First some background. This week, I sent him a few posts that I thought were prescient, refuting several doctrines of the Soka Gakkai. He wrote me back:
"I have actually tried, with great difficulty, to read some of your messages. I honestly don't think you are very well."
"Well your way of communicating is, frankly, bizarre. I am not sure that even you are clear what you are trying to achieve by it."
"I find it striking that although you claim to be happy, you seem unable to use your own words to do so. Instead all you can do is parrot the words of Nichiren ("However many times I were to repeat the cycle of birth and death, no life could be as fortunate as this"). Your lack of feeling and conviction is obvious. It reminds me of my relative who suffers from paranoia. He said to me in a bland voice recently "I never get angry", even though I have seen him on many occasions go wild with rage, sometimes to the point of intense physical violence."
"I think it is a safe bet to say that in your daily interactions with people you demonstrate very little such warm and humane behaviour."
"I didn't say that you don't seem to be very well in order to put you down. I said it because that is what I honestly think. There is a lot of mental illness in my family so I have a lot of experience of dealing with it. I have one relative who has paranoid personality disorder. He thinks he is always right and that anyone who disagrees with him is either an idiot or a conspirator against him. Sometimes he can rant for two or three hours without pausing for breath about the injustices that he thinks have been perpetrated against him, and if you dare just to raise your hand to ask permission to get a word in, he explodes. His life is closed, miserable, and very isolated. You remind me of him."
"Yet again, all that you really manage to communicate is your lack of ordinary human feeling. For instance in my previous message I apologised, quite genuinely, for being rude. I wonder when was the last time you ever admitted you were wrong about anything?"
Reply:
This SGI leaders mode of communication is known as "bull baiting".* Notice how he can't or won't discuss the teachings of the Lotus Sutra and Nichiren.
Nichiren writes:
"If he takes them (Shijo Kingo's fiefs) from me, his illness will surely return. At that time, even if he should apologize to me, I will not accept it.” Having said so, take your leave in an abrupt manner." - A Warning of Begrudging One's Fiefs
What the Soka Gakkai and this leader perpetrates, altering and corrupting the teachings of the Lotus Sutra and its Supreme Votary and slandering the true votaries of the Lotus Sutra, is far more serious than Shijo Kingo's Lord's actions.
I also replied, when you repent of your wrongdoings I will forgive you and when your Sensei,
Daisaku Ikeda, admits he was wrong about anything, I will follow suit.
The Selection of Time reads:
"According to the Buddhist teaching, however, even those who commit the five cardinal sins may be saved, and even those who are unfilial may gain salvation. It is only the icchantikas, or persons of incorrigible disbelief, those who slander the Law, and those who pretend to be foremost in observing the precepts who cannot be forgiven."
You sir are an icchantika (person of incorrigible disbelief).
* Bull baiting is a cult technique of lying, slander, and verbal abuse
Actually, 90 percent of what I sent him were direct quotes from the Lotus Sutra and writings of Nichiren. He must think Nichiren and Shakyamuni Buddha are "bizarre and not well".
ReplyDeleteYou have misquoted me. I never said "Why don't you accept my apology, you stupid, deluded arsehole", as you well know.
ReplyDeleteWhat I was trying to do was to get past the religious fanatic Mark Rogow and communicate with the human being underneath. That is why I was not interested in getting into disputes about points of doctrine with you. It would have achieved nothing. The fact that you are incapable of understanding that is due to your paranoia. As I said earlier, but it is even more striking to me now, attempting to communicate with you has been uncannily like trying to communicate with my relative who suffers from paranoid personality disorder.
Remember that it was you who contacted me, not the other way round. You had already decided that it was impossible for anyone who does not accept your narrow religious views to be decent or sincere in any way. Absolutely anything I might have said you would have interpreted through the filter of your paranoia.
I encourage my readers to put two and two together. Six of one a half a dozen of another:
ReplyDeleteI honestly don't think you are very well."
"Well your way of communicating is, frankly, bizarre. I am not sure that even you are clear what you are trying to achieve by it."
