Daisaku Ikeda, Buddhist philosopher and president of the Soka Gakkai International (SGI), died from natural causes at his home in Shinjuku City, Tokyo, on the evening of November 15. He was 95.

Born in Tokyo to a family of seaweed farmers on January 2, 1928, Ikeda emerged from World War II with a firm resolve to work for peace. He became a member of the Soka Gakkai in 1947 after attending a talk by its second president, Josei Toda, whose revolutionary approach to Nichiren Buddhism had been forged during his imprisonment by the Japanese military government for resisting the war.

Inspired by Toda, Ikeda became a tireless advocate for nonviolence, mounting an international movement to eradicate nuclear weapons. He succeeded Toda as president of the Japanese Soka Gakkai in 1960, and became the president of the Soka Gakkai International in 1975. At the time of his death, the SGI had spread to 192 countries around the globe, with a combined membership of more than 12 million, making it the largest Buddhist lay movement in history.

The Soka Gakkai (“Value Creation Society”) began as a student-centered educational movement in the 1920s under the guidance of founding President Tsunesaburo Makiguchi. Makiguchi converted to Nichiren Buddhism in 1928, grounding his educational theory in the teachings of the Lotus Sutra. Imprisoned by the government along with his protégé Jose Toda in 1943, he was subject to harsh interrogation and died as a result of malnutrition the following year.

Daisaku Ikeda’s approach to Buddhism combined the optimism of Makiguchi’s Value Creating educational theory with Toda’s unshakable confidence in the power of chanting “Nam-myoho-renge-kyo” (the title of the Lotus Sutra) to transform any situation. He founded four-year universities in Japan and America, published dialogues with philosophers, scientists, and civil rights activists, and supported humanitarian and social justice causes throughout the world.

A TIME magazine article written in 1975 hailed Ikeda as “The Super Missionary” and claimed, “His most consuming passion is the creation of an international people-to-people crusade against war.” Its authors clearly believed that his passion for peace had inherently political overtones, given that, at the height of the Cold War, he had made in-person appeals to Soviet Premier Aleksey Kosygin and Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai. Even as a private citizen, Ikeda had worked to establish diplomatic relations where the efforts of governments had failed—a goal he described as a “great desire” for the happiness of all humankind.

Daisaku Ikeda leaves behind hundreds of published works, including scholarly books on Buddhism and The Human Revolution, his twelve-volume novel recounting the history of the Soka Gakkai. He is survived by his wife, Kaneko, and his sons, Hiromasa and Takahiro.

The post Daisaku Ikeda, President of the Soka Gakkai International, Dies at 95 appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

“The purpose of the appearance in this world of Shakyamuni Buddha, the lord of teachings, lies in his behavior as a human being”  

—“The Three Kinds of Treasure,” The Writings of Nichiren Daishonin

Wayne Shorter, the renowned jazz saxophonist, prolific composer, and dedicated Buddhist practitioner, passed away on March 2, 2023, at the age of 89. July 2023 would have marked fifty years of Shorter’s practice of Nichiren Buddhism as a member of Soka Gakkai International (SGI). His practice inspired him to treat every day, every moment, as the proving ground on which to manifest and enjoy his own enlightenment and inspire others to do the same. Shorter’s decades of practicing Nichiren Buddhism profoundly influenced his creativity in music and all other aspects of his life. 

Deeply inspired by his life and legacy, I chanted Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, the core practice of Nichiren Buddhism enacted by millions of SGI members worldwide, with profound gratitude for his life. In doing so, I realized I wanted to write an article about him to ensure that people knew how much his extraordinary artistry was fueled by his practice, and how his practice infused his behavior as a human being. Whenever I had occasion to encounter Mr. Shorter at various SGI activities, he was always encouraging and humble in the way that only people confident in their intrinsic value can be. He always had this warm wit and relaxed courage shining in his way of being and speaking. As a longtime SGI member, I was honored to talk with several of Shorter’s family and friends about his resonant legacy—and his deep relationship with the dharma.

“I think the focal aim of his behavior, as a human being and as a musician, was to live this Buddhist philosophy so that it would inspire people through his behavior,” Carolina Shorter, Wayne’s wife and a SGI Buddhist practitioner, told me. “Buddhism is a practice where we believe that all of us are one, and we cannot be happy while someone else is suffering. And so it’s not about removing yourself from society. We are all together. Let’s all help each other in all kinds of ways.” 

Carolina shared how she could feel this message in his music, too, stating, “He always aimed toward inspiring people to have courage, to get back in touch with their dreams even if it was a profound dream that had been forgotten.” For instance, in 2016, Shorter and fellow jazz musician and close friend Herbie Hancock penned “An Open Letter to the Next Generation of Artists,” in which they write: 

You cannot hide behind a profession or instrument; you have to be human. Focus your energy on becoming the best human you can be. Focus on developing empathy and compassion. Through the process you’ll tap into a wealth of inspiration rooted in the complexity and curiosity of what it means to simply exist on this planet. Music is but a drop in the ocean of life. 

As the poet Rumi says, “You are not a drop in the ocean, you are the ocean in a drop.” The ocean of Shorter’s life was filled with exquisite crescendos of achievement: a 1998 NEA Jazz Masters Fellowship; a Lifetime Achievement Grammy in 2015; a Guggenheim fellowship in 2016; in 2017, the Polar Music Prize; in 2018, the Kennedy Center Honors award. Honorary doctoral degrees were conferred on him by Berklee College of Music, NYU, and the New England Conservatory. Shorter recorded over twenty albums and wrote over 200 compositions, with “mastery (in) knocking down the wall between jazz and classical [music],” according to the New York Times. After serving as primary composer for Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers in the late 1950s, he joined Miles Davis’s quintet in the 1960s, later cofounded the fusion band Weather Report and his own jazz quartet, and toured and performed with many notable talents. In 2008, music critic Ben Ratliff wrote that Shorter was “probably jazz’s greatest living small-group composer and a contender for greatest living improviser.”

In addition to being a twelve-time Grammy-winning recording artist who made genre-defining contributions to the legacy of jazz, Mr. Shorter also actualized his own long-held profound ambition when he cowrote an opera, Iphigenia, at the age of 87, fulfilling a dream he had since he was 19. Coauthor of the opera, esperanza spalding, who became an SGI member herself after Wayne, Carolina Shorter, and Herbie Hancock introduced her to the practice, describes him as a “combination muse, guide, mentor, and guru.”

Adin Strauss, General Director of the SGI-USA, shared his admiration for Shorter’s musical brilliance and how he always maintained high spirits, even throughout the last five years of his life as he challenged and conquered one massive, life-or-death health obstacle after another. “[He was] always moving forward in the spirit of what he termed ‘zero gravity’—a unique Wayne-ism that beautifully expressed Nichiren’s and the Lotus Sutra’s spirit of ‘from this moment forward,’” Strauss told me. “He was unbound by the fetters of the past—musically, culturally, or otherwise—always with eyes fixed on the future, confident that his Buddhist faith, the philosophy of Nichiren and Daisaku Ikeda, the mentor whom Wayne so cherished, and his own irrepressible energy would enable him to conquer any obstacle, including sickness and death. And that is indeed what he did.”

Carolina described how she, too, was simply in awe of Wayne’s unyielding courage coupled with enthusiasm in the face of serious difficulty. She described him as having a childlike excitement for seeing how obstacles could be transformed as they chanted for wisdom to grow like a lotus flower from the mud of suffering. One major challenge they faced occurred when the Shorters were hit hard financially during the 2008 global economic crisis. When Carolina read a letter they had received describing their dire straits, Wayne clasped his hands in elation, stating, “I can’t wait to see what the surprise will be!” On some level, she understood where he was coming from, because as a longtime practitioner herself, she was familiar with how SGI members would often congratulate one another on the loss of a job or some other difficulty out of confidence that good fortune would manifest through practice to overcome the difficulty. Yet even with that awareness, Carolina held the letter up again for Wayne, saying, “I don’t think you understand,” to which he smiled and replied, “Oh, I understand. I understand clearly.”  

Reflecting on this, Carolina said, “We always hear that the obstacles are actually the raw material with which you are going to build the palace of your Buddhahood. And I feel that. But it is very interesting to me how Wayne literally lived that part of the practice.” 

“Wayne went beyond transcending to transformation, transforming each hardship into a blessing,” said world-renowned flutist Nestor Torres, a friend and fellow SGI member for more than forty years who also performed with Shorter. “That is what I feel differentiates us, who practice Nichiren Daishonin’s Buddhism within the Soka Gakkai; that it is one thing to overcome, another thing to transcend, and yet another to transform the difficulty into a blessing.”

Even when Wayne was told in hospice that his body was failing, he embraced the sufferings of illness and death with inimitable courage. Carolina shared that when Wayne heard the news, he said, “Okay, so I guess it’s time for me to go get a new body and come back and continue the mission.”

“If that’s not the most incredibly profound understanding of how the sickness and death part of the four sufferings work, I don’t know what is,” Carolina told me. Wayne’s valiant spirit in the face of his own mortality reminded Carolina of a teaching from SGI President Dr. Daisaku Ikeda, in which he states: 

Illness can neither rob us of true happiness nor stop us from living a victorious life. Though one may be ill, this has no bearing on the inherent nobility, dignity, and beauty of one’s life.

Elaborating on this, Carolina shared that, “even in his illness, there were so many moments in the hospitals and everything where people would come up to him. I mean, they couldn’t believe how Wayne was dealing with his illness. He used to cite the phrase from President Ikeda’s guidance, ‘Faith is to fear nothing.’ And in this case, I think that the ultimate victory was his never-give-up spirit… His aim at every thought, with his work and with his behavior, including in the hospital, was so strongly aimed toward inspiring people to actually awaken to the greatness of their own lives.”

