Day 26 concludes Chapter 21, The Supernatural Powers of the Tathāgatas, includes Chapter 22, Transmission, and introduces Chapter 23, The Previous Life of Medicine-King Bodhisattva.
We start with some supernatural powers found in the Lotus Sutra:
To sum up, all the teachings of the Tathagata, all the unhindered, supernatural powers of the Tathagata, all the treasury of the hidden core of the Tathagata, and all the profound achievements of the Tathagata are revealed and expounded explicitly in this sutra. Therefore, keep, read, recite, expound and copy this sutra, and act according to the teachings of it with all your hearts after my extinction!
Sakyamuni and his replicas from the ten directions gave credence to the sutra’s verity by extending their tongues to the Brahmā heaven.
The Buddhas joyfully display
Their immeasurable, supernattural powers
Because [the Bodhisattvas from underground]
[Vow to] keep this sutra after my extinction.
Seeing the Buddhas and causing them to rejoice:
Anyone who keeps this sutra
Will be able to see me. He also will be able to see
Many-Treasures Buddha,
[The Buddhas of] my replicas,
And the Bodhisattvas whom I have taught today.Anyone who keeps this sutra will be able to cause me to rejoice.
He also will be able to bring joy
To [the Buddhas of] my replicas
And also to Many-Treasures Buddha
who once passed away.
The light of understanding:
Anyone who understands why the Buddhas
expound [many] sutras,
Who knows the position [of this sutra
in the series of sutras],
And who expounds it after my extinction
According to its true meaning,
Will be able to eliminate the darkness
Of the living beings of the world where he walks about,
Just as the light of the sun and the moon
Eliminates all darkness.
He will be able to cause innumerable Bodhisattvas
To dwell finally in the One Vehicle.Therefore, the man of wisdom
Who hears the benefits of these merits
And who keeps this sutra after my extinction,
Will be able to attain
The enlightenment of the Buddha
Definitely and doubtlessly.
In the next chapter, Transmission, we begin with Sakyamuni putting his right hand simultaneously on the head of each the countless Bodhisattvas who emerged from underground, urging them to take up the sutra and expound it.
In the future, when you see good men or women who believe in the wisdom of the Tathagata, you should expound this Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma to them, and cause them to hear and know [this sutra] so that they may he able to obtain the wisdom of the Buddha. When you see anyone who does not receive [this sutra] by faith, you should show him some other profound teachings of mine, teach him, benefit him, and cause him to rejoice. When you do all this, you will be able to repay the favors given to you by the Buddhas.
In Chapter 23, The Previous Life of Medicine-King Bodhisattva, we learn of a Buddha named Sun-Moon-Pure-Bright-Virtue in a world without calamity and a Bodhisattva named Gladly-Seen-By-All-Beings who hears the Lotus Sutra from the Buddha and seeks “Buddhahood strenuously with all his heart for twelve thousand years until at last he obtained the samadhi by which he could transform himself into any other living being. Having obtained this samadhi, he had great joy.”
Gladly-Seen-By-All-Beings made supernatural offerings but in the end concluded these offerings were “less valuable than the offering of my own body.”
While Gladly-Seen-By-All-Beings’ flaming pyre that illumined “worlds numbering eight thousands of millions of times the number of the sands of the River Ganges” was certainly noteworthy, the all-consuming compassion shown by Nichiren is an example of “offering of my own body” more worthy of emulating.