135
“Yes, I went to the local police. I didn’t tell them about Eri, but I did say that I had
been unable to get in touch with my friends inside for a long time and I feared they
were possibly being held against their will. At
the time, they said there was no
thing
they could do. The Sakigake compound was private property, and without clear
evidence that criminal activity had taken place there, they were unable to set foot
inside. I kept after them, but they wouldn’t listen to me. And then, after 1979, it
became truly impossible to mount a criminal investigation inside Sakigake.”
“Something happened in 1979?” Tengo asked.
“That was the year that Sakigake was granted official recognition as a religion.”
Tengo was astounded. “A religion?!”
“I know. It’s incredible. Sakigake was designated a ‘Religious Juridical Person’
under the Religious Corporation Law. The governor of Yamanashi Prefecture
officially granted the title. Once it had the ‘Religious Juridical Person’ label, Sakigake
became virtually immune to any criminal investigation by the police. Such a thing
would be a violation of the freedom of religious belief guaranteed by the Constitution.
The Prefectural Police couldn’t touch them.
“I myself was astounded when I heard about this from the police. I couldn’t
believe it at first. Even after they showed it to me in writing and I saw it with my own
eyes, I had trouble believing it could be true. Fukada was one of my oldest friends. I
knew
him—his character, his personality. As a cultural anthropologist, my ties with
religion were by no means shallow. Unlike me, though, Fukada was a totally political
being who approached everything with logic and reason. He had, if anything, a
visceral disgust for religion. There was no way he would ever accept a ‘Religious
Juridical Person’ designation even if he had strategic reasons for doing so.”
“Obtaining such a designation couldn’t be very easy, either, I would think.”
“That’s
not necessarily the case,” the Professor said. “True, you have to go through
a lot of screenings and red tape, but if you pull the right political strings, you can clear
such hurdles fairly easily. Drawing distinctions between religions and cults has
always been a delicate business. There’s no hard and fast definition. Interpretation is
everything. And where there
is room for interpretation, there is always room for
political persuasion. Once you are certified to be a ‘Religious Juridical Person,’ you
can get preferential tax treatment and special legal protections.”
“In any case, Sakigake stopped being an ordinary agricultural commune and
became a religious organization—a frighteningly closed-off religious organization,”
Tengo ventured.
“Yes, a ‘new religion,’ ” the Professor said. “Or, to put it more bluntly, a cult.”
“I don’t get it,” Tengo said. “Something major must have occurred for them to
have undergone such a radical conversion.”
The Professor stared at the backs of his hands, which had a heavy growth of kinky
gray hair. “You’re right about that, of course,” he said. “I’ve been wondering about it
myself for a very long time. I’ve come up with all
sorts of possibilities, but no final
answers. What
could
have caused it to happen? But they’ve adopted a policy of such
total secrecy, it’s impossible to find out what is going on inside. And not only that,
Fukada, who used to be the leader of Sakigake, has never once publicly surfaced since
they underwent their conversion.”
136
“And meanwhile, the Akebono faction ceased to exist after their gun battle three
years ago,” Tengo said.
The Professor nodded. “Sakigake survived once they had cut themselves off from
Akebono, and now they’re steadily developing as a religion.”
“Which means the gunfight was
no great blow to Sakigake, I suppose.”
“Far from it,” the Professor said. “It was good advertising for them. They’re smart.
They know how to turn things to their best advantage. In any case, this all happened
after
Eri left Sakigake. As I said earlier, it has no direct connection with Eri.”
Tengo sensed that the Professor was hoping to change the subject. He asked him,
“Have you yourself read
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