Indeed, Mr. Shorter could often be seen wearing a hat or T-shirt with the SGI motto “Never Give Up.” Although the phrase may seem to be one that simply cheers us on, it has a deeper meaning, as illustrated in the way Shorter lived. Never Give Up is a rallying cry, a call to our own greater self, a reminder that, of course, we can manifest more of our enlightenment. There are thousands of elegant solutions to any challenge; there is growth and possibility beyond our wildest dreams. “Never Give Up” means that we are determined to actualize the universe’s capacity to align with our determination to transform suffering into growth. It is an expression of resolve, of limitless determination to which the universe responds with limitless compassionate matching force that, in turn, compounds our life force. “Never Give Up” is our rallying cry because it recognizes our own inestimable possibility as human beings and the reflection of that limitless possibility in the cosmos. We say it humbly because we know that there is so much more potential in ourselves and in the universe than we are tapping at any given moment, and we can—must—use our daimoku (our chanting practice) and Buddhist study to tap into more of that potential. It means that we have a humble awareness that there is always hope, there is always a possibility, and if there isn’t, we can create hope and possibility. We can, as African Americans say, “make a way out of no way.” This is in fact what African Americans did with the creation of the genre called jazz.  

Jazz itself is a wisdom transmission about creative living. As a genre, it portrays the particular and otherwise inexpressible triumphs and challenges of Black musicians. According to eminent jazz musician Herbie Hancock, who describes Shorter as a best friend, “Even though the roots of jazz come from the African American experience, my feeling has always been that jazz really developed from a noble aspect of the human spirit common to all people—the ability to respond to the worst of circumstances and to create something of great value, or as Buddhism says, to turn poison into medicine.”

Through his music, his practice, and his relationships, Shorter continually transformed the sufferings of life into something creative and constructive. Olivier Urbain, director of the Min-On Music Research Institute in Tokyo, Japan, recalled Shorter’s own words on the transformative potential of his music: “Shorter said, ‘The music I am creating now has to deal with the unfamiliar; it has to be music that inspires people to consider negotiating with the unexpected instead of the familiar, with the unknown, to raise their life condition.’”  

What Nichiren Daishonin refers to as magnificent “behavior as a human being” is manifest in the compassionate humility with which Wayne Shorter nurtured everyone around him. The fact that he continued to cultivate music to the last weeks of his life, developing a brilliant opera in his late 80s, signifies that when we use our Buddhist practice, we can actualize the real meaning of our appearance in this world and behave as human beings who do not rest on our laurels, ever. 

Up to the last moments of his conscious life, Wayne Shorter was chanting the mantra Nam-myoho-renge-kyo. When the doctors advised him that he would most likely not wake up after receiving the medicine he was being given, he asked Carolina to hand him his prayer beads, which he always kept nearby, so that he could chant, which he did until he drifted into sleep. Carolina describes how she, too, had fallen asleep many hours later, until a nurse came to tell her that his heart rate was slowing; it would not be long. Carolina grasped Wayne’s hand and began to chant for his joyful transition. Even after he passed peacefully, at 4:04 a.m., she continued chanting with him and holding his hand for the next four hours. She says she was thinking of the passage from “The Heritage of the Ultimate Law of Life” from Major Writings of Nichiren Daishonin, where he says,

For one who summons up one’s faith and chants Nam-myoho-renge-kyo with the profound insight that now is the last moment of one’s life, the sutra proclaims: ‘When the lives of these persons come to an end, they will be received into the hands of a thousand Buddhas, who will free them from all fear and keep them from falling into the evil paths of existence.’ How can we possibly hold back our tears at the inexpressible joy of knowing that not just one or two, not just one hundred or two hundred, but as many as a thousand Buddhas will come to greet us with open arms!

The twenty-fourth chapter of the Lotus Sutra describes bodhisattva Wonderful Sound as one who will propagate Buddhism eternally. Listening to his timeless music and chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo in communion with him, may we allow our lives to harmonize with bodhisattva Wayne Shorter’s eternally glorious, victorious life force.  

The post The Glorious, Victorious Life of Bodhisattva Wayne Shorter appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

Last month, amid the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, Daisaku Ikeda, president of Soka Gakkai International, the nongovernmental organization that serves as an umbrella group for the world’s largest sect of Nichiren Buddhism, pleaded for the five nuclear weapon states—including Russia—to commit to never being the first to use nuclear weapons in a conflict.

“In a world where divisions are as deep as they have ever been, it is crucial that all the nuclear-weapon states clearly declare that they intend to maintain the stance of self-restraint with regard to nuclear war,” he said, ahead of the review conference for the states party to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, which concluded on August 26.

While for many the issue of nuclear abolition has faded to the background after the Cold War, members of the Soka Gakkai movement have been fighting for nuclear abolition for more than 60 years—and say that the war between Russia and Ukraine should be a stark reminder of the imminent and existential threat nuclear weapons pose to humanity. 

“As Buddhists, we believe in the utmost dignity of life, that life is so precious,” said Anna Ikeda, a representative for SGI at the UN. “Nuclear weapons destroy life on such a broad scale in an instant, so of course we should be enraged at them.”

This commitment to nuclear abolition is actually intertwined with the foundation of SGI itself, Joan Anderson, of the group’s international office of public information, points out.

Soka Gakkai traces its roots to 1930s Japan, during the lead up to World War II. Its two founders, Tsunesaburo Makiguchi and Josei Toda, were schoolteachers who opposed Japan’s growing militarism and imposition of the Shinto religion, and were later imprisoned for publicly resisting it, Anderson said. Makiguchi died in prison.    

“Resistance to nationalism and to the war is in-built in SGI members,” Anderson said.

Toda was released from prison in July 1945, one month before the United States dropped atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which killed more than 200,000 people, most of them civilians, and leaving thousands of survivors, known in Japanese as hibakusha, with cancer and other health effects from the radiation. Toda then began rebuilding Soka Gakkai in the war’s aftermath.

In 1957, at the height of the Cold War and months before his death, Toda delivered a declaration on the abolition of nuclear weapons, which became the foundation for Soka Gakkai’s work on nuclear abolition.

“We, the citizens of the world, have an inviolable right to live,” he said. “Anyone who jeopardizes that right is a devil incarnate, a fiend, a monster. I wish to declare that anyone who ventures to use nuclear weapons, irrespective of their nationality or whether their country is victorious or defeated, should be sentenced to death without exception.” 

His strong language was a response to the global arms race and ballooning of nuclear stockpiles at the time, Anderson said.

“I think he felt that it’s not the case that there are good nuclear weapons and bad nuclear weapons, that having nuclear weapons in the hands of the United States is fine, but in the hands of the Soviet Union is bad,” she said. “What he said was, we have to stop this kind of thinking, nuclear weapons are a threat to all life, and there’s no such thing as a limited nuclear war.”

After Toda’s declaration, Soka Gakkai started an extensive international campaign for nuclear abolition. One of the organization’s first activities was interviewing hibakusha to document their experiences with nuclear war and suffering. By tasking young members with collecting these testimonies, he was able to educate a new generation about nuclear weapons, Anderson said.

Soka Gakkai also put together exhibitions about the human toll of nuclear weapons, which have been showcased around the world, and launched other public education campaigns. In 1983, Soka Gakkai International registered as a nongovernmental organization with the United Nations, where it’s also been pushing for abolition on a global scale. 

SGI is a partner organization of the Geneva-based International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), which was awarded the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize. SGI also works on the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT)—an agreement among the world’s five nuclear powers to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons—and the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons—an agreement led by non-nuclear countries that aims to ban all development or production of nuclear weapons.

And in the United States, SGI-USA is currently working with the Back from the Brink campaign—a coalition of faith and civic groups, including the Union of Concerned Scientists, the Sierra Club, and several mainline Protestant denominations—to push a domestic policy platform that includes renouncing the first use of nuclear weapons; ending the president’s sole, unchecked authority to launch nuclear war; taking nuclear weapons off hair trigger alert status; and abandoning the plan to update the US’s arsenal with enhanced weapons.

Anna Ikeda said that as a Buddhist civil society organization, SGI’s role in the fight for nuclear abolition is to strengthen international norms and remind people of the human toll that’s at stake, since governmental discussions about nuclear weapons are typically “sanitized” and focus on numbers and military strategy.

“It’s to the point where you don’t really hear about human suffering,” she said. “So it’s the role of SGI, ICAN, and others to put human suffering at the center of the debate.”

Another noteworthy attribute of SGI’s nuclear abolition work is that youth have always played a significant role, Danny Hall, public affairs director for SGI-USA, pointed out. (Daisaku Ikeda wrote in 2009, “It is the passion of youth that spreads the flames of courage throughout society.”) Student groups have for decades hosted exhibitions on their college campuses and disseminated petitions to raise awareness. 

Even though nuclear abolition isn’t often at the forefront of the minds of young people, who weren’t alive during the Cold War, Hall said it should be. By some measures, the risk of nuclear war is even greater now than it was during the Cold War, he said, since the number of nuclear weapons has once again started to grow. In addition, he said, “nuclear weapons don’t exist in a vacuum; they intersect with issues young people care about.” 

Nuclear weapons can exacerbate the climate crisis, and nuclear testing and waste have disproportionately impacted marginalized people and communities of color, he said. It’s also an issue of economic justice: The US will spend nearly $2 trillion over 30 years to update its nuclear arsenal, money that could be used for housing, healthcare, or schools, he said. 

Finally, for SGI, nuclear abolition isn’t just about politics; it’s also about spirituality. 

Anna Ikeda said that in SGI’s view of Buddhism, nuclear weapons are “a manifestation of what we call the fundamental darkness. It’s our inability to see our own dignity and the dignity of others.” Because of this, she said it’s critical not just to abolish nuclear weapons themselves, but also the types of thinking that have led people to develop—and use—them in the first place. “We could destroy all nuclear weapons from earth, but if you don’t change human tendencies, it’s going to be something else,” she said.

