Transformation Or Transgression

People don’t change. Leopard cannot change its spots, and a zebra doesn’t change its stripes.

But people do change; you can tame your inner leopard and paint new circles to cover the old stripes.

The black-and-white thinking permits us not to try. It helps us to be victims — subjects to external forces that we cannot control, let alone use for our good.

Religions throughout history have played the game with those who are in power. The ruling class loves religion which helps them to keep people under control.

The divine intervention, the word of God, or clever interpretation of his will have been powerful tools for those who want to shackle other people’s hands.

Modern Buddhism is different.

The ruling clan was immediately offended when Nichiren Daishonin declared his teachings in 1253. He was twice exiled to certain death, and once, the shogun’s henchmen tried to behead him.

However, he was persistent and convincing and didn’t let his followers down. Instead, he and his teachings survived all the ordeals, threats and persecutions.

You can think of a backdrop of medieval Japan: ruled by a ruthless military government supported by priests of different religious sects to gain wealth and power over the laypeople who paid for the ruler’s and temple’s luxury with their lives and livelihoods. Women were not regarded as capable of anything but giving birth and pleasing men.

In that context, Nichiren had the guts to say that women are equal and everyone deserves to be happy and have decent lives. He didn’t propagate a gateway to heaven but a clear pathway for people to transform their lives, societies and, ultimately, the world.

He established a simple yet powerful method and tool to practice Buddhism as a layperson and not rely on any government or temple. No middlemen or women are needed, said Nichiren: it is up to each person to change their circumstances and gain happiness in this life and not in a distant lifetime with the heavenly BS that so many religious leaders promote.

Fast forward some 700 years. The Second World War was limping to the mass graves, and a new weapon brutally killed the people of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Millions of Jews, minorities and marginalised people were killed.

About two weeks before Japan surrendered, a thin and physically weak but mentally untouchable man was released from prison. Josei Toda was a school principal imprisoned as a thought criminal in 1943 because he opposed the war and was a vocal critic of the militaristic government. His mentor Tsunesaburo Makiguchi died in an icy cold prison cell in 1944 of malnutrition and relentless interrogations, and torture.

Josei Toda was alone. The world almost ended. Tokyo was in ruins. But his spirit and determination were burning with the hottest flame behind his skeletal appearance. He went home and was determined to change the world, starting with himself.

A few years later, when the organisation that Toda had revived had started to gain momentum, a young man entered one of the meetings Toda held. This 19-year-old teenager was Daisaku Ikeda.

Toda and Ikeda build a bond of a mentor and disciple. Toda’s experiences in prison and his unwavering loyalty to the teachings of Buddhism and his late mentor Mr Makiguchi were inspiring and helped the young Ikeda to move on. He was sick, and the doctors didn’t expect this young man to survive his tuberculosis. However, he did. And he still is with us as a respected Buddhist philosopher and leader at the age of 94.

To pay the debt of gratitude to his mentor Josei Toda, Ikeda started to write the novel The Human Revolution on the second of December 1964. It was a chronicle of the brilliant life of Josei Toda and how he managed to transform his life and that of millions of others towards happiness, beauty and gain.

In the introduction, Ikeda wrote these words:

A great human revolution in just a single individual will help achieve a change in the destiny of a nation and, further, will enable a change in the destiny of all humankind.

The Human Revolution has become a term that millions of SGI-Nichiren Buddhists use to describe their journey towards fulfilment and happiness in this life.

It is the way to transform even the most terrible circumstances into a source of hope, energy and happiness. It starts from within without any external authorities. It is a journey of our own life by building a stronghold of respect and sanctity of life as our foundation. It is the inner yardstick of our progress on that journey.

Now more than ever, we need a life philosophy and faith that allows us to be free, equal, productive, and progressive members of society.

History tells us that it will repeat itself if we don’t learn from our mistakes first. It also tells us that a change implemented by external forces will not last. All empires that are based on brutal force and suppression have, in the end, failed.

Nelson Mandela was in prison for 27 years, but he survived because he transformed his life from hate and revenge into a force of good. Josei Toda did the same, and Daisaku Ikeda has built a global organisation and lay movement for peace, culture and education.

A human revolution is possible. There is hope. There are opportunities. There is always a way if we believe that our inner change is where we need to start.

I still practice Buddhism every day: I am making my human revolution.

I am taming my leopard and painting the stripes of my personality to be the art of my lived life experiences. Some of the stripes you are reading now. And there is more to come.