Day 28 covers all of Chapter 24, Wonderful-Voice Bodhisattva, and concludes the Seventh Volume of the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.

Having last month covered the greeting Wonderful-Voice Bodhisattva delivers, it’s time to consider the road traveled to get here.

Thereupon Flower-Virtue Bodhisattva said to Sakyamuni Buddha:

World-Honored One! What root of good did this Wonderful-­Voice Bodhisattva plant and what kind of meritorious deeds did he do in order to obtain this supernatural power?

Sakyamuni Buddha said to Flower-Virtue Bodhisattva:

There was once a Buddha called Cloud-Thunder-Sound-King, the Tathagata, the Arhat, the Samyak-sambuddha. His world was called Appearance-Of-All-Worlds; and the kalpa in which he Lived, Gladly-Seen. [There lived] a Bodhisattva called Wonderful-­Voice [under that Buddha. The Bodhisattva] offered hundreds of thousands of kinds of music and eighty-four thousand patras of the seven treasures to Cloud-Thunder-Sound-King Buddha for twelve thousand years. Because of this, he was able to appear in the world of Pure-Flower-Star-King-Wisdom Buddha, and obtain supernatural power such as this.

Flower-Virtue! What do you think of this? Wonderful-Voice Bodhisattva who had offered the music and the jeweled bowls to Cloud-Thunder-Sound-King Buddha [at that time] was no one but this Wonderful-Voice Bodhisattva-mahasattva [whom you see here now].

Flower-Virtue! This Wonderful-Voice Bodhisattva already made offerings to innumerable Buddhas, attended on them, and planted the roots of virtue a long time ago. He also already saw hundreds of thousands of billions of nayutas of Buddhas, that is, a many Buddhas as there are sands in the River Ganges.

What roots of good could I grow if I put my faith to work?