Her views reflect that of Daisaku Ikeda, who in 2009 wrote, “If we are to put the era of nuclear terror behind us, we must struggle against the real ‘enemy.’ That enemy is not nuclear weapons per se, nor is it the states that possess or develop them. The real enemy that we must confront is the ways of thinking that justify nuclear weapons; the readiness to annihilate others when they are seen as a threat or as a hindrance to the realization of our objectives. This is the new consciousness we must all share.”

SGI members understand that they face an uphill battle to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons. 

“Is it possible? I don’t know,” Hall said.

“But it’s a matter of faith to continue to make this effort for a world free of nuclear weapons,” he said. “Our goal is not to be resigned to nuclear war as an inevitability, but to believe that a better world is possible and that we can make a difference.”

The post This Buddhist Group Has Been Advocating for Nuclear Abolition for Over 60 Years appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

Nothing is permanent, so everything is precious. Here’s a selection of some happenings—fleeting or otherwise—in the Buddhist world this week and next.

Soka Gakkai International President Daisaku Ikeda Releases 40th Peace Proposal 

On the 47th anniversary of the founding of Soka Gakkai International (SGI), the world’s largest and most influential sect of Nichiren Buddhism, SGI president Daisaku Ikeda released his 40th peace proposal, which is titled “Transforming Human History: The Light of Peace and Dignity.”  The full translation in English will be available here on February 11. Ikeda focuses on the inequalities heightened by the pandemic, the climate crisis, and the abolition of nuclear weapons. 

Emphasizing that vulnerable people—especially, women, the elderly, and children and young people who have suffered because of school closures, loss of family members, and unemployment—have become even more vulnerable during the pandemic, Ikeda says, “I firmly believe that the key factor determining the direction of history will prove to be we humans ourselves, and not a virus.” Joan Anderson, a representative of SGI, adds, “President Ikeda draws on the wisdom of an episode from the Vimalakirti Sutra illustrating the bodhisattva spirit of empathy and the sense that our own individual security cannot be realized in isolation from the conditions of privation faced by others.”  

Ikeda also reiterates his longtime support of youth participation and leadership in social issues by calling for a post-COVID youth summit to reimagine the world after the pandemic, and by continuing to call for participation in addressing the climate crisis. This year, he specified the need for a youth council on protecting environmental resources. “Listening to the voices of young people is not optional; it is the only logical path forward if we are genuinely concerned about the future of our world,” he said at the COP26 UN climate summit in Glasgow last year and repeated in the peace proposal.

Finally, as a leader in the movement to abolish nuclear weapons, Ikeda shared his support for the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). “As more countries that presently feel they cannot sign or ratify the TPNW begin to positively acknowledge its true value and significance, I am confident that this will catalyze the energy and political will needed to put an end to the era of nuclear weapons,” he writes in the proposal.

SGI, which was founded in 1975 to support members of Soka Gakkai outside of Japan, has become the most diverse Buddhist organization in the US. Today, 8.27 million households in Japan are part of the Soka Gakkai, with 2.8 million members participating in SGI outside of Japan, including 354,000 in North America, 325,000 in Central and South America, 162,000 in Europe, 51,000 in Africa, and 1.9 million members in Asia and Oceania. 

Memorial Ceremonies and Tributes Continue for Thich Nhat Hanh

Practitioners around the globe continue to share tributes and remembrances since the passing of the beloved Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh, who died on January 22 in Hue, Vietnam, at the age of 95. The Plum Village Community, Nhat Hanh’s sangha, shared a selection of tributes from notable figures who expressed their gratitude for Nhat Hanh’s teachings on peace, love, and compassion. President Nguyen Xuan Phuc and Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh of Vietnam shared their wishes for the Plum Village Community to “continue the Zen master’s vision and aspiration for engaged Buddhism. . .   and, together with the wider Buddhist community in Vietnam and abroad, promote peace in the world.” Hundreds of thousands, Buddhist and non-Buddhist, have participated in online memorial services hosted by the 11 monasteries Nhat Hanh founded in the US, Europe, and Asia. Following a week of livestream memorial services from Tu Hieu Temple in Hue, Vietnam, the final funeral and cremation ceremony took place on January 28 at 6 p.m. EST. Find a schedule of worldwide memorial services here. Read a practitioner’s remembrances from a 1993 retreat in West Virginia led by Nhat Hanh, and read Nhat Hanh’s full obituary here. 

Kyabje Dodrupchen Rinpoche Passes Into Parinirvana

On January 26, Dodrupchen Chorten Monastery in Sikkim and Tashi Choling Center for Buddhist Studies in Oregon announced that Kyabje Dodrupchen Rinpoche—a master in both the Nyingma and Dzogchen school of Tibetan Buddhism and key holder of the Longchen Nyingtik teachings—passed into parinirvana. It is believed that the rinpoche is now in a state of thukdam, during which his body will be preserved as his mind becomes luminous awareness.

Keanu Reeves Facing Backlash in China for Pro-Tibet Stance

Actor Keanu Reeves recently agreed to perform in this year’s Tibet House US Annual Benefit Concert, a virtual fundraising event that will be hosted by The Dalai Lama’s New York-based Tibet House organization in March. Reeves’s support for Tibet has ruffled the feathers of some Chinese nationalists, who are calling for his newest movie, The Matrix Resurrections, to be banned in China.

Coming Up

Saturday, January 29: The newest issue of Tricycle magazine goes up online. Find the issue here.

Monday, January 31: On the final day of Tricycle Meditation Month, Myoshin Kelley, a teacher at Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche’s Tergar Meditation Community, hosts a live Q&A on Zoom where participants can ask questions about their practice. Register for the 1pm ET Q&A here.

The post Soka Gakkai International President Daisaku Ikeda Releases 2022 Peace Proposal appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

On the night of November 4, 1980, Steve Harvey was playing his saxophone in a public park, as he often did to unwind after gigs in Kansas City. While in the bathroom, he was attacked by three white men, who chased Harvey through a nearby baseball field and crushed his skull with a bat, killing him.

The attackers, led by 19-year-old Raymond Bledsoe, believed the park was a hangout for gay men. Bledsoe told friends afterward he had killed a “Black faggot.”

At the time, Alvin Sykes was 24 and managing a funk band in Kansas City. He was friends with Harvey, one of the many talented “songbirds,” as he said, perched in the city’s celebrated music scene. “Steve Harvey was a great musician,” Sykes recalled, “he was going to go far.”

An informant identified Bledsoe and his friends as Harvey’s killers. Two pled guilty to assault charges in exchange for testimony against Bledsoe. Nonetheless, Bledsoe was acquitted by an all-white jury.

The injustice gnawed at Sykes. “They killed one of our songbirds, and for them to get away with it? Nah—that just wasn’t going to go.”

A few years before, Sykes had converted to Nichiren Buddhism, a form of Mahayana Buddhism founded in 13th century Japan. Fellow members of Soka Gakkai, Nichiren’s international lay organization, encouraged Sykes to chant the group’s distinctive mantra—Nam myoho renge kyo—a phrase believed to contain all of the dharma. (It means: “I take refuge in the Lotus of the Wonderful Law.”) The practice, known as daimoku, “took away any feelings of limitation,” Sykes later said. Chanting about the Harvey case gave him the confidence to dig deeper.

And so, Sykes, a high school dropout with no legal training, assigned himself the case. His stepmother had preached the value of reading, so he walked to the Kansas City Public Library and hit the stacks. With Harvey’s widow by his side, he tunneled through law books before finding the nugget he needed: an obscure clause in the 1968 Civil Rights Act that made it illegal to deny someone use of a public property based on race.

At Syke’s urging, the Justice Department charged Bledsoe with violating Harvey’s civil rights. Again, an all-white jury would decide Bledsoe’s fate. This time, the jury found him guilty.

Bledsoe, 56, is now Inmate #02512-045 inside a federal prison in Pennsylvania, serving one of the longest sentences ever meted out for a civil rights violation.

Alvin Sykes, who died on March 19 at age 64, would become one of the country’s savviest and most successful civil rights activists, the architect behind landmark bills to reopen cold cases and a relentless advocate for justice.

Sykes personally convinced a US Senator to drop his opposition to a bill that empowered federal agents to investigate unsolved racial crimes from decades past. He also helped write or pass state laws about jury reform, using DNA to exonerate falsely accused criminals, securing voting rights for public housing residents and penalizing animal cruelty as a felony crime.

Though he often eschewed the spotlight, the arc of Syke’s remarkable life—from the Kansas City Public Library to the halls of Congress—has an almost storybook quality, like a Frank Capra film or a saint’s biography. That includes his conversion to Buddhism, which came by way of Herbie Hancock, the legendary jazz pianist and composer.

For Sykes, Buddhism became the bedrock of his life. Before every big moment, he told friends, he chanted daimoku, which he credited with instilling the conviction that he could change his life and the courage to do so, even against formidable odds. 

“In SGI we talk about making the impossible possible,” Hancock told me in a recent interview, using the acronym for Soka Gakkai International. “He lived that every day. He took on these impossible cases, many were from poor Black people who didn’t have money for lawyers or for justice. And he won.” 

Turning poison into medicine

Alvin Sykes was born July 21, 1956 to a 14-year-old girl, and raised by Burnetta Page, a family friend. Sykes was told his mother was his sister, and the only time he saw his father, Vernon Evans, Evans was lying in a casket. The confusion left a mark. 

“Truth for me had been so evasive and changing,” he said. “That’s why it became so important for me to find out the whole truth throughout life.”

Sykes was a sickly child, but Page mortgaged her home to pay for his epilepsy treatment and extolled the power of books. “Anything worthwhile takes reading,” she said.

