Jikan wrote:Queequeg wrote:My impression about Soka University has been that they have been running from their Buddhist identity since opening in Aliso Viejo. They want to be a school emphasizing "Value Creation", not Buddha Dharma. Ikeda is celebrated, but Buddha makes only cameo appearances.
This is unfortunate.
It is. To be completely up front, though, I never attended and have not been in the SGI loop for a while. I recall asking someone a while back involved with the school admin why they didn't emphasize the Buddhist aspect more, and if I recall correctly, they said they wanted to be a mainstream liberal arts school. I don't think I said anything, but in my mind I was thinking, "There are so many great liberal arts schools in the U.S.; if I had a choice, I would choose so many others over SUA. The only thing that would get me interested in that place would be if they were more explicit in their Buddhist perspective." To me, its an unfortunate misdirection of resources - like so much of what SG does.
Apropos of Buddhism as pedagogy: B Ziporyn's take on Zhiyi in Being and Ambiguity intersects with (and largely supports) Queequeg's interpretation in an interesting way, if anyone's interested. I find it compelling.
Made it only half way through BandA but was very impressed and influenced by Evil and/or/as Good. BandA seemed to recycle large chunks of Ea/r/aGood. Do you know what Prof. Ziporyn is up to these days? I was wishing he would translate some Zhiyi and Zhanran, but looks like he's moved on from Tientai.