The Human Revolution (人間革命, Ningen Kakumei) is a roman à clef by Daisaku Ikeda published between 1964 and 1995 in a newspaper belonging to his Buddhist organization, Soka Gakkai.
It chronicles the efforts of Jōsei Toda, the second president of the Soka Gakkai, to construct this Buddhist organization upon his release from Sugamo Prison at the end of World War II.
It is inspired by epic novels, like Romance of the Three Kingdoms (in Chinese Sanguozhi, in Japanese Sangokushi), and the style of French romantics like Victor Hugo or Romain Rolland.
It is also used as a rite of passage for recruits, who have to read it entirely and "produce evidence of results (seiseki), either by converting one household to Soka Gakkai or securing one new subscription to Seikyō shinbun", explains scholar Levi McLaughlin; "The Gakkai thus regards mastery of the organization’s history, represented as Ike- da’s literary biography, as the true test of faithful adherence."
These volumes began with Ikeda's trip to organize the Soka Gakkai in the United States and Brazil in 1960, several months after he succeeded Toda as president.