Your lack of feeling and conviction is obvious. It reminds me of my relative who suffers from paranoia. He said to me in a bland voice recently "I never get angry", even though I have seen him on many occasions go wild with rage, sometimes to the point of intense physical violence."
"I think it is a safe bet to say that in your daily interactions with people you demonstrate very little such warm and humane behaviour."
"His life is closed, miserable, and very isolated. You remind me of him."
"Yet again, all that you really manage to communicate is your lack of ordinary human feeling."
and here are a few I didn't quote in the post:
"So much posturing, so little insight. You remind me of the Jehovah's Witnesses."
Referring to the following which I sent him regarding other Soka Gakkai lack of decent communication:
"He is a misogynist", 'He seethes with hatred," "You are a hater", "foaming-at-the- mouth, exclusivist, seemingly hate-filled", "You are a serious hatemonger and it is shameful that you would ever consider yourself a "buddhist.", "I'm not sure if he is a hater." "I will respond to hate-speech, the posting of burning Gohonzons. the generalizations, racism, and distortions by Mark Rogow.", "You are embittered and hate filled", "You are a hateful Buddhist.", "If you need a straight male priest to tell you what to do, that's fine, be ok with it and end the slander of that which you hate (in your own heart). There is no corruption outside of you, only in your heart.", "What a sad life condition", "This isn't "free speech", "moderators, this is hate speech." , "You are filled with hate.". "The most dangerous thing to a bigot is to know the object of his hate and fear.", "With your ever present hate, you slander the good SGI members", "Your hate rants are tiresome", "You are a racist", "You are a fascist", "asshole", "jackass", "You really suck you ungrateful pig", "You are still a lying sack of shit", "your holier than though, self serving BS", "Bullshit, this is a place for Mark Rogow to slander people", "brain dead", "slandering idiot", "KEMPON HOKKE IS NOTHING BUT A PILE OF SHIT AND ALL YOU FUCKING PIGS ARE JUST SHIT EATERS, GO FUCK YOUR GOD DAMNED MOTHERS STUPID FUCKING BITCHES THEY ALL ARE!* *LEAVE YOU TO YOUR DEVICES? FUCK YOU ASSHOLES. i’LL KICK THE FUCKING SHIT OUT OF YOU. GO FUCK YOUR DEVICE JUST LIKE YOU FUCK YOUR MOTHER! PIECES OF FUCKING SHIT!*, "He calls for violence against the SGI", "bitter", psychotic", " He must be "drinking", "smoking","cowardly", "ignorant", "doing drugs", "scumbag cunt filled with shit", "shit stinking", "The fucking assholes in Kempon Hokke can not be described, how evil they are is beyond words. I hope to meet some of you some day. I will make you sorry you were ever born.", "fool", "foolish", "deluded", "devil", "evil", "hateful lying prick", "counterfeit Buddhist", "conceited", "egotistical", "xenophobic", "pathetic fascist, asshole", "perpetrator of medicare fraud", "offensive", "no knowledge", "no wisdom", "lacking faith", "nutty", "fucking moron", "Bodhisattva Fuckyou."
continued
Continued....
ReplyDeleteMediocre Monk also writes:
"I agree that some of the ways in which people have addressed you are just emotionalism and serve no useful purpose. However the rest, which is the majority of them, are simply statements of reality. You are cold, fanatical and bitter."
Again and again, he writes to the effect: "Your lack of feeling and conviction is obvious. It reminds me of my relative who suffers from paranoia."
"Yet from you I sense not even the slightest trace of warmth or empathy. You are clearly entirely lacking in treasures of the heart."
and lastly,
"While I do not completely understand why Nichiren put those words in Shijo Kingo's mouth* in that letter that he wrote on his behalf, I am very clear that he was not trying to make him sound like an ungracious ARSEHOLE. That aspect of it seems to have passed over your head."
*This regards Nichiren telling Shijo Kingo to not accept his landholder Lord's apology were he to take Kingo's land and later return them.
