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13. Does the Gohonzon Need
an Eye-opening Ceremony? |
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Kryssi Staikidis
New York City
Nichiren Shoshu has made the claim that the Nichikan-transcribed
Gohonzon that the SGI issues is counterfeit, because the
high priest has not performed an eye-opening ceremony
upon them. How should we view this claim?
After excommunicating the SGI in November 1991, Nichiren
Shoshu stopped issuing Gohonzon to SGI members. However,
Nichiren Daishonin inscribed the Gohonzon for the purpose
of saving all humanity. By using his authority to prevent
conferral of the Gohonzon on sincere believers, High Priest
Nikken goes against the Daishonin's intent.
Therefore, Sendo Narita, the chief priest of Joen-ji,
a temple that severed its ties to High Priest Nikken and
the head temple, Taiseki-ji, offered to make the Nichikan-transcribed
Gohonzon available to SGI members in 1993. Narita believed
that making the Gohonzon available to the harmonious body
of sincere practitioners was in accord with the Daishonin's
will, since his purpose in propagating the Mystic Law
was to enable all people to attain Buddhahood.
As to the question of the necessity of having the high
priest's permission to distribute the Gohonzon, it is
only recently that Nichiren Shoshu came up with this rule.
It has been the norm, for instance, for local priests
to bestow Gohonzon reproduced in their temples. Priests
other than the high priest often reproduced and issued
Gohonzon from their local temples.
Moreover, nowhere in his writings does the Daishonin indicate
that we need the high priest to empower the Gohonzon.
Nichiren Shoshu claims that the high priest must perform
an eye-opening ceremony on the Gohonzon; however, the
Daishonin makes it clear that the eye-opening takes place
nowhere but within our lives, when we open our own eyes
of the Buddha. He states, ‘Single-mindedly desiring
to see the Buddha' may be read as follows: single-mindedly
observing the Buddha, concentrating one's mind on seeing
the Buddha, and when looking at one's own mind, perceiving
that it is the Buddha (The Writings of Nichiren Daishonin,
pp. 389—90).
The Daishonin clarifies in his writings that the eye-opening
ceremony was simply a formality passed down in provisional
Buddhist teachings and is not part of the original spirit
of Buddhism. It is one's faith in the Lotus Sutra, the
Gohonzon, that brings forth Buddhahood in our lives. As
he states, When we revere Myoho-renge-kyo inherent in
our own life as the object of devotion, the Buddha nature
within us is summoned forth and manifested by our chanting
of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo (WND, 887).
It is not a high priest, nor his sanction, nor his capacity
to perform an eye-opening ceremony that gives a Gohonzon
the power to work. As the Daishonin admonishes, Even though
you chant and believe in Myoho-renge-kyo, if you think
the Law is outside yourself, you are embracing not the
Mystic Law but an inferior teaching (WND, 3).
The magnitude of tremendous benefit that SGI members have
received from our practice to the Nichikan-transcribed
Gohonzon is actual proof that we are putting these teachings
into practice.
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(Originally published in the World
Tribune, Oct. 19, 2001)
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