The Third President

"When I die, I'm depending on you to continue my work."

Mr. Toda's last words echo like thunder through my mind. I couldn't possibly exchange for any price the continuous disciplined training I received from my master. Day after day I was up till late, the wheels in my mind spinning interminably. June 1958: appointed first executive director of the Soka Gakkai. Mountains of paper work and exhausting travels became part of my daily schedule in solidifying the Gakkai. The business of propagating the faith and expanding our organization saw me bustling from one end of the country to the other.

Hokkaido with its wind, moon and lush green. Sado Island floating on heavy seas. Then on to Kyoto, a city overflowing with poetic sentiment. Next, to Kyushu where huge mounds of waste around coal mines reminded me of the impoverishment of modem society. Toyohashi, Otsu, Fukui, Fukuchiyama, Gifu--all on a hurried five-day agenda. My endless forced march continued. Osaka, Nagoya, Sendai. . . each and every day a new opportunity.

In the process, a year passed. Another was about to pass when a troublesome problem arose for me. All around me people began asking me to become the third president of the Soka Gakkai. I repeatedly begged off.

In the end, however, I was steamrollered into it. In diary entries for those days I recorded some incidents experienced then.

March 30, 1960:	"Managing staff members all favorably inclined; they also say that the time is ripe, so I hear that they hope to appoint me the third president. Selfish as it may be, flatly decline. I'm weary."
April 9:	"Special board of directors meeting at headquarters till late. Contacted about decision to assume presidency; politely decline."
April 12:	"News of strong and unanimous wish to inaugurate me as third president. I decline."
By April 14 I was no longer able to refuse and so, with no choice in the matter, I ultimately came around to consenting. In my diary entry for the fourteenth I wrote:
	"End of resistance. No choice. No choice at all."

I was inaugurated as the third president of the Soka Gakkai on May 3, 1960. Ceremonies were held in the Nihon University auditorium in Ryogoku, Tokyo. I disliked becoming president beyond words, but once having been appointed, I had to carry out all my duties. I wondered, however, how long my health might hold out. At the inauguration, Reverend Hosoi Nittatsu, the 66th high priest of the Nichiren Shoshu head temple, offered his congratulations and told me of his great expectations. The duties laid on the shoulders of a person only thirty-two at the time were too, too onerous.

That night when I returned to my home in Kobayashi, Ohta Ward, I expected that my wife would have cooked a modest festive meal of red rice or something of the sort. She hadn't prepared a thing. Her excuse was,

"I figured that from today on you wouldn't be home any more. Today is the funeral of the Ikeda family."

For my wife and three sons, May 3 might actually have been a "funeral." Till sometime before my inauguration, I had been able to take my wife out to a movie or the like only once every other month. After becoming president, however, even that became impossible. With this and that to be done, I simply lacked opportunity to relax at home like those who figure that one of life's joys is to come back from work in the evening, take a bath, and eat supper surrounded by one's family. I had left the training of my three sons to my wife. Fortunately, it appeared that she was bringing up all three to be good boys.

Once I brought back from Kyoto a small samurai helmet as a souvenir for my oldest son. Every year at Sekku, the Boys' Festival, they bring out that toy helmet and display it in our home. The fact of the matter is that the children grew up without really knowing their father, who tended not to be home much of the time.

In spite of this situation, one incident made me feel quite proud. Once when my oldest son was kindergarten age, my mother-in-law asked him as they walked along the street,

"Who do you like the best at home?"

Since he was Grandma's boy, she had apparently put the question to him with a good deal of confidence in his answer. Nevertheless he said, "Daddy." And to the question, "And then who?" he answered, "Mommy." Finally, third in line, he said, "Gramma." I understand that my mother-in-law was terribly mortified over his preferences, for she pampered him and looked after him from morning till night.

At the present time, my two older sons are in college and the youngest is going to high school. My educational principle is to respect their individuality; it seems their mother's hope is that even if they never do anything noteworthy, they might at least keep their health.

I contributed to the 1974 New Year edition of a prominent woman's magazine an article titled,

"What I Commit to My Children."

I concluded the article with these words:

"Presently they'll fall in love and marry. When they do, I'll have just one thing to say to them: 'Don't worry about me. Just be sure to cherish your mother.'" I hope to make it up to her some day, for she has never stopped smiling despite having felt that May 3 was the "funeral of the Ikeda family."

---

Comments and more material

You will note that there are stylistic similarities to President Ikeda's essay on his resignation in 1978 from the Gakkai. What a woman his wife is!

Reproduced from this site: http://www.sgi.org/english quoted for the sake of commentary and education.

back to index

Hosted by www.Geocities.ws