November 18, 1930 is considered the day Soka Gakkai was founded. We
honor that day as the starting point of the modern movement to spread peace,
culture and education through Nichiren Buddhism.
What
happened that day, 84 years ago, was the publication of Mr
Makiguchi's book The System of Value-Creating Pedagogy. Mr Makiguchi
had wanted to publish a book for a number of years, but was unable
to, because he was a poor school principal without resources. It was
his protege, Josei Toda, who single handedly compiled, edited and
financed the publication of The System of Value-Creating Pedagogy .
Mr
Makiguchi identified three values – beauty, gain and goodness. He
thought that the purpose of education; schools, families, and
society's purpose in raising children, should be to teach how to
create values.
What do
we mean by values? Values are the underlying beliefs that influence
all our thoughts, words and behaviours. Our values lead to our
thoughts. Our thoughts lead to words, then to deeds, and have a
profound effect on our experience. Values are the things that are
important to us, what we prize, what we find precious.
What we
choose to value is important. I say choose because if we aren't
choosing what we do, if we simply react the same way over and over to
stimulus, hurting ourselves and others, then maybe we don't have
values. Maybe we have addictions. If what we find precious is
pathological, such as a magic ring, we may find ourselves in a lot of
trouble and create trouble for others.
The
value of beauty is that which appeals to our senses. Aesthetics.
Sights, hearing, taste, smell, touch. Daisaku Ikeda has said the
value of beauty indicates transforming reality, to change our
circumstances, and in so doing find meaning and purpose.
In our
society the value of beauty has been completely corrupted. Society
has created a fixed externalized model of beauty that all must adhere
to. In truth, beauty is what appeals to our senses. It is our
experience of beauty that matters. What is truly beautiful is the
ability to find meaning. But our society dictates standards of beauty
that become rigid rules. This is leading to the destruction of our
sense of personhood, our body-hood – a kind of daily, insidious,
incremental rape.
In 1993,
in Vancouver, Ikeda Sensei taught us that true beauty is found in
sincere and diligent striving. Beauty is in our earnest efforts, not
in externalized referents.
The
second value, gain – that which enhances the whole person not just
senses. Ikeda has identified the value of gain with changing our
destiny to enhance our own existence. You think gain, or benefit, is
getting what you want. But Sensei says true gain is the capacity to
transform ourselves and so enhance the totality of our self.
According
to the heretical philosophy of our times, gain lies only in the
accumulation of things, money and consumption. We think all problems
can be solved through consumption.
In 1993,
in Vancouver, Ikeda-Sensei taught us that true wealth is in living
with latitude and generosity. Having a little bit of room for others
is to be truly wealthy.
The
third value, goodness, means that which contributes to others well
being. Again, Sensei identifies the value of goodness with working
for others' well being,
regardless of our circumstances and regardless of their
circumstances.
In our
world goodness is only vaguely sensed as a judgemental moralizing.
All our behaviours are judged by nebulous sets of rules that shift
with the demands of the production/consumption society. Basic
activities, such as eating, working, exercising for example, are seen
as moral choices, rather than demands of nature.
The
three values of beauty, gain and goodness are not equal. Gain is
greater than beauty because gain enhances our entire life, not just
our senses. Goodness is greater than either beauty or gain because
goodness enhances the lives of others. However do not think this is a
ladder. You do not advance up a ladder from beauty to gain to
goodness. You have this mistaken belief that you can only act for
others once you have a basis of a strong self. You think you can only
share the greatness of the Mystic Law on your good days. You decide
who to give an experience based on who is not having trouble. This is
completely mistaken; there is no evidence for this position in the
Daishonin's Gosho or the guidance of the founders of our
organization. The fact is we experience beauty and gain only by
developing goodness. We experience beauty and gain only by
contributing to others. It is our actions for others that is the
cause for our own transformation.
I will
tell you a short story to emphasize my point that every person, no
matter their circumstances, no matter how low they appear to be, can
make a tremendous contribution to others well-being. This is the true
story of Philip Gonzales and Ginny. Philip is a big guy, a steam
fitter, a man's man. He had a horrible accident, was disabled, lost
his job, became depressed. He lost all hope and ultimately refused to
leave his apartment.
Philip
was exactly the kind of person that you think of as needing help,
powerless, a victim. Philip, you think, needs a whole lot of help,
before Philip should even think about helping others.
Philip
lost all his friends, except one. That friend said, Philip, you
should get a dog. Philip thought, I can't take care of myself, how
can I take care of a dog? Very reluctantly Philip went out of his
apartment. He went to the local shelter. Philip thought, I am a big
strong man who has lost my strength. I will look for my type of dog –
a big, strong dog, so when I go out no one will pick on the cripple.
Philip was still a macho dude.
Now,
there is one thing lower than a hopeless, powerless person. That is a
hopeless, powerless dog, waiting to be destroyed in a cage in a
shelter. We feel pity for them, we try to help them, we contribute to
the local humane society. We do not expect abandoned animals on their
last hours and minutes to help anyone, certainly not change the
world.
Philip
did not find his big strong macho man's dog. Instead Ginny found him.
Ginny was an abused, abandoned Schnauzer-husky mix. Ginny was neither
large nor strong. She was sick and about 48 hours from being
destroyed. The shelter people said, take Ginny for a walk. Philip
said, I don't walk so good. They said, Ginny will help you. So
Philip, who because of his disability did not walk very well, took
Ginny for a walk. Within a few steps he sensed something about Ginny,
some energy. Within seconds Phillip started feeling better, moving
better. Philip took sick, broken Ginny home.
Slowly
Ginny's love and caring started to work on Philip. Philip knew Ginny
was special and felt it his purpose to help Ginny. He became
healthier, stronger, more sociable.
Now the
story really begins. There is one thing lower than an abandoned,
sick, abused dog – feral cats. Cats left on the street to return to
their wild state. We despise them as a society and fear them when we
meet them.
One
night Philip and Ginny were walking when Ginny found an abandoned,
feral cat. Philip thought, this is not going to go well, someone is
going to get hurt. The cat and Ginny did not fight. Ginny started
licking and caring for the cat. Ginny, the dog, acted like the cat's
mother.
Ginny
and Philip started taking care of feral cats. They went out, night
after night. They rehabilitated abandoned cats and found homes for
them. Ginny loved cats, no matter how damaged they were – blind,
legless, deaf, sick. She not only rescued them from fields and
streets, but also from hard-to-find places such as drain pipes,
dumpsters, and the glove compartments of abandoned cars. Ginny, the
dog, was even named Cat of the Year, for her uncanny skill and
bravery in rescuing and caring for cats. One time at a construction
site Ginny threw herself against a vertical pipe, using her little
weight to topple it and reveal kittens trapped inside. Another time
she dug through a box of broken glass, ignoring her own cuts to find
an injured cat inside.
Ginny
finally died in 2005 after rescuing over 8 hundred cats.
What
happened to Philip? Philip has written two books about Ginny and has
established a foundation in her name to care for abandoned cats. He
gets up at 2 every morning to make the rounds of nineteen colonies he
and Ginny built in abandoned fields and alleys, where he feeds
approximately 320 cats. He has since adopted other dogs but none of
them have the slightest interest in caring for cats.
Moral of
my story, moral of the three values is not to get a dog. It's not to
get anything. It is to stop thinking about what you can get and start
thinking about what you can give.
The
three values have a social implication. When people work together to
create beauty, we call it culture. When we strive collectively to
teach how to truly gain, we have education. When goodness is a social
value, we achieve peace, the highest value of all. This collective
action of peace, culture and education is called the Soka Gakkai
International.