Without a doubt, Mediocre Monk intimated that for not accepting his apology, I was an "ungrateful arsehole."
Mediocre Monk's rants against me are merely projections* and his "bull baiting" was in response to me demonstrating that he and the Soka Gakkai were slanderers of Shakyamuni Buddha, the Lotus Sutra and Nichiren Daishonin and calling him an unrepentant icchantika or person of incorrigeable disbelief.
*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_projection
You might want to be careful about tossing around that term "icchantika", since Nichiren and the Lotus Sutra both declare that *killing* such persons carries no karmic penalty. It's hard to miss the implications...
ReplyDeleteYou can see sources and links here, if you're interested: https://www.reddit.com/r/sgiwhistleblowers/comments/b28ztx/its_just_fine_to_murder_people_so_long_as_you/
Where do you see anything in the Lotus Sutra that justifies killing of anyone or anything, including icchantikas? We see in the Mahayana Nirvana Sutra that when a Buddhist dynasty and were attacked, it is permissible to kill the marauding icchantikas. Nichiren taught this view in his, On Establishing the Correct Teaching for the Peace of the Land. He also stated in this treatise that icchantikas who would kill the Supreme Votary of the Lotus Sutra, the Pure Land and Zen priests, should be beheaded. However, in this very same treatise, he clarifies: "...If we can quickly put an end to the alms that are given to these icchantikas..."
ReplyDeleteIn 90+ percent of Nichiren's writings on icchatikas, we see that even they can be saved through the power of the Lotus Sutra:
"The Lotus Sutra turns icchantikas, or people of incorrigible disbelief, into Buddhas."
"The Nirvana Sutra says, “Suppose that a couple has seven children, one of whom falls ill. Though the parents love all their children equally, they worry most about the sick child.” Now the sickest of these seven children are icchantikas, or persons of incorrigible disbelief, and those persons who slander the correct teaching. For among all illnesses, the gravest illness is that of slandering the Lotus Sutra. And among all medicines, the finest medicine is Namu-myoho-renge-kyo."
"In this sutra, the Lotus, evil persons, women, persons of the two vehicles, and icchantikas are not discriminated against. Thus, as the sutra says, “all attain the Buddha way.”18 This is also known as the great wisdom of equality."
"Suppose that a person is burning with fever. If he sits down beside a large body of cold water and stays there for a while, his fever will abate, but if he lies down beside a little body of water, he will continue to suffer as before. In the same way, if an icchantika, or person of incorrigible disbelief, who has committed the five cardinal sins and has slandered the Law, should try to cool himself beside the little bodies of water that are the Āgama, Flower Garland, Meditation, and Mahāvairochana sutras, the raging fever caused by his great offenses would never be dispelled. But if he should lie down on the great snowy mountain that is the Lotus Sutra, then the raging fever caused by the five cardinal sins, his slander of the Law, and his incorrigible disbelief would be dispelled instantly." -- Repaying Debts of gratitude
T’ien-t’ai says: “The icchantikas, or persons of incorrigible disbelief, nevertheless have minds, and so it is still possible for them to attain Buddhahood. But persons of the two vehicles have annihilated consciousness, and therefore cannot arouse the mind that aspires to enlightenment. And yet the Lotus Sutra can cure them, which is why it is called myō, or wonderful.”41 Miao-lo says: “The reason that the other sutras are called ‘great’ but not myō is simply that it is easy to cure those who have a mind, but difficult to cure those who are without a mind. Because it [the Lotus Sutra] can cure what is thought to be incurable, it is called myō, or wonderful.”
contuned...
