This is another in a series of daily articles concerning Kishio Satomi's book, "Japanese Civilization; Its Significance and Realization; Nichirenism and the Japanese National Principles," which details the foundations of Chigaku Tanaka's interpretation of Nichiren Buddhism and Japan's role in the early 20th century.
Having previously discussed the Kaidan and the Daimoku, it’s time to consider Kishio Satomi’s take on the third of the Three Great Secret Dharmas, the Gohonzon.
Nichirenism and the Japanese National Principles, p77-78The Sacred Title was treated as the problem of a religious subject while the Supreme Being is going to be treated as a problem of a religious object. Every religion has its object for worship. In Nichirenism, with regard to this point, what kind of object is given?
First of all, we must know the meaning of the Supreme Being itself. Three meanings were ascribed to the Supreme Being in Nichirenism. Originally, the word Honzon was a compound noun which can be divided into Hon and Son (Zon is an euphonical change). Hon means Origin and Son means augustness or supremacy. The innate supreme substance is the first definition, the second is the radical adoration, and the third is the genuine or natural respect. All these are slightly different expressions of the Supreme Being and its aspects.
There are two kinds of Supreme Beings in general. The one has the abstract principle as its religious object, while the other has a concrete idea of personality or person itself as its object of worship. In this connection, Nichiren has both simultaneously. According to him, Buddha Shakyamuni is the only savior in this world, therefore we must have Him as our object of religious worship. The following quotation demonstrates it:
“Worship, in Japan and the world, the Buddha Shakyamuni, the revealer of the Honmon of the Hokekyo, as the Supreme Being ” (Works, p. 195).
On the other hand, he says:
“You shall have the Sacred Title of the Hokekyo as the Supreme Being ” (Works, p. 348).
Thus, he founded two kinds of the Supreme Being, the object of worship. In other words, these are the Buddha centric Supreme Being and the Law centric one.
For Satomi, the Mandala Gohonzon is the physical representation of the Supreme Being.
For all beings, gods and men, animals and plants, spirits and demons, he gave the right position in the Supreme Being, the Circle or the Mandala. All of them, without exception, are surrounding the Sacred Title of the center, in other words, all the beings from Buddha to Hell devoted themselves to the highest truth of the Sacred Title. The Sacred Title is nothing but the Buddha Shakyamuni’s true name, as well as it is our own inherent nature. Realization of true self through the Sacred Title according to the principle of the Mutual Participation is thus taught. Man or Buddha or God in the highest possible sense can be seen here with the true significance of life. …
Keeping this in view it will be easy to understand that Nichiren’s idea consisted in “Coincidencia oppositorum” and “Synthetic union.” According to him, all beings on the one side are a mass of lust, but nevertheless they are, on the other side, Buddha in nature or Buddha in substance. Therefore if they would self-awaken to their true value and strain every nerve to get near their intrinsic Buddhahood, significant lives would be established. For that reason he divided the Buddha into two kinds, viz. Buddha-in-Nature and Buddha-in-Realization. The former corresponds to normal man and the latter means Buddha himself. Besides, all beings from the Buddha to Hell or from man to all lower animate creatures are united in the highest principle, that is to say, Myohorengekyo. Thus, this Mandala is, indeed, the real form of the Real Suchness or the world or self or the class harmonization. [Nichiren], therefore, strongly advocated this Supreme Being in the absolute sense. He writes on the right side of the Supreme Being as under:
“This is the Great Mandala which has never before appeared in this world during these two thousand two hundred and twenty years since Buddha’s Decease.”
On the left side is written
“Having been condemned to die on the twelfth day of the ninth month, in the eighth year of Bunn-nei, but as I had, instead, been exiled later on to the distant Isle of Sado, on the eighth day of the seventh month, in the tenth year of the same, I, Nichiren, make this representation for the first time.”
Thus Nichiren made the Supreme Being in a perfectly graphical method, which is much more effective than the ordinary Buddha’s image or Buddha’s picture or an abstract heaven.
Nichirenism and the Japanese National Principles, p80-83
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