Experienced chanting the daimoku 10,000 times 483 times: Buddhist Altar Revolution - Kokuu Zushi: We received an order for a Buddhist altar that touched lives

There were many realizations during the conversation.

A customer from Kanagawa Prefecture came to our store after emailing and calling us to say that they wanted to see the "Koku Zushi" in person. It was time to replace their Soka Buddhist altar, and this time they wanted to change it from a furniture-style altar to a more compact one. However, was that the right thought? They also had doubts about their own life. As we talked, we realized a lot of things.

The Koku Zushi was originally a custom-made Buddhist altar. The term Koku Zushi is a word I coined, and it refers to the spatial design inside the altar. It is not the exterior of the altar. The customer from Kanagawa this time first saw the Koku Zushi, and wondered how the light of the principal image was used to create the effect. He then removed the acrylic to see inside the altar.

I wanted to stage the Lotus Sutra's Kūkai ceremony inside the altar.

No customer had ever behaved like that before. Space design inside the shrine: I wanted to create a space that resembled the Lotus Sutra's Kukue ceremony. When I explained this, the customer commented, "The image certainly appears to be floating and three-dimensional."

The Buddhist altar is where the principal image is enshrined and where religious services and chanting are performed. The place where the principal image is enshrined within the Buddhist altar is called the "Zushi." The "Koku Zushi" is a spatial design within this Zushi to evoke the image of the Koku-e ceremony.

I have devised and developed the Koku Zushi, which is centered around the image of the Koku-e ceremony in which all Soka Gakkai members recite the daimoku to the Gohonzon, and which brilliantly reflects the life of Namu Myoho Renge Kyo. I have since made a series of compact Buddhist altars and furniture-style Buddhist altars.

About the Koku-e ceremony, religious practices and daimoku

We can go from the harsh reality of this world (Before Vulture Peak Assembly ) to the "world of faith" of the Vulture Peak Assembly through religious practice and chanting, and manifest our own Buddhahood. Then, we can return to the reality of this world (After Vulture Peak Assembly ), and live our lives accomplishing our own human revolution. I have excerpted this from the wisdom of the Lotus Sutra, which I have referred to as guidance that confirms that the act of practicing and chanting in front of the Gohonzon is taking action in the two places and three assemblies.

The following is an excerpt from Sensei's teachings on page 111 of The Wisdom of the Lotus Sutra (Vol. 1):

Honorary Chairman: The flow from the former Vulture Peak Society to the Koku-Kai to the later Vulture Peak Society is, so to speak, a flow of "reality → the world of enlightenment → reality." To be more precise, it is a flow of "reality before enlightenment → the world of enlightenment → reality after enlightenment."

We must break free from the chains of time and space, worldly desires, and the earthly reality of life and death, and reach a higher state of existence in the void where we can look down on all of this. From that higher place, we can clearly see that all suffering, worries, joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness are nothing more than the joys and sorrows of a small world, like a floating island.

The Daishonin states, "Realize that suffering is suffering and that pleasure is pleasure. Think of both suffering and pleasure and chant Nam-myoho-renge-kyo together. Isn't this the self-enjoyment of the Dharma?" (Gosho, p. 1143). This is the perspective from the void, the perspective of Buddhism, and the perspective of faith. The practice to achieve this is chanting.

The Daishonin states, "When Nichiren and others like him chant Namu Myoho Renge Kyo and dwell in faith, they dwell in the air, in the assembly of empty space" (Gosho, p. 740). The faith we practice in devotion and chant to the Gohonzon is directly connected to the "assembly of empty space." There is nothing more wonderful than this.

Toda Sensei often said that "there is no more sublime place in the daily lives of us ordinary people than this practice of religious practice and chanting." To rise to the void means to elevate our state of being through penetrating faith. This is the significance of the progression from "Former Vulture Peak Society to Koku-kai."

Saito: In that case, the subsequent flow of "Koku-e → Goryoshusan-e" represents a return to and challenge of the realities of life and society, based on the vitality of the Buddha realm gained through religious practice and chanting.

Honorary Chairman: That's right. Life is faith, and faith is life. The Lotus Sutra never strays from reality. Herein lies its greatness. Once you have lived in the Void, the reality that you should hate becomes reality that serves to prove your Buddhahood. Suffering and worries also serve to prove and strengthen your faith. Earthly desires are enlightenment. Turning poison into medicine.

Opening the Buddha realm from the polluted world of the nine realms, in other words, "the nine realms are the Buddha realm," can be said to be "the former Vulture Peak Society → the latter Vulture Peak Society." Now, when "the Buddha realm is the nine realms" (the former Vulture Peak Society → the latter Vulture Peak Society) is entered as a savior, the polluted nine realms of impure land become the land of eternal light illuminated by the Buddha realm. The impure land is the land of eternal light. At that time, this world of impermanence, suffering, selflessness, and impurity will become a world of permanence, happiness, self, and purity.

"Illuminated by the light of the five characters of the Mystic Law, they assume their inherent noble form," says Nichiren Daishonin (Gosho, p. 1243). The lives of the nine realms, symbolized by the characters in the Johon, are all illuminated by the Mystic Law, and ordinary people, while remaining ordinary, assume their supremely noble and original forms and shine forth in the real world. From reality to the Society of Space, and from the Society of Space to reality -- this back-and-forth process is the "track of human revolution."

There is a revolution in our state of being from small to big. Life should not be limited to the reality in front of us. We must aim for the ideal and go beyond reality.

On the other hand, we must not become detached from reality. If our feet are not on the ground, nothing will change. Many lives and many religions try to either "compromise and bury themselves" in the reality of society, or "isolate and escape to create a different world." Both of these are mistakes.