"Therefore, we understand that, once the “Life Span” chapter of the essential teaching had been revealed, all those in the assembly on Eagle Peak became enlightened to the lotus of the entity. Those of the two vehicles, the icchantikas, or persons of incorrigible disbelief, and the determinate groups, as well as women and evil men, all gained an awakening to the lotus of the eternal Buddha." -- The Entity of the Mystic Law
ReplyDelete"Among the bodhisattvas with their two good eyes, the cross-eyed people of the two vehicles, ordinary people with their blind eyes, or icchantikas who have been blind since birth, there were none who could make out the true color or shape of things by means of the earlier sutras. But when the Lotus Sutra was preached and the moon of the theoretical teaching came forth, first the bodhisattvas with their two good eyes gained enlightenment, and then the cross-eyed people of the two vehicles. Next the blind eyes of ordinary people were opened, and then even icchantikas, who had been blind from birth, were able to establish a relationship with the Lotus Sutra that assured them that their eyes would one day open. All this was due entirely to the virtue of the single character myō."
“‘But this is not true of those icchantikas who have cast aside the roots of goodness. Why? Because, Great Wisdom, if those icchantikas who have cast aside the roots of goodness should meet with a Buddha or with a good friend, then they will conceive a desire for enlightenment and will cultivate good roots and thus be able to attain nirvana.’”
"Answer: This is a matter that is difficult to believe and difficult to understand. T’ien-t’ai defined two points that are “difficult to believe and difficult to understand.” One lies in the realm of doctrinal teachings and the other in the realm of meditative practice. With regard to the former, in the sutras preached before the Lotus Sutra we read that persons of the two vehicles and icchantikas, or persons of incorrigible disbelief, are forever barred from attaining Buddhahood, and that Shakyamuni Buddha, the lord of teachings, attained enlightenment for the first time in this world. Nevertheless, we find that the theoretical and the essential teachings of the Lotus Sutra repudiate both these statements..."
"...icchantikas, and women were described in the sutras that preceded the Lotus Sutra as having scorched and killed the seeds that would have allowed them to become Buddhas. But by holding fast to this single character myō, they can revive these scorched seeds of Buddhahood."
“Volume thirty-one of the same sutra says, ‘To believe that all living beings, including icchantikas, possess the Buddha nature is the first of the ten rules to be followed by bodhisattvas, and is known as sufficient belief.’
From another perspective, there is no need to kill icchantikas because there destiny is set:
continued...
ReplyDelete"[According to the Nirvana Sutra, the icchantikas, on the other hand, are likened to] “dead trees or stony mountains” that can never bring forth growth. They are “scorched seeds that, although they encounter the sweet rain,” will not grow. “Bright pearls have the power, when put into turbid water, to change it into clear water... But when thrown into the mud of icchantika, they cannot purify it.” They are [like persons without a wound on their hands when the sutra says], “If a person with a wound on his hand handles poison, it will enter his body, but it will not enter the body of a person without a wound.” “Just as torrents of rain cannot remain suspended in the sky, [so the rain of the Law cannot remain in the sky of icchantika].” Through these various similes we can know that icchantikas of the most evil type will invariably fall into the hell of incessant suffering in their next life. Therefore, they do not suffer any immediate punishment in this life. They are like the evil rulers of ancient China, King Chieh of the Hsia dynasty and King Chou of the Yin dynasty. During their reigns, heaven did not display any unusual manifestations as a warning. That was because their offenses were so grave that their dynasties were already destined to perish." - Opening of the Eyes
"In general, there are four kinds of people who have great difficulty in attaining Buddhahood or rebirth in the pure land. First are those predestined for the two vehicles,28 second are icchantikas, third are those who cling to the doctrine of void, and fourth are those who slander the Law. But through the Lotus Sutra, all of these people are able to become Buddhas. That is why the Lotus Sutra is called myō."
What can I do to help you Dr. Rogow? I have help by giving you massive bounces in views, in the past. I have been following you for many years. Even before this blog, believe it or not. I really love this post.
ReplyDeleteJertemiah, may I ask you how old you are? Are you chanting Namu Myoho renge kyo with faith in the Lotus Sutra, The Master of Teachings (Gohonzon), and Nichiren, the Supreme Votary of the Lotus Sutra? Then I will tell you how you can help me. Thank you for your kind words.
ReplyDelete