Great Construction

I Preach Truth

     Everyone must realize that that which I preach contains a meaning which is quite different from the hitherto accepted way of thinking. All so-called conventional views are widely known and scarcely need writing about here. Nevertheless, however skilfully such views may be presented, they are after all, only an adaptation from the originals and so a faint effort.
     We can not rate the merits too highly of the sages, and the wise and great men, who have lived from olden times, and have done good to the world through their teachings and views. Still we can not but admit that their utility has become less relative to the progress of the world. Hence a new viewpoint which can be useful in this new era has necessarily been born. This is what the modern people have a crying need for.
     Indeed, that which great religions in existence preach, must of course have had great significance for the people of the time when those religions were born, and their contents were suited to the cultural level of the time. But the actual state of the present tells us eloquently that they have not enough power to appeal to the people now that long years have elapsed since their birth. Furthermore, scholars and wise men have amended and distorted parts of what were originally preached by those religions.
     Thus one may say that existing religions have almost lost their power to save the world. Another problem is that religious classics and records are very difficult to understand. Most religions which are based on the teaching of a single founder, are divided into several sects, and in some religions, there exists a continuous conflict among those sects. Thus it is utterly impossible for those religions to give people a true philosophy.
     It is most important for religions in general to reform man’s mind through teaching of truth, as the intrinsic mission of religion in general is to embody truth. As a result of mistaken concepts of religion, social work has been thought to be an essential religious work, although actually it is only a secondary thing.
     Then arises the question of what truth is and the thoroughness of explanation is necessary, although there is nothing so simple and understandable as truth. That which is unintelligible and complicated is really far from truth. Truth is for example, the facts that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, or that one breathes and eats.
     It has been a wonder to me that truth has been considered very difficult to understand since olden times. One reasons is that there has never been anyone who could see truth in the real sense of the word. It is because this world has been in a nocturnal period.
     I was endowed with the greatest mission from God when I was more than forty years of age, and at the same time reached a stage of being able to see the truth. I have noticed that modern culture has committed too many errors after observing every phenomenon during this stage.
     Then, the fundamental condition of salvation should be to enlighten the ignorance of all the people of the world by clearly exposing the real state of affairs. In this sense, that which I advocate and carry out is quite different from what has conventionally been advocated and done, and so I break through the bond of tradition.
     As everyone sees, I explain all truth quite easily and simply, and as understandably as possible to illiterates as well as literates. One difficulty is, that the truth which I preach is prone to be mistaken as non-truth by people who find it difficult to discard the hitherto conventional way of thinking. This can not be helped as a temporal phenomena in a transitional period.
     However, the truth is truth and must of course gradually be understood as such by all in the course of time. Truth is such a thing. The unprecedented development of our religion proves the genuineness of these facts.

The Glory, Number 003, page 1, January 1, 1955