Japan
Japan is an island country in East Asia. Japan first appears in written
history in 57 AD, in China's Book of Later Han, as "the people of
Wa, formed from more than one hundred tribes." In the 3rd century,
according to China's Book of Wei, the most powerful kingdom in Japan was
called Yamataikoku. Japan in the 1945 atomic bombings of Hiroshima and
Nagasaki,which together killed about mostly civilians. Japan has 47 prefectures.
Each has an elected governor and legislature, and an administrative bureaucracy.
While there exist eight commonly defined regions of Japan, the prefecture
is the largest administrative subdivision. Japan, a country of islands,
extends along the eastern or Pacific coast of Asia. The main islands, running
from north to south, are Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu. Naha in
the Ryukyu archipelago is over 600 kilometers to the southwest of Kyushu.
In addition, about 3,000 smaller islands may be counted in the full extent
of the archipelago. Japan's official language is Japanese (Nihongo). Mount
Fuji 3776 meters high which is the highest mountain in Japan and is it
the iconic snow-topped volcano. Mt. Fuji has five lakes around Lake Kawaguchi,
Lake Yamanaka, Lake Sai, Lake Motosu and Lake Shoji. They, and nearby Lake
Ashi, provide excellent views of the mountain.
SGI practice Soka Gakkai's particular form of Nichiren Buddhism. Butsudan
Buddhist altar Nichiren taught that by chanting "Nam Myoho Renge Kyo"
to the Gohonzon. SGI practitioners call this process a "human revolution."
