Warning: Delicate material and concepts that may be offensive to some.
Ryuho Okawa is the founder of Happy Science, which is a new religion that is based on truth and unconditional love. Ryuho believes he is the reincarnation (for lack of a better word) of El Cantare, a consciousness on the same level as Jesus Christ and Abraham Lincoln that has the duty of spreading 'the law' to the universe. What Happy Science hopes to achieve is to bring a sort of Utopia to the world, eventually removing Hell.
I'm nearly at a loss for words. I read this book in the hopes of gaining some enlightening ideas that would help me personally further myself on my path. I can't argue with some of the theories presented in this book, but some of them are so outlandish that I have trouble rationalizing it. I'm not saying that anything said in this book is incorrect. I'm a firm believer that everyone has the right to their own religion as long as they've chosen it for their own. What I'm saying is that some of the ideas presented here don't make sense when I try to apply them alongside my own beliefs.
If you have firm religious beliefs, I strongly suggest you not pick up this book. I know several people who would be offended from page one. If you have an open mind, this might be a book for you. I can't say I suggest this religion for anyone, but you are responsible for choosing your own path, and it could be. Who am I to say? Either way, if you aren't offended by the thoughts presented in this book, it definitely is an entertaining read. You'll learn all about aliens from other planets here on earth, where we, as humans, were derived from as well as read interviews with four higher consciousnesses. An entertaining read, but definitely not what I was expecting.
If you think this book is outlandish, you should take a look at some of the others; not to mention the texts of some speeches delivered by Okawa in the past. He talks about ancient civilisations coming and going in the last 250,000 years like so many express elevators; most of them sank into the sea, as he predicts America will do in about 100 years - unless it doesn't. This "re-born Buddha" and "living God" claims that his "predictions" are subject to forces beyond his control which can cause them to turn out differently or even not happen at all; he's not much of a deity, it would seem. He also obviously has no idea about plate tectonics; the geophysical forces needed to make a landmass of any size sink into the ocean are tremendous. And these events take multiple hundreds of thousands of years to happen and leave traces when they do; nothing of that nature has happened in the last few million years – if it had, we would know of it.
ReplyDeleteI’ve read one or two of his books and they are little more than a mishmash of new-age ideas combined with bits and pieces of other religions, a selection of various mythologies, and fanciful retellings of segments of actual history, all under the umbrella of a re-worked version of Buddhism with Okawa cast as the main figure in all of them. His claim to be the re-born Buddha is evidence of just how far this con man will go to bilk money out of the gullible; the historical Buddha said he was not going to be re-born – ever! It’s just a cheap repackaging of the Jesus myth, which was itself taken from earlier stories; except, of course, Okawa claims the he was Jesus. Oh – and those past speeches I mentioned earlier? This “new messiah” is on record saying this – and I quote:-
"[i]n the 21st century, there will be no enemies for Leviathan [Japan]. It will slash throats of the old eagle and the exhausted red bear, and laugh at the aging Europe. It will use China as a slave and Korea as a prostitute."
This is taken directly from a speech he gave to his followers in 1991; doesn’t sound much like the source of peace and love here, does he? My advice is to save you money and leave this book and any others by Okawa in the remainder bin where they belong.