Nichiren took Sadāparibhūta [Never-Despising Bodhisattva] as a personal model and strongly identified with him. First, there were obvious parallels in their practice. “Sadāparibhūta was a practitioner at the initial stage of rejoicing,” Nichiren wrote, “while I am an ordinary person at the level of verbal identity. He sowed the seeds of buddhahood with twenty-four characters, while I do so with just five characters [Myō-hō-ren-ge-kyō]. The age differs, but the buddhahood realized is exactly the same.” This passage suggests that Nichiren saw Sadāparibhūta, like himself, as someone at the initial stages of practice who was carrying out shakubuku, planting the seeds of buddhahood in the minds of people who had never before received them. He saw other similarities as well. Both Nichiren and Sadāparibhūta lived long after the passing of the respective buddhas of their age, in an era of decline when there was much hostility. And both persevered in the face of emnity, enabling their persecutors to form a “reverse connection” (J. gyakuen) with the Lotus Sūtra. In short, Sadāparibhūta was for Nichiren an exemplar of practice for the latter age, and in this sense, he wrote, “The heart of the practice of the Lotus Sūtra is found in the ‘Sadāparibhūta’ chapter.”