Response to a critic

This person who I thought was a friend, admonishes me for admonishing the SGI for their sundry faith and practices because they succeeded in having so many people chant the Daimoku and it is a slander to slander the votaries of the Lotus Sutra. As proof, he cites my kidney disease and tells me that if I change my viewpoint of the SGI, my kidneys would heal.  Here is my response:

I am dismayed. You read what the "influential" SGI says about the votaries and still SAY behind closed doors*, and you criticize me, one man alone without influence for criticizing them. Not only is their behavior amiss but their doctrines. Inserting their Shingon Yui Yoga "mentor disciple" is as bad or worse than the Tientai school inserting Shingon and becoming Mikkyo (Tendai). Their claims that "we are Buddha" is as bad as the Zenmen claiming, "we are Buddha". Nichiren was as close to Buddha as anyone in the history of Buddhism, save for the Buddha himself, and he didn't go around saying, "I am Buddha". Interfaith too, is not Nichiren's exclusive faith and practice of the Lotus Sutra. You praise them for spreading Nam Myoho renge kyo, I admonish them for destroying Namu Myoho renge kyo. They are no different than Nichiren's errant disciples. Please wake up.

And, by the way, Nichiren at age 61 had chronic diarrhea and probably died from colon cancer. Would you have told him to mend his ways and his colon cancer would have resolved? This is the very last time I will allow you to admonish me.

*For example, SGI's slander in their vile Bible of Shakubuku and the pronouncements of Ikeda that the copies of the Nichiren Gohonzon are worthless and that those in the other Nichiren sects:

"The family which believes in the so-called Nichiren-shu will have children who have deformities, mental retardation or madness." - Daisaku Ikeda in the Manual of Forceful Conversion (Bible of Shakubuku).

"...Therefore, the objects of worship inscribed by those in the Butsuryu and Minobu factions [of the Nichiren Shu sect] are absolutely powerless. They are worthless because they are fake. In fact, they contain the power of evil spirits. That is why they are dangerous." Former SGI president, Josei Toda, Daibyaku Renge, 98, p. 98.

"Members of the Minobu school of the Nichiren sect chant daimoku. They have the Gosho Their recitation of the sutra also includes the Hoben and Juryo chapters. And, in the Shoshinkai, which consists of ex-priests of Nichiren Shoshu , and the portions of the sutra they recite and the daimoku that they chant are identical to the practice we observe. Though their religion may seem the same as ours, they lack the single, unbroken heritage of the law received directly from Nichiren Daishonin. If one's faith is not based on this line of inheritance, it is worthless to embrace any Gohonzon, for no benefit will be forthcoming. That is to say, "Without the lifeblood of faith, it would be useless to embrace the Lotus Sutra." " Daisaku Ikeda, Buddhism in Action, vol 3, p 254