Sykes heeded that advice, but ignored his stepmother’s warnings about the couple across the street.

Lured to their house by candy, Sykes was sexually abused. Not knowing to whom or where to turn for help, he returned and confronted his abusers. They attacked him again.

“That’s when I started thinking there needed to be someone between people and law enforcement,” he said.

After more neighborhood trouble, Page sent Sykes to Boys Town, the home in Nebraska for at-risk children founded by the famous Father Flanagan. Sykes hated it, except for the music program. Returning to Kansas City, he didn’t like high school much either, dropping out in the 9th grade.

But Sykes didn’t stop studying. To hide his truancy, he visited the public library, letting curiosity guide his curriculum.

“There was a time when somebody like me wouldn’t have been allowed inside a library – or as a Black man, permitted to read at all,” Sykes recalled. “But I was able to revolve much of my life around the library. I sought and got my education there.”

Sykes also chased his love of music through the city’s jazz clubs, where he was introduced to Hancock. When they met, in the early 1970s, the jazz pianist was a star, after stints in Miles Davis’ band and scoring mainstream hits with the funktastic Head Hunters.

Most of the Head Hunters practiced Buddhism, Hancock recalled. “We were hardcore members back then, and we always challenged ourselves to do shakubuku,” Soka Gakkai’s phrase for sharing the dharma.

Hancock said his initial conversations with Sykes continued for the musician’s whole weeklong engagement in Kansas City. Back on the road, he would call to check if his protege had chanted, and the two became close. Sykes considered Hancock his spiritual mentor and best friend.

In Soka Gakkai, Sykes found one of America’s most diverse and socially engaged Buddhist movements. He also found values to guide the rest of his life: honoring the intrinsic dignity of each person, a strong belief in the power of dialogue and an insistence that, with practice, even poison can be alchemized into medicine. 

Ray Bosch, an attorney with the Environmental Protection Agency in Kansas City, recalls meeting Sykes at Soka Gakkai events in the early 1980s.

Before long, Sykes was asking for legal advice. One of the first cases he asked about was Steve Harvey’s.

The Harvey victory sent Sykes’ life into new and unexpected directions. Victims of injustice clamored for meetings with the self-taught savant. He spent nearly four decades traveling across the country, sleeping on couches, meeting with victims’ families and lawyers, working late nights with papers spread across greasy McDonald’s tables, scouring court records and law books for an instrument to pry open cold cases.

From time to time, Sykes would think about the music career he’d put on hold and get an itch to return.

“I’ve always been trying to not be doing what I’ve been doing all these years,” Sykes said at an event in 2015, drawing laughter. “I had other goals in life.”

But there was always someone who needed help.

“There came a time in his forties when he got bombarded by so many people in need,” Bosch said. “He couldn’t turn his back on them.”

Before long, Sykes got hooked by the ultimate cold case.

People’s last resort

Emmett Till was maimed and murdered in 1955 by white men in Mississippi who never served a day for their crimes. Till had supposedly whistled at one of the men’s wife, who later admitted making it all up.

Mamie Till-Mobley, Emmett’s mother, pressed prosecutors for decades to reopen her son’s murder case, without success.

In 2002, Sykes showed up at Till-Mobley’s door and told her it was possible to turn “the poison of Till’s murder into the medicine of justice for other victims.” He soon gained her trust and took on her cause. Just days later, Till-Mobley died.

“At the end of her life she was happy because of Alvin,” Hancock said. “He took the torch. He was people’s last resort and he came through.”

In 2005, the Justice Department reopened the Till case. A two-year investigation yielded some new evidence, but a grand jury declined to indict anyone on criminal charges.

Despite the disappointment, Sykes used the momentum behind the Emmett Till case to push for a bill that would create new departments to investigate cold cases associated with violent civil rights violations.

Introduced by the late Georgia congressman John Lewis in 2007, the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act sailed through the House by a vote of 422-2. Everyone expected the Senate to quickly follow suit. Then the bill ran into the Senate’s infamous Dr. No.

Chanting for Dr. No

The “Till Bill” had been put on hold by the late Senator Tom Coburn, a conservative Republican who had appointed himself the arbiter of how Congress spends our money. By placing “holds” on bills, “Dr. No,” as Coburn’s Senate colleagues called him, could stop legislation in its tracks.

Democrats were outraged and denounced Coburn to the media. Both parties seemed less interested in working together than exploiting the moral high ground. 

Sykes took it upon himself to open a dialogue with Coburn, starting by calling Coburn’s staff and politely but persistently advocating for the bill. The senator did not oppose the merits of the bill, he explained, according to Sykes, just the method of paying for it.

Sensing an opening, Sykes flew to Washington to meet with Coburn. But first, he chanted Nam–myoho–renge–kyo for the Senator. “He wanted to connect with his heart,” said Bosch.

“Those who supported the bill started beating him up in the press, but I saw it as a test in terms of faith. I chanted a lot about this, studied SGI President Ikeda’s encouragement and stepped up my participation in SGI-USA activities,” Sykes told World Tribune, the organization’s newspaper. “Then it hit me: Why don’t you reach out to the senator? When I did that, I realized that neither side had engaged in dialogue. He became receptive and eventually dropped his hold on the bill. When he did so, he spent five minutes on the Senate floor praising my heart, integrity and determination. I was floored. This was my actual proof of faith.”

After meeting with Sykes, Coburn not only dropped his opposition to the bill, he also delivered a floor speech in the Senate extolling the civil rights activist’s stamina, integrity, forthrightness and determination.

“He has held true to his beliefs and his commitment to the mother of Emmett Till,” Coburn said on the Senate floor, “and because of that, we are going to see this bill come to fruition.”

For Sykes, convincing Coburn was more than a political win.

“This was very much a spiritual victory for me,” he said. “Because in Buddhism we believe very much in the power of dialogue.”

The man at McDonald’s

In 2019, Sykes was rushing to catch a train to Chicago for an event with Emmett Till’s family, when he fell and hit his head. The injury paralyzed Sykes from the chest down, said friends. He spent the rest of his life in an assisted care facility.

Bosch said Sykes was no monk. He loved music and barbeque, suffered heartbreak and wanted to start a family.

But he also sacrificed for his cause. He never learned to drive a car, dressed in second-hand clothes and slept on couches. He never sought fame, and to this day many don’t know about his influence or accomplishments.

In 2013, the Kansas City Public Library named Sykes its first scholar in residence. Sykes called it the graduation ceremony he never had. In his speech, he challenged the audience to see beyond their surface prejudices.

“I can remember the times when I sat inside a McDonald’s restaurant, hungry but absorbed in my work, papers spread around me and passersby giving me that look,” he said in 2013, when the Kansas City Public Library named him its scholar in residence. “To those who applaud me now, I ask: Don’t turn up your nose at the next guy like me you see at McDonald’s—too busy, or maybe too poor to eat. You don’t know what he’s working on. It might wind up on the President’s desk.”

The post In Memory: The Remarkable Life of Alvin Sykes appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

Tina Turner is an American icon—a remarkably versatile creative artist whose career has spanned more than sixty years. The winner of eight Grammy Awards, Turner was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991 and received a Kennedy Center Honor in 2005. But her path has not always been easy. Tina has overcome domestic abuse, discrimination, professional setbacks, life-threatening illness, and devastating personal loss. Throughout it all, she has credited her practice of Nichiren Buddhism as the source of her hope for a better world and her determination to overcome every obstacle in her life.

Born Anna Mae Bullock in 1939, Tina began her musical career in 1960 as a member of the Ike & Tina Turner Revue. She divorced Ike in 1978 and, after virtually disappearing from the music scene for several years, rebuilt her career, launching a string of hits including her 1984 solo album, Private Dancer. In 1986 she published a bestselling memoir, I, Tina, which was turned into the Academy Award-nominated film What’s Love Got to Do with It in 1993. Tina’s latest book, Happiness Becomes You: A Guide to Changing Your Life for Good, draws lessons from her personal life about using Buddhism to transform sorrow into joy and break through all limitations to achieve a happy and fulfilling life.

When Tricycle contributing editor Clark Strand interviewed Tina this past May, they discussed topics ranging from her first encounters with Buddhism to how she maintains a positive outlook in a world plagued by pandemic and social unrest.

You were already a successful songwriter and performer when you began practicing Buddhism in the early 1970s, but your personal life was in crisis. You’ve credited your spiritual practice with getting you safely through turbulent, sometimes frightening times. How did you discover Nichiren Buddhism? By 1973, I was distressed and exhausted from domestic abuse, and it was getting harder to hide it from some of the people around me. When I was on my own in the studio with our recording team, they’d sometimes give me looks, like they wanted to say “When are you getting out of that mess?” Which wasn’t all that helpful. Then one day a young sound engineer said something different: “Tina, you should try chanting. It will help you change your life.”

Chanting sounded like it was probably more for college students than a mother in her thirties like me, so I put it out of my mind. A couple of months after that, my youngest son, Ronnie, came home carrying what looked like a rosary but was actually Buddhist chanting beads. He said he’d been chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo at a friend’s house up the street and asked me to go there with him to a chanting meeting.

I wanted to, but in those days I was basically a prisoner in my own home. So I told Ronnie I couldn’t, and that was that. Then a few weeks later, Ike brought home this nice-looking lady to see me. He was always doing that, bringing people around to “see Tina.” Well, wouldn’t you know, she started talking to me about chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo. Here we go again! [Laughs.]

Obviously the universe had been trying to send me a message, and I was finally ready to receive it.

What is it about the practice of chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo that works for you? When I first learned about it, I liked the fact that the practice offered me a simple, practical formula for happiness. As I began studying Buddhist teachings and chanting more, it led me to take responsibility for my life and to base my choices on wisdom, courage, and compassion. Not long after I started chanting, I began to see that the power I needed to change my life was already within me.

