlightenments of his life. One autumn evening, as he was reading from the Lotus Sutra, his concentration was interrupted by the buzzing of an insect. He writes:"
" Suddenly I penetrated to the perfect, true, ultimate meaning of the Lotus Sutra. The doubts I had held initially were destroyed and I became aware that the understanding I had obtained up to then was greatly in error. Unconsciously I uttered a great cry and burst into tears" {page 374}
Doumoulin devotes a full chapter to Hakuin and recounts Hakuin’s frustration with the Hokekyo and re-tells the bell ringing Kensho story. I believe the book is still in print for anyone who wants to look this all up.
Now Petry wants you to think that I used smear tactics against a defenseless, long dead Zen Master when in fact I simply re-told a widely known story. The truth is actually that it is Jon Petry, more than anyone else I know, who tries to truncate discussion by trying to pin the harshest possible labels on people. Just a couple of months ago he and his buddies tried to tell people that I was a "bigot" and a "racist". How did they come up with that smear you may ask ? They said that because I am a Civil War re-enactor ( a Yankee re-enactor btw who has constantly begged off playing a Southern soldier because I consider the Southern cause so reprehensible, a detail they ignored). The fact is that you would be very hard pressed to find anyone on these boards with a more left wing political history of activism then me, which includes civil rights ( I helped organize the demonstrations in Boston over school bussing in the seventies for one example). So they floated a complete lie about me, hoping to dissuade people from listening to what I have to say about Nichiren Buddhism. McCormick even tried to fold in my advocacy of exclusive practice of the Lotus Sutra as a sign of bigotry against other Buddhists, I guess, which is a complete miss- statement of a wholly orthodox Nichirenist viewpoint and a view held not just by me but by the Nichiren Shu too.
So I am pretty fed up with Petry and McCormick. They are from what I can tell from reading what they preach, apostates from any notion of traditional Nichiren Buddhism including the core views of the Nichiren Shu. I think they are really trying to re-tool the theology to attract people who do not fully appreciate how far they have gotten off the track and are using their Nichiren Shu membership as cover. It is Petry who employs personal slander tactics, witness the "Marc is a racist and bigot" smear. His false portrayal of my methods and views in this particular exchange over Hakuin, when he did not recognize Hakuin’s most famous Kensho story, miss-characterizing it as an "attack", shows how he tries smoke up the real issues.
Jon's approach to the exchange of religious idea’s seems to come from his training as a lawyer.. Discredit the witness, find loopholes to exploit, distract the jury. He needs to cut it out and back off."
Marc Strumpf
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