How the practice of Nichiren Buddhism sustained Tina Turner for 50 years
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Saturday, May 27, 2023
Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō, Tricycle: The Buddhist Review, Partnership, Soka Gakkai International, Ike, Turner, Leadership, Nichiren Buddhism, Marriage, Record, Research, Ike & Tina Turner, Gohonzon, Divorce, Mahayana, Happiness Becomes You (book), Courage, SGI, Family, Empowerment, Lotus, Music, Management, Teahouse, Book, Interior design, Love, Buddhism, Nichiren, Tina Turner
What many did not know is that for the past 50 years Turner had practiced Soka Gakkai International Nichiren Buddhism.
Key Points:
- What many did not know is that for the past 50 years Turner had practiced Soka Gakkai International Nichiren Buddhism.
- As a scholar of Buddhism in South Asia and in the U.S., I have closely studied the career of African American artists who practice Buddhism.
- Tina Turner, in particular, sought to teach Buddhism through her writings and later through her records.
Turner’s early religious life
- Her family was Baptist and worshipped at both Woodlawn Missionary Baptist Church and Spring Hill Baptist Church.
- As I found while doing research for my forthcoming book, “Dancing in My Dreams: A Spiritual Biography of Tina Turner,” Turner’s religious influences extended beyond the forms of Afro-Protestant institutional religion.
- In her memoir “Happiness Becomes You,” Turner describes the deep, mystical connection that her grandmother had to nature, which suggests that her grandmother was immersed in the more mystical strands of Black Southern religious culture.
Introduction to Buddhism
- Turner was introduced to the teachings of Nichiren Buddhism in 1973.
- Nichiren Buddhism is based on the teachings of Nichiren, a Buddhist monk who lived during the 13th century in Japan.
How Nichiren Buddhism was popularized
- As these members spoke primarily Japanese and were geographically spread out, they initially had limited success in their efforts to propagate Nichiren Buddhism in the U.S. That changed in 1960 when, under the leadership of the third Soka Gakkai president, Daisaku Ikeda, an American branch of the organization was formally established.
- With his guidance, they spread the basic Nichiren Buddhist practice of chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo before an inscribed scroll called the Gohonzon.
- It is the SGI Nichiren Buddhist understanding of personal empowerment and human revolution that seems to have initially attracted Tina Turner.
A resurgence powered by SGI Nichiren Buddhism
- After her divorce, Turner struggled as a solo artist before her well-known career resurgence with 1984’s “Private Dancer” album.
- Her practice would be chronicled in two autobiographies: the first, “I, Tina,” published in 1986; and a second, “My Love Story,” published in 2018.