“You could say that chanting is a kind of spiritual performing art.”

For me, the practice feels active and invigorating. In the Soka Gakkai tradition of Nichiren Buddhism, we chant with our eyes open and in vigorous rhythmic repetition, which I’ve always loved. Little by little, it brought out my courage to break away and live an independent life on my own.

Some friends in my neighborhood chanting group had been practicing for years before I started. They promised I’d become happier than I ever dreamed possible if I stuck with it and never gave up. They were right! I truly believe that anyone can do the same.

Years ago, a Broadway actress told me that chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo was the most popular type of Buddhist practice among entertainers. What is it about this form of Buddhism that attracts so many people in the performing arts—from actors and dancers to singers and jazz musicians? That’s a great question. Buddhist teachings in general promote an open-minded, accepting, and nonjudgmental outlook, which artists find appealing.

With Nichiren Buddhism in particular, chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo has such a clear, musical rhythm—it’s similar to singing. I think performers are naturally drawn to practices that involve rhythm and sound, and that may be why so many prefer chanting over quieter forms of meditation. You could say that chanting is a kind of spiritual performing art.

You have sometimes identified yourself as a “Baptist-Buddhist.” What does that mean to you? I was raised in the Baptist tradition, and virtually everyone I knew in my hometown was Baptist. The Baptist influences of my childhood didn’t just disappear because I started to study and practice Buddhism. I’ve always respected my heritage, while also having a seeking spirit. My way of communicating with Mother Nature and the universe simply changed vocabulary, from Baptist to Buddhist. The language of Buddhism works for me. And as I’ve learned about the world’s religions and philosophies, I’ve seen common threads shared between them all. It’s important to me to celebrate both—to find unity in diversity—which is what my Buddhist practice guides me to do.

Was it that impulse to find unity in diversity that led you to become involved with the Beyond Music Project, a not-for-profit movement that weaves together music and inspiration from Tibetan Buddhism, Christian, Hindu, Nichiren Buddhism, and other traditions? Yes, definitely. I feel passionate about promoting interfaith and intercultural unity, which is why joining Beyond was appealing to me. The music we’ve created with Beyond is an invitation for all people to open their hearts to the Other, beyond any differences, and to be united as a global community.

And yet we seem to be living in an increasingly polarized world. What’s your view on the divisiveness that currently dominates politics, both in America and abroad? I believe the remedy for divisiveness is to cultivate and spread compassion for all living beings. It seems in so many places there is a drought of love and kindness these days. Some people react to pain by inflicting more pain on themselves and others. This is a vicious cycle that creates more negative karma and makes things worse for everyone. Our human family must end the toxic karmic pattern of divisiveness before it ends us.

America was already reeling from violence and division before COVID-19. If anything, the pandemic seems to have made everything worse. As someone who has survived racism, family trauma, financial ruin, and the premature death of loved ones, what advice would you offer? The most important thing is to never give up. No matter what. When we choose hope over despair, we have already won. “Winter always turns to spring” is one of my favorite sayings from Nichiren. The trick is that we have to do our part to help it along.

Buddhism has taught me that hidden inside of our challenges are the lessons we must learn in order to break through to a better life. As hard as that might be to grasp in the midst of difficult times, when we can see our problems from that perspective, things naturally change. Then even the impossible becomes possible.

Choosing hope is crucial, as is finding ways to use our difficulties to move forward. In my life there were a lot of so-called impossible circumstances that I couldn’t control or change, but my epiphany was that, through my spiritual practice, I could change my way of responding to challenges. I realized that the most valuable help comes from within.

What, for you, is the most important aspect of Buddhism for people to keep in mind today? Buddhism teaches equality—the empowering principle that everyone has the potential to attain enlightenment and become absolutely, indestructibly happy. When we come to see this potential in ourselves, we can see and respect it in everyone else, too.

As the Soka Gakkai International (SGI) president Daisaku Ikeda says: “When we realize that our lives are one with the great and eternal life of the universe, we are the Buddha. The purpose of Buddhism is to enable all people to come to this realization.” This is so important because it’s open to everyone, regardless of culture, language, even religion. It’s a reminder that everyone equally has the potential for Buddhahood, for enlightenment, and that our salvation is up to us.

What makes you such a strong believer? Actual proof. Nichiren taught that spiritual practice should result in “actual proof.” And my personal practice has shown me, time after time, that it just works. Nothing is more convincing than actual proof. And that makes me a very strong believer.

You’ve never stopped struggling to better yourself, never stopped striving. What has been your biggest challenge recently? Staying physically fit and healthy after my health challenges. In the past ten years, I’ve experienced cancer, vertigo, strokes, and kidney failure. That would be a lot to handle at any age, but I got through it in my seventies! No matter how challenging it was, or might yet be, nothing can defeat my spirit.

Now at eighty, I can say with a smile that I have truly won in every aspect of my life. I am thankful that the discipline of my spiritual practice helped me to keep calm and collected, regardless of what happened, and I never felt low for very long.

Mental attitude is always half the battle, and my mental state has been clear and strong, thanks to chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo.

What would you like to share with people who are just beginning their Buddhist practice? Have patience and be determined. Never stop growing and learning. Be open to expanding your heart and mind. Become bigger than any problem you encounter. Continually broadening your inner world is the key to happiness. In the Soka Gakkai tradition, we call this process “human revolution.”

Can you say a bit more about that for our readers who might not be familiar with this principle? Human revolution is an inner transformation, a revolution of the heart. It’s the process of growth that happens when we work on expanding our best qualities in order to overcome obstacles or adversity. Think of it as a way of getting comfortable with voluntary growth.

“When you can see clearly, you can transform any situation.”

Stepping out of your comfort zone for the sake of self-improvement and contributing to the greater good is a lifelong practice. But wonderful things come from opening your heart and mind to new possibilities. I believe we can find a higher purpose in nearly anything we do—in work or in life. That is human revolution.

What’s the most surprising thing you’ve learned in your eighty years of life? Regardless of age, life will always have more surprises in store for you! Some surprises will bring joy and some will bring suffering. Either way you have to roll with it and, most important, learn from it. Smile and appreciate the ride—it’s a reminder that you’re alive!

If you could convince everyone in the world to do just one thing to make it better, what would that one thing be? Always be kind. You will find it comes back to you.

That’s good advice for anyone, and I suspect there are circumstances where you must first be kind to yourself. A large part of your story of personal transformation was your escape from an abusive relationship. Do you have advice for people who may feel trapped in an unhealthy relationship? You may not have direct control over what comes your way, but you do have control over how you respond. You are stronger than you think. Take care of yourself, love yourself. Through spiritual practice, you can come to see yourself and your life clearly. And when you can see clearly, you can transform any situation. Never settle for a relationship in which you aren’t respected, honored, and cherished.

You have spoken publicly about your positive view on aging. How did you manage to rise above the youth-obsessed culture of the music and entertainment business? I’ve always welcomed getting older and owned my age with pride. I’ve definitely run up against ageism in my career, but I overcame it by doing my best and showing that experience is valuable.

Experience brings wisdom. If we aim to be a happier version of ourselves today than yesterday, then age is only a number. At every stage of life, I’ve felt fortunate to experience what comes with each year. In my heart today, I feel more youthful than ever. That is because I treasure every moment.

You’ve taken on the air of an unflappable hero over the course of your long career. After all you’ve overcome and your years of spiritual practice, do you still get angry or feel despondent? Yes, of course, I’m a real human being, after all! [Laughs.] And like everyone else, I experience the full range of human emotions—including anger and sadness. But I’ve learned not to let negative feelings linger.

Whenever I feel the shadows creeping in, I increase the light however I can. Exercising, doing yoga, meditating, reading, chanting, going for a stroll, spending time with friends or family. Even just taking a nap can work wonders. But it’s also possible to transform those feelings, to “change poison into medicine,” as Nichiren called it.

It’s the idea that when you raise your life condition, when you improve your state of mind, you can use the resulting wisdom, courage, and compassion to convert any negative into a positive. It starts by facing problems with the knowledge that you have the power within you not only to overcome them, but also to thrive because of them—to accomplish more than you have before and reach new heights. And when your confidence needs a boost, you can recharge it by doing whatever positive practice lifts you up. Elevating your life condition is the key to creating meaningful, lasting changes.

Today, those coming to Buddhism for the first time are often in their twenties. As a friend observed recently: their first memories are of 9/11. Then came climate collapse. And now the pandemic. Do you have any advice for young people today? Be part of the solution to our world’s challenges, in whatever way suits you best. Be honest, work hard, and be true to yourself. Hard work will serve you well. Don’t be fooled by the allure of an easy path. Only toil gives rise to solid character.

Devote yourself to becoming the type of person who can always bring out the goodness in yourself and others. That’s how to create real value, satisfaction, and sweetness in life.

The post Absolutely, Indestructibly Happy appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

There’s a moment in Indian Matchmaking—the hit Netflix reality show that centers on a Mumbai-based matchmaker who works with clients in both the United States and India—that led many Buddhist viewers to take notice.

For those who have yet to dive into the buzzy docuseries, the heart of Indian Matchmaking is Sima Taparia, the 50-something matchmaker who is devoted to finding the perfect rishta (match) for her clients. In episode three, viewers learn Sima’s dedication even extends to meditating over how best to help them find love. The camera pans to Sima as she sits at her personal prayer area and recites “Nam-myoho-renge-kyo,” which is the title of the Lotus Sutra and the bedrock chant for followers of the Nichiren Buddhist organization Soka Gakkai International (SGI) worldwide.

In many ways, the embrace of SGI by Sima is reflective of the growth of the organization in India, especially among the country’s thriving professional class. While SGI’s Indian affiliate Bharat Soka Gakkai only had 1,000 members when it opened 1992, membership has skyrocketed in the decades since. The group now claims to  have over 200,000 members in over 300 cities and towns across India. 

