Na Mu Myo Ho Ren Ge Kyo
A Peace Pagoda containing the remains of Buddha Shakyamuni is under construction by the Nipponzan Myohoji of Bainbridge Island next to the Kitsap-Bangor Naval Submarine Base in Poulsbo, Washington. The pagoda is on the site of the Ground Zero Center for Nonviolent Action, a grassroots peace organization founded in 1977 to reject nuclear weapons and violence.
When completed in 2025, it will be the first pagoda on the West Coast and the third “non-violence” memorial in the United States, after Massachusetts and New York. The pagoda is uniquely located about one mile from the largest storage facility nuclear warheads on Earth. It is perhaps the only such strategically located stupa in the world.
Stupas (pagodas) began as mounds of earth. They were built up in layers of bricks, clay, stone, and in Japan, wood. A stupa would be built over the enshrined remains of Buddha and saints, sometimes far from where they lived or died, so that people could worship them even from a distance.
Construction of the Pacific Northwest Peace Pagoda began in 1980, but the onsite temple was destroyed by arsonists and the building permit was denied midway through construction. Kitsap County issued a second building permit in 2019, which was a miracle and a groundbreaking event. Once a new permit was granted, construction on the pagoda began immediately.
As of October, fabrication of the foundation, walls, and part of the dome have been completed. The concrete dome will soon be finished, ending the major construction efforts of 2024.
The pagoda is simple in form and adorned with several special artisan-created elements that make the Northwest Peace Pagoda truly unique. Artists are creating relief panels depicting the life of the Buddha, a limestone statue of the Buddha’s first sermon, and a sōrin, an ornate brass top spire crafted in Japan and sent by ship to Seattle. The central Buddha statue was recently completed by Massachusetts Buddhist sculptor Thomas Matsuda, while the three reliefs were created by local artist and Quaker Craig Jacobrown.
The project will enter the final stages of construction over the course of the next ten months, including installation of the spire and decorative box on the top, installation of the statue and reliefs depicting four scenes from the life of the Buddha, and the decoration of the exterior walls incorporating Art Deco.
Other than concrete pouring, construction has relied entirely on volunteers, including the project manager, and the service of local Americans. Material and spiritual support have also come from Japan. The Nipponzan Myohoji monks have no words other than gratitude and look forward to further support from many people.
The Significance of Pagodas and Ancient Indian King Ashoka
For the past 2,300 years, there has not been a single Buddhist country in Asia that did not have a pagoda. This includes Nepal, Thailand, China, Korea, Vietnam and Sri Lanka. After the Buddha’s nirvana, lay believers cremated his body, divided his remains (relics) into eight pieces, and built memorial towers (stupas) to house the remains.
According to legend, King Ashoka, the first king to unify India in the 3rd century BC, excavated the relics of these eight pagodas, built 84,000 pagodas throughout India, and distributed and enshrined the relics across the land.
What was the meaning behind this? King Ashoka was the initiator of the construction of pagodas and the greatest contributor to the spread of Buddhism. Ashoka Pillars, which were built alongside pagodas all over India, have his decrees inscribed in the oldest Prakrit script. The inscriptions are: (1) Do not kill any living thing, including animals; (2) Respect parents and elders and be polite; (3) Be considerate of the poor and always considerate of others; (4) Be tolerant of different beliefs and ideas; (5) Strive to live in peace and harmony.
By practicing these moral virtues, King Ashoka essentially advocated an ethical code of conduct that applies to everyone, regardless of religion. When he was young, King Ashoka indulged in war with neighboring countries, using all his tyranny, even killing his own relatives, including his brothers and family. Through fighting, the King eventually achieved unification. However, after seeing countless corpses and blood and listening to the sermon of an unknown monk, he is said to have changed his mind about war and became Buddhist.
His idealistic political ideas were unrealistic and after his death, his empire was destroyed by another general and India returned to a divided state, but many said, “King Ashoka is not dead.” Ahimsa (non-violence, no-killing) is at the core of ancient Indian religious teachings such as Jainism, which emerged at the same time as Buddhism, and this became the basis of King Ashoka’s vows for the latter half of his life. It can be said that Mahatma Gandhi inherited these teachings more than two millennia later. The center of the national flag of independent India contains the dharma wheel first presented on the Ashoka Pillar. After World War 2, India has been relatively neutral in the world and has continued to live out his political ideas to this day, despite its ups and downs.
The conclusion of World War II there was a notable development in the construction of peace pagodas in Japan. Rev. Fujii Nichidatsu, the founder of a Japanese Buddhist order, Nipponzan Myohoji, built a pagoda with the vow that the use of nuclear weapons and war would never be repeated in response to the experience of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. After that, peace pagodas were built one after another. It all started with three relics (smaller than any grains) given to Rev. Fujii Nichidatsu by Jawaharlal Nehru, the first Prime Minister of India.
Pagodas spread throughout Japan and other Asian countries, as well as Vienna, London, the east coast of North America, the Western world. Now there are over 80 stupas, with construction still ongoing in five places: Kathmandu, Nepal; Great Smoky Mt., Tennessee; Tamil Nadu, India; Kaohsiung, Taiwan and Poulsbo, Washington. The relics for the PNW pagoda were given by Rev. Gyangkaji, a monk from Kathmandu, Nepal, more than ten years ago. They are three grains and are currently kept in the altar of Nipponzan Myohoji temple in Bainbridge Island, waiting for the day when it will be enshrined next to Kitsap Base.
The world is facing uncontrollable global warming and the risk of plunging into all-out war, including nuclear war, and there is no shortage of reasons and things to be pessimistic about the future. It is precisely at this time that Buddhism is practiced, and I sincerely hope that this pagoda will be a catalyst for awakening everyone to their Buddha nature, one of the three thousand aspects of human nature that symbolically has been passed down through humanity. There have been quite a few difficulties in the construction, but I feel that it must be accomplished at all costs.
Rev. Senji Kanaeda, Nipponzan Myohoji Bainbridge Island Temple
