Sōka Gakkai

Sōka Gakkai (創価学会?, lit., "Value-Creation Society") and/or Sōka Gakkai International (SGI) is a lay Buddhist movement linking more than 12 million people around the world. Sōka gakkai members integrate their Buddhist practice into their daily lives, following the Lotus Sutra based teachings of Nichiren, a 13th-century Japanese Buddhist priest. It is a lay Buddhist movement within the school of Nichiren Buddhism and is being regarded as one of the largest Japanese new religions. Founded by educator Tsunesaburō Makiguchi in 1930, the organization was suppressed during World War II for its opposition to government-supported State Shintō, which should not be equated to Shintō. Makiguchi, Jōsei Toda, and other top Sōka Gakkai leaders were arrested and jailed in 1943 and charged as "thought criminals". In November 1944, Makiguchi died in prison of malnutrition at the age of 73. His companion Jōsei Toda was released in July 1945, and took responsibility for the organisation. In the following years he rebuilt the Sōka Gakkai membership from less than 3,000 families in 1951 to more than 750,000 before his death in 1958. The Sōka Gakkai International (SGI) currently consists of 84 constituent organizations and has 12 million members in 192 countries and territories worldwide. The SGI was founded on January 26, 1975 on the island of Guam by Daisaku Ikeda. The growth of its membership has been attributed in part to the organization's tradition of small group, neighborhood and local community discussion meetings.