Much of that growth can be attributed to SGI’s boom in popularity at the beginning of the millennium. Soka Gakkai “is definitely Japan’s most successful religious export,” Levi McLaughlin, an expert on Soka Gakkai and a professor of religion and philosophy at North Carolina State University, told Tricycle. “And that is really saying something if you think about Zen, for example.”

As McLaughlin watched Sima meditate on the show, he was struck by several aspects of her practice, particularly the fact that she displayed an Indian statue of the Buddha alongside statues of Hindu deities like Shiva. (In keeping with Soka Gakkai tradition, the gohonzon, or mandala depicting the daimoku, was not photographed and instead appeared to be just off camera). “If you were to set up the calligraphic object of worship alongside the Hindu gods Shiva and Vishnu in Japan, people there would be quite shocked,” he said, adding that Nichiren Buddhists in India are known for blending local cultures with Buddhist principles.

Sima’s adoption of SGI practice also reflects the faith’s growing popularity in India, particularly among that nation’s burgeoning population of upper-middle-class professionals. “This is a very aspirational group of people, and Soka Gakkai appeals to the aspirational,” said McLaughlin. “One of the principles of Soka Gakkai is human revolution and the belief that through dedication to the practice one can achieve anything one desires to achieve.” Whereas Soka Gakkai is known as a religion of the poor in Japan—a history that dates back to the faith’s growth in the 1950s as Japan struggled to recover from World War II—the average SGI practitioner in India is decidedly economically ambitious. 

For Indian American SGI practitioners, watching Indian Matchmaking and seeing Sima chant the daimoku was particularly poignant. “The show has both its positives and things that I don’t necessarily agree with, but they are all part of our society,” viewer and SGI practitioner Shraddha Wadhwani told Tricycle. Critics of the show note that Indian Matchmaking glosses over how matchmaking can serve to uphold India’s caste system and how the insistence of many families that potential brides be “fair” continues to normalize the rampant colorism many Indians experience.

Despite the criticism, Wadhwani was heartened to see a familiar custom on screen. “I don’t think the concept of matchmaking is foreign to Indians and honestly, any marriage is arranged right?” she remarked. “You usually either meet the person through friends or family.”

Wadhwani was particularly taken by the fact that Sima not only chanted to support her personal goals but also to receive guidance about how best to serve her clients—many of whom had opened up to her about their past relationship struggles and their dreams for the future. “I liked the fact that she used meditation to chant about her clients, that is a very integral part of SGI and Nichiren Buddhism,” noted Wadhwani. “The practice is meant to make us more compassionate and promote the happiness of both self and others.”

Wadhwani also understood how Soka Gakkai could provide much-needed guidance for both a matchmaker and someone going through the process of finding a spouse. Wadhwani now lives in New Jersey, but she first came to Soka Gakkai seven years ago when she was at a turning point in her life while still living in India. “When you chant, you tend to look at things at a deeper level,” said Wadhwani. “There was a phase in my life where things weren’t going well and made me realize some of the things that I needed to work on.”

That introspection is particularly important for those looking to get married, said Wadhwani, who got married herself two years ago at the age of 32. Searching for a spouse “is a high stress thing and the chanting helps you look beyond just finding a partner,” she said. “It prompts you to ask, ‘Why do you want to get married in the first place? What is it that you are seeking?’ That helps you focus on your goals.”

Watching Indian Matchmaking reminded SGI practitioner Meghna Damani of her own experiences as a young bride in 2002. Damani was surprised to discover that Sima also practiced Nichiren Buddhism, a practice that she herself started following after she struggled to adjust after her own marriage. In her debut documentary, Hearts Suspended, Damani detailed the struggles she and many other Indian wives experienced after arriving in the US on spousal visas that prohibited them from working. She was introduced to Soka Gakkai after she briefly separated from her husband and returned to Mumbai to work in advertising.

“My boss practiced Soka Gakkai, so the screensaver on my work computer was the chant,” she recalls. Her boss soon invited her to an SGI meeting. “It was incredible because the chanting itself really started giving me hope and made me start believing in myself,” Damani said. As she continued her practice, her fellow practitioners urged her to rejoin her husband in the US and to seek out the SGI community there.

Connecting with the Soka Gakkai community in New Jersey after she settled back into life in the States “was like finding an anchor,” she said. “It was realizing that home is not a physical place, it is a spiritual place within yourself.”

While Sima’s Buddhist practice may escape mainstream viewers of the show, SGI practitioners may see a hidden message in her commitment to Buddhism.

“As in all matters of the heart, we can get easily swayed. What the practice of Nichiren Buddhism teaches us that we create our own lives and destiny,” Damani explained. “As we transform, we attract the right partners into our lives.” 

The post The Hit Netflix Show <i>Indian Matchmaking</i> Has a Surprising Connection to Buddhism appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

I was born a nervous child. Nearly everything scared me: talking to strangers, the first day of school (every year), playing games on teams (in which one could be hurt or laughed at), learning to ride a bike, the crickets in our basement, and the sound of my own voice in a group. Each new experience would make me tremble and feel small, as if my success held the world together and my mistakes could make it come crashing down. Courage, I decided by 14, is something I was simply born without.

And so I got through school by finding myself in books. Usually, they were coming-of-age stories in which a heroine discovered strength she didn’t know she had through an effort to care for others, like Dicey Tillerman from Cynthia Voigt’s Tillerman Cycle or Jessie Alden from Gertrude Chandler Warner’s The Boxcar Children series.

These characters grew up to lead lives larger than they’d ever imagined for themselves, and this is something I’ve always longed for. It’s the reason I began practicing Soka Gakkai International (SGI) Nichiren Buddhism with my family, who, beginning with my mother, left their Sikh and Hindu roots before I was born to pursue a fresh path to enlightenment. And it’s the reason I am a disciple of Daisaku Ikeda, the SGI leader, a prolific writer, peace activist, and my mentor.

The mentor-disciple relationship in Buddhism is nearly as old as Buddhism itself. More than 2,500 years ago, the Buddha’s compassionate commitment to teach people how to free themselves from suffering, coupled with the spirit of his disciples to learn, apply, and spread these teachings, led to the foundation of the tradition as we know it today.

In SGI Nichiren Buddhism, the purpose of the mentor-disciple relationship is to achieve a life-state of unshakable happiness, a unity of spirit that allows both parties to manifest their inherent power. In the “Expedient Means” chapter of the Lotus Sutra, the Buddha Shakyamuni says to his disciple Shariputra: “At the start I took a vow, hoping to make all persons equal to me, without any distinction between us, and what I long ago hoped for has now been fulfilled.”

Of this passage, Ikeda writes: “The Buddha vows to elevate all people to the same state of life as his own. This is the spirit to raise capable people, to enable people to develop to their fullest potential. This is also the spirit underlying the mentor-disciple relationship.”

Growing up in suburbia in the early 2000s did not make me inclined to follow anyone, though that’s what I inadvertently ended up doing. My one attempt at the school stage landed me a role as one of Captain Hook’s assistant pirates in Peter Pan. After that, I joined a backstage makeup crew, assisting other makeup artists even though there was no hierarchy. Eventually, I found freedom in walking a path away from people, usually just far enough that I could see the fun without having to participate in it. As you might expect, this led to a growth in both my curiosity about people’s behavior and my loneliness. By the time I was 16, I needed a new strategy in life.

At first, practicing Buddhism was my way to avoid the mainstream path in a fairly homogeneous community. But when I started chanting “Nam-myoho-renge-kyo”—the title of the Lotus Sutra—something happened. Nichiren Buddhists believe this chant, known as daimoku, is a means of activating our inherent courage, wisdom, and compassion. I didn’t begin thinking it made any sense, but I was curious enough to try it because the warmth of the SGI members I knew inspired me, and I had nothing to lose. To my surprise, I found it to be true. After chanting for a few minutes a day before school, I felt a surge of energy and calm at the same time, as if a long-dormant voice woke up inside of me, diminishing my anxieties and igniting creativity. I started carrying a notebook everywhere I went, and I spent my math and science classes (which I hated) writing stories and poems. I started forming a thesis on life. But most importantly, I wanted to talk to people. I wasn’t afraid of them or judgmental, as I had been, and I started making true, treasured friends, which is a big deal for a loner in high school. This led to a courage I’d never experienced before. It took many forms: more comfort in my own skin, which was hairier than that of most girls around me and something I had been bullied for; a more open heart with my own family; and to my surprise, a new passion, performing poetry aloud among those same peers from whom I’d once cowered. Without my thinking about it, my life just grew.

As I turned 21, then 25, and then 30, I learned to use my voice more effectively. I chanted my way through graduate school (with the occasional pep talk to myself in a bathroom mirror before an interview), became a bona fide journalist, and told stories I was proud of. Turns out, all those years of observation were useful to people, and with the courage problem solved, I could make a career of it.

But courage was not the only thing I gained. In addition to chanting and participating in my neighborhood SGI community, I started reading Ikeda. And through his words, I started gaining an understanding of the purpose of my life.

In a book titled Discussions on Youth, he writes, “Even if you think you’re hopeless and incapable, I know you’re not. I have not the slightest doubt that each of you has a mission. Though others may disparage you, please know that I respect you. I believe in you. No matter what circumstances you now face, I have absolute confidence that a wonderful future awaits you.”

The first time I read these words was while sitting on the floor of my childhood bedroom in my parents’ house at the age of 21. I had just graduated from college, ended a relationship, and been rejected from every job I’d applied to. I felt small Jihii reemerge, the one who longed for a bigger, better life but was stuck beginning this one.

