Great Construction

Way to Happiness

     The gravest problem of people in the world today, is how to attain happiness.
     Man is necessarily occupied with this thought from the cradle to the grave. Ironically enough, that which man is most anxious to know is usually most difficult to know. This problem is no exception to the rule. I am fortunate enough to know the answer to this problem. My knowledge is unerring because it is based on practical experience. The definition of fortune is not easy as it is so vague. One can not change one’s fortune. The only thing one can do is to leave one’s fortune to take its own course.
     It is very difficult even for the greatest man in the world to swallow his lot. As a result, the ardent desire for happiness is a stimulant to life, which makes one toil and struggle to earn money, or attain distinction through life, to no avail.
     There is nothing more contrary than human fortune, which is too elusive to catch. A chance to become happy must be seized at the instant it appears, otherwise it escapes.
     Through various experiences, I once felt as though I were being mocked by good fortune, but now I know I have been blessed with good fortune.
     This is very difficult to explain to non-church members, who are inclined to judge things superficially without looking into the core. When a person is not able to penetrate into the core of good fortune, he is unable to understand what fortune actually is.
     When man moves, it is not his body that moves of its own motivation, but his mind which moves the body. The same principle is applicable to fortune. The universe is composed of the phenomenal side and the invisible spiritual side. Such is the way in which God has created the universe. The spiritual side of the world moves the phenomenal or physical side of the world just as the mind moves the body. And in every case, the spiritual world precedes the phenomenal or real world.
     So, fortune follows the same rule; that is, one can become happy only when the spiritual side of oneself in the spiritual world has become happy. One’s happy condition in the spiritual world reflects upon the physical world to make one happy in this world.
     In the spiritual world, the class system is more strict and impartial than in this world. It is divided into three strata, the upper, middle and lower, each stratum being again subdivided into sixty divisions. Therefore, it has one hundred and eighty divisions in total. The upper stratum corresponds to heaven, the lower to hell, and the middle to purgatory, the condition of which is approximately the same with that of this world.
     This may be inconceivable to modern people. This fact, however, is unerring and has been revealed to me by God, and is based on my own thorough and long investigation into the relation between the spiritual world and the physical world. The numerous people who have become happy through having faith and practising my teaching based on this revelation proves the genuineness of the fact.
     The spiritual side of man resides in the spiritual world, whereas the physical side of man lives in this physical world. The spiritual side of man, or his soul, stays in one of the one hundred and eighty divisions, that is, he is spiritually domiciled in that position in the spiritual world. This spiritual domicile is not settled but always moving upward or downward. This movement influences man’s fortune to make him happier or unhappier. Man should, therefore, try to uplift his spiritual domicile as much as possible.
     The lower part of the spirit world is hell, of course, a pandemonium full of every kind of agony, a dark lightless world.
     The higher one’s soul goes, the better the condition becomes. The upper part is heavenly, peaceful and bright. An ideal world. The condition of the middle part is neither very good nor very bad.
     Thus, it is quite clear that to lift the position of one’s soul in the spirit world is basically the most important thing to become happy, when one’s domicile in the spiritual world is reflected upon one’s fortune in this world to make him happier or unhappier.
     There are some persons who, having succeeded in life and been envied by many, suddenly fell in their circumstances to their original condition in spite of their expectation in continuity of success. The cause of their fall is attributable to their too strong self-confidence, negligence of God and ignorance of the above-stated fact. Besides, those people are inclined to afflict others and attempt the impossible. In consequence, they may phenomenally succeed in life, but their souls are then already in hell. The condition of their souls in hell is reflected upon them in time, finally making their lot hellish by the law of “spirit preceding body”.
     Vicious deeds make one’s soul cloudy, whereas virtuous deeds make one’s soul pure enough to ascend upward. The secret to attain happiness is therefore, to avoid all vice, do good as far as one can, and thus try to make one’s soul as pure as possible.
     I affirm that this is the truth and that there is no other way to become truly happy. I know it is much easier to preach than to practise. There is one way, however, to make its practice easy—Faith.

Teachings of Meishu and Kyoshu, page 12, no date [1959?]