But in that moment, reading Ikeda’s words reminded me that one could create the life one wanted, because we are made of buddhahood. This is when I decided I wanted Ikeda to be my mentor—in other words, I wanted to be his disciple, and not just a member of a Buddhist organization that he leads. I now call this my prime point in Buddhist faith—a point to which I can always return to remember why I am doing what I am doing.

In SGI, there is no “process” of taking on a mentor. Simply put, because we study the writings of Ikeda so thoroughly, we appreciate him as a mentor. Whether or not we consider ourselves disciples is an individual decision. I do, because I want to see how far Buddhism can take me in this lifetime.

In SGI, we call Ikeda “sensei” which means “teacher” or “mentor.” But Ikeda calls himself a disciple.

At 19, he was lost like me, seeking to make sense of life’s purpose and navigate the misery of Japan after World War II. Ikeda attended his first Buddhist discussion meeting in 1947, and he decided then that Josei Toda, the second president of SGI, would be his mentor.

For the two of them, the next 11 years were a joint struggle to spread Nichiren Buddhism in a Japanese society racked by poverty and illness—against the tyranny of authority, human frailty and sickness, social ridicule, financial hardship, and plotted schemes to thwart their efforts to awaken the people of Japan to their power by those who were afraid of losing their own power.

What I respect most about him is that he has never claimed to be greater than anyone else; in fact, he has perhaps been hardest on himself, striving for constant self-improvement to diligently put into practice everything his teacher taught him. This allowed him to cultivate his own “greater self,” an internal potential for courage, compassion and wisdom that Nichiren Buddhists believe all people have and can tap into through Bodhisattva practice in the harsh realities of the secular world.

Ikeda writes, “The path of mentor and disciple is strict and demanding; it is itself the great path of human revolution and attaining Buddhahood in this lifetime . . . I also dedicated myself wholeheartedly to Mr. Toda, protected him, and fulfilled my mission as his disciple. I actualized all of the goals he set.”

Before Toda died in 1958, Ikeda had led an enormous grassroots effort to raise thousands of successors committed to the goal of global peace based on living and propagating the Lotus Sutra. In 1960, because it had been Toda’s unrealized dream, he took this effort across the ocean, to the United States, and from there throughout the world.

And in 1983, my mother, a young woman in India seeking a deeper purpose to life, began chanting “Nam-myoho-renge-kyo.” Six years later, I was born.

There are a few things that happen when you take on a mentor. In the beginning, you feel small and in awe, soaking in every bit of wisdom your teacher has to offer. If you are a serious disciple, you aspire to join their ranks and so you practice what they show you. Eventually, through some combination of your age and skill advancing, you do join their ranks. And in many cases, especially if both you and your mentor are not ruled by ego, you surpass them. Ikeda describes his experience as follows in an episode that he recounts in the New Human Revolution:

I also strove to make President Toda’s spirit my own and to be in rhythm with him. In doing so, I gradually began to find the confidence to tackle problems that had at first seemed daunting and even impossible. No matter how painful or difficult the situation, I felt courage and strength. And day by day, I was able to break through my own inner barriers. This was possible because I tapped into the great life force of President Toda. … Those who walk the path of mentor and disciple of kosen-rufu [world peace based on the propagation of Buddhism] will never find themselves at an impasse. Through experience, I have concluded that when you are completely united in spirit with your mentor, unlimited strength wells forth.

For Ikeda, this strength manifested itself in overcoming personal hardship, such as a diagnosis of tuberculosis that was expected to end his life early, and hardships in the effort to spread Buddhism, such as ridicule, criticism, and false accusations. Josei Toda had similarly been imprisoned alongside his own mentor, Tsunesaburo Makiguchi (the founder and first president of the Soka Gakkai) for fighting for his beliefs as a religious reformer.

In essence, Makiguchi, Toda, and Ikeda, who are seen as the three eternal mentors of the SGI, successively developed their respective mentor’s vision of enabling all human beings to attain enlightenment through Buddhist practice, and they worked hard to both modernize and spread this teaching. (Today, there are over 12 million members of the lay organization throughout the world.) The solid foundation they laid—and Ikeda Sensei’s thorough documentation of how they did it in the Human Revolution and New Human Revolution book series— has empowered me to contribute to this ongoing Buddhist movement as a young woman in the 21st century, while also striving to build a life based on my best self.

If I apply my practice to overcome my self-doubt, meet my goals, and enjoy each moment of my life, then I can teach other people to do the same, thereby achieving Ikeda’s goal. This is where the oneness of mentor-disciple comes in. Over time there ceases to be a difference between my goal and Ikeda’s, because they are one. Each time I reach an impasse in life—be it an obstacle to my dreams or the inevitable challenges life throws at just about everyone, like illness, pain in relationships, financial hardship—I can chant, seek my mentor through his writings, and tap into a life force that allows me to break through.

This strength of growing, of never feeling stuck, brings me joy, while at the same time I’m helping other people find happiness through daily dialogue, study, and chanting together. Because of this reciprocity, the movement for individual enlightenment through collective effort has grown and continues to grow while maintaining the conviction that its members are equal. And at scale, a force of individuals who are able to consistently tap into this life force and take courageous, compassionate action is able to overturn societal suffering and injustice in crucial moments. This is kosen-rufu, as I see it.

In this way, the oneness of mentor and disciple allows each individual to transcend what they would not have been capable of alone in a single lifetime.

When people ask me why I have chosen to live my life together with the Soka Gakkai, I say that when I die, I would rather look back knowing I have lived my life to its very limits by advancing what those who came before me began, in my own unique way. The alternative would be to start from scratch, pondering how to live and dabbling in a little of this and a little of that. At best, I might achieve some big personal goals without knowing whether my life has contributed in any way to the happiness of others, and at worst, I could end up nowhere in particular, or perpetuate systems based on what Buddhism describes as the three poisons—greed, anger, and foolishness—which I think we’ve seen enough of.

Through Ikeda’s example, I have learned that it is only a succession of united disciples inheriting the baton from their mentor who can make this great potential of the Lotus Sutra a reality, by opening hundreds and thousands of people to the greatness of their own life. This is possible through the simple, steady process of chanting, studying the behavior and the writings of those who have kept it alive, and teaching others to do the same, beginning with the person in front of us.

Another passage from Nichiren reads, “Blue dye comes from indigo, but when something is repeatedly dyed in it, the color is better than that of the indigo plant. The Lotus Sutra remains the same, but if you repeatedly strengthen your resolve, your color will be better than that of others, and you will receive more blessings than they do.”

The question now is where this spirit of oneness will take me. What will I accomplish in my lifetime, by living with the same heart as my mentor? How many other disciples will I practice with in his lifetime?

Ikeda once wrote, “‘Just as Mr. Toda called out 55 years ago, I call out to all the youth who are my true successors: ‘My young friends, how will you accomplish kosen-rufu? What are the challenges that lie before you? Where and how will you fight and win?’”

I intend to win over my own self-doubt each day and challenge myself to care for the people around me to the best of my ability, both the successors of the Soka Gakkai and in society, which needs hopeful, courageous people more than ever.

And in doing so I will report to my mentor each day: “I have courage, I am happy, and I have won. No longer do I only read my way through life, but I write, too. Today, I have written another two pages—one of my story, in which the heroine discovers a strength larger than she had ever known; and one of ours, in which a mentor and disciple have together helped one more person begin to believe in the power of human life.” Just as he reports to his.

The post Why I Have a Mentor appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

“$100.00 reward. Ran away from the subscriber’s farm, near Washington, on the 11th of October, negro woman Sophia Gordon. . . . I will give the above reward, no matter where taken and secured in jail so that I get her again.”

So reads a typical ad for a runaway slave, featured in artist Aretha Busby’s installation Tolerably Black. She screen-prints the ads by hand onto cotton muslin and frames them in black shadow boxes or attaches them to hanging nooses, also handmade. The cotton is a reference to the industry for which many slaves labored. “They were giving their lives to the fabric,” Busby said, “and I wanted the fabric to give back to their memory.” The nooses are a reminder of what often became of those who ran away repeatedly.

With the project, Busby hopes to give meaning to the lives of the runaway slaves whom history has forgotten. Busby is herself a descendant of a runaway slave who made it to freedom in Canada. “These people were the foundation of my existence here,” she said.

It’s a history that not everyone is comfortable dealing with. As part of the installation, Busby dresses in period costume to interact with visitors, creating a space for open conversation that sometimes leads to pushback. Born into a family that practices in the Nichiren Buddhist organization Soka Gakkai International, she sees the dialogue, approached with a compassionate heart, as part of her Buddhist practice.

Tolerably Black was most recently shown at Brown University in November 2018. Busby has also presented it to elementary schools in New York and New Jersey, and at press time was planning presentations to coincide with Black History Month in February.

—Emma Varvaloucas, Executive Editor

How did Tolerably Black begin? I was trying to learn banjo. There was a Southern band I was interested in called the Carolina Chocolate Drops, and on their website they had a runaway slave ad that said “Looking for my wench.” We’ve all seen runaway slave ads before—I’d like to think so, anyway—but for some reason I had never read one with the same heart. Perhaps it was because I was trying to connect to this music at the time. I looked at it and thought about my great-great-great-great-grandmother, who was a runaway slave. What would her ad have looked like? It started me on a journey.

I started researching the ads and collecting them, and as I was doing that I began thinking that something needed to be done for the people in them. There’s no ending to any of their stories—were they caught? Were they hanged? Did they succeed at running away and live a happy, fulfilling life somewhere else? I wondered what the best way was to dignify their lives and their suffering.

Why is the project called Tolerably Black? There was an ad for someone named Alfred that struck me for a couple of reasons. One was that it only offers five dollars for him, ten dollars if he’s found further away. Then it gets into his physical description: “ . . . about 5 feet high, tolerably black.” “Tolerably black” stopped me in my tracks. What the hell does that mean? We know that this is a physical description—maybe this is just the best way a Caucasian person in 1844 can convey before photography what Alfred looked like. We might never know what “tolerably black” meant in 1844. But I know what “tolerably black” might mean today, in 2019. So I named the whole show that because of the questioning of our identities as people of color in the United States. What are the boundaries? At what point have we crossed over into where we aren’t “tolerably” black anymore— when we’re uncomfortably black? Do you know what I mean?

I think so, but can you explain? I believe what they’re implying here is that the darker your skin, the more offensive you were. That thinking has driven how we as people of color view ourselves, how people who are not of color view us, and from there, which opportunities have been afforded to us and which have been denied.

Those two words—tolerably black— seemed like the most important thing. When a black person reads the term they might have a certain thought; people who are not black will have a different one. Those thoughts are the things that we have to talk about, because this “tolerably blackness” is why we often are on different sides of an issue.

Related: Racism Is a Heart Disease

My Buddhist practice is about unity; it’s about coming together and not differentiating ourselves, about really understanding that we are all human beings, pursuing happiness. So in my view, the more we can share and talk about our feelings about why we believe we’re different, the better for everyone.

What kind of reactions have you been getting from the people who participate in the installation? Pretty much every reaction that you can imagine. A lot of the time people are afraid, and that manifests itself as fear but also as anger. And if you’re carrying around something shameful and something about my work ignites that, then you’re not going to receive it positively. That’s my understanding, and it occurs on both sides. For example, there were two women of color who came to an event at Brown University. They had a really big problem with the nooses. One shared that two of her ancestors were lynched, and she said to this day her family still won’t talk about it. And the other woman’s family had become sharecroppers after slavery; they still live on that same land. She thought the work was traumatizing. As much as she was uncomfortable, I was like, “Right on.” I want people to feel uncomfortable. Otherwise I’d be painting tulips, you know?

It’s an uncomfortable conversation for a lot of people, I’m sure. How do you navigate such fraught dialogue? The two women I mentioned who were so resistant—I felt for them. I could see they were trembling while they were talking to me. And I said, “That’s why we’re doing this.” Because if your family can’t talk about these things, you can bring it here; this is a safe space for it. By the end, those same two women didn’t want the event to end! The catering people came and cleaned up, and we were still there talking.

There’s a shame attached to all these stories that hinders people from sharing them. I want to do away with all the shame. I want everyone to feel proud. I want people of color to feel like we can wear our history like a badge of honor. I’m the descendant of slaves, which means that there were some resilient people in my lineage that made some very difficult choices so that I could be here today.

You also actively participate in the installation by dressing up. Does it affect you? There’s definitely an emotional toll to it. There’s a video we play in the installation that shows me and a friend running away. That day in the park, it took us five hours to shoot what was reduced to ten minutes of usable footage. It’s hot and buggy. I’m sweaty. The shoes and the hoop skirt are uncomfortable. And I’m thinking, what was it like for my great-great-great-great-grandmother when she left? You hear rustling in the grass, and you start to think about how everyone these slaves encountered could have been the person who resulted in your demise. And not only that, but they were running into the unknown. It’s not like there was Google Maps. You were just relying on the kindness of strangers and I don’t know what else.

It sounds like it really connects you with your fourth great-grandmother. I grew up with a girl whose dad had passed away when she was young. She shared with me that when he would take her to the park, there was one intersection where they would stop and wait to cross the street. When he passed away, going to the park together was one of the things that she missed the most. She said she would go, even until she was a teenager, to that intersection, and stand in the place where he stood, because it made her feel really close to him.

I feel like that’s the only analogy I have. I mean, clearly, I did not have a physical connection with my ancestors as she did with her dad. But there is this becoming them that happens when I dress up.

What is your perspective on freedom for people of color in the United States today? Has it been found? I think it can change from minute to minute. I would like to believe that life is a million times better. I mean, I can make my own choices now, right? But I do also feel that when you make choices that aren’t successful, as a person of color you’re judged more harshly. And it can also be more difficult for you to get yourself back on track. There’s the Christian expression “There but for the grace of God go I.” It’s not to say that it’s hopeless. I believe in hope and I believe that you can turn any situation around. But society isn’t super forgiving if you are a person of color.

Related: What the Buddha Taught Us About Race

You mentioned that your whole family converted to Buddhism at once. Of course, I have to ask about how that happened. Yes, when I was 8 or 9. It started with my uncle on my mom’s side. He encountered a practitioner of shakubuku, the word we use when someone shares the practice with you. I think he was trying to ask her out on a date, and she said, “I’ll go out with you, but you’ve got to come to this Buddhist meeting with me first.” He went and said he heard some things that were amazing that he shared with his four sisters. So, adding up them and their kids and so on, it comes to about 20 people.

Do you see any other connections between your Buddhist practice and this work? Regular discussion meetings are a part of SGI, so I’m very used to communicating with people from all walks of life. I grew up with all kinds of people coming to my house and chanting and so on. It’s something that I bring to the project: the idea that no matter what color you are, you can be a friend.

There is also an immense respect for history and legacy in our Buddhist practice. We are constantly studying and sharing a lot about the three founding presidents and what they endured. I don’t see persecution as a hindrance. I think that’s what might be the biggest disconnect for people when they look at the project. Like, “This is horrible. How could you show this to us and make us look at it?” Whereas in our Buddhist practice it’s that you go through things that are difficult to endure, and that’s the winning, sometimes. There is a feeling of perseverance, to keep pushing forward. “Never give up” is one of our mantras. I think that would be the one connection that I see, not only in the way that I’ve had to never give up in terms of presenting my work, but also the fact that my ancestors didn’t give up, either.

—Photographs by Michael Avedon

The post Tolerably Black appeared first on Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.

In “Ski. Climb. Write.” (Winter 2018), Emily Stifler Wolfe chronicled how the legendary climber and skier Dick Dorworth was transformed by his Zen practice. D. C. Risker considered the article part of an overplayed trend toward profiling extraordinary figures, writing, “The extreme case always seems in vogue. . . . Isn’t ordinary life supposed to be the way . . . especially in Zen?” Others found the article inspiring; @foreverantrim tweeted that the article was “simply fantastic.”

J. Sunara Sasser’s reflection on her experience in Soka Gakkai International as a black American, “Why Are There So Many Black Buddhists?” (tricycle.org, October 16, 2018), was hotly debated. Thomas Ellis was glad that there is “a sect with growing popularity that is committed to challenging racism and oppression in all its forms.” Others argued that Buddhists should strive to be color-blind. Joseph Anderson wrote: “The author’s attachment to race is something they will eventually have to overcome if they are to continue forward in Buddhist teachings.” “Operaman” criticized any pretense at color blindness, writing that “some of the comments on this thread reflect why American sanghas can seem unwelcoming to black people,” and noting he was sad to see others “judge the author . . . rather than showing compassion for challenges that black Americans must live with for no reason other than the color of their skin . . . When a sangha is overwhelmingly of one race or one class in the midst of a diverse community, it is fair to wonder whether it is the sangha, and not the uncomfortable person of color, that has an attachment that might bear further reflection.”

“The One Pure Dharma” (Winter 2018) by Judith Hertog took a deep dive into the controversial and rapidly expanding New Kadampa Tradition (NKT) and its leader, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso. Many readers were critical of the NKT, while some NKT members criticized the article’s direction: Lesly Weiner says she has been “happily practicing within the NKT for 17 years,” and Joan Boccafola noted that the article lacked the voices of “those of us who are very happy being Kadampas.” Reader “Giankar” saw value in the NKT’s focus on purity, writing that the school “just stresses the importance of following one practice sincerely, without making a New Age salad of half-digested practices.” Some former NKT members sang another tune: Pete Woods described having felt “manipulated” when attending an NKT center, and “Peace 2 all” expressed fear that “I would have lost myself to the NKT” if not for “the brave people that have spoken out about their experience.”

Following Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche’s Facebook letter of admiration and support for Aung San Suu Kyi, Burmese Buddhist activist Maung Zarni and journalist Matthew Gindin’s response, “An Open Letter to Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche” (tricycle.org, November 28, 2018), elicited strong reactions. A number of readers applauded the article and expressed concern over the original letter. Barbara Delaney wrote, “[His] complete disregard for the plight of the Rohingya stood out and was deeply disappointing.” Academic and blogger Justin Whitaker is “very grateful” for the response to Dzongsar Khyentse, who “seems to have a profound misunderstanding of and even disdain for ‘the West.’” The Tibetan Feminist Collective called the response “a must-read.” Tenzin Peljor, owner of the blog Strug-gling with DiffiCult Issues, added: “Dharma realizations don’t make you an expert on cross-cultural issues or geopolitics.” But Sherab Jamtsho felt that Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse’s letter was intended to make readers engage in critical thinking and “deserves an open-minded introspection by the West, instead of paranoia about any criticism that comes their way.” “Jacaranda” questioned Aung San Suu Kyi’s ability to challenge the military’s treatment of the Rohingya without facing “death or persecution” and argued that her lying low “is the intelligent thing to do.”

The Question

How did you know you had found the right school or sangha for you?

When I read and listened to the Thai forest tradition teachings of Thanissaro Bhikkhu, they just made sense to me. I found answers to basic foundational questions that I had been wondering about all my life, and the connection grew from there.
—Mary Freeman Ericson

I haven’t yet.
—Kathleen Russell
Kathleen Russell, you aren’t alone, friend.
—David Hickerson

Once I met my teacher, I just knew. 🙏
—Bobby Devito

More important: how do you find a school or a sangha? I live in Alabama, and I have had a tough time finding a mentor locally.
—Karen McClure

For the next issue: 
The spiritual teacher Ram Dass keeps photos of both Barack Obama and Donald Trump on his altar. Do you incorporate an inspiring or challenging contemporary figure into your practice? Email editorial@tricycle.org.

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