The buddha of the esoteric teachings is not the historical buddha Śākyamuni but the cosmic buddha who is timeless and omnipresent: all forms are his body, all sounds are his voice, and all thoughts are his mind, although the unenlightened do not realize this. Through the performance of the secretly transmitted “three mysteries” — the performing of mudrās or ritual gestures, the chanting of mantras, and the ritual use of mandalas — the esoteric adept was said to unite his body, speech, and mind with those of cosmic Buddha, thus “realizing buddhahood with this very body” (sokushin jōbutsu). Esoteric Buddhism contributed to the rise, in Japan’s medieval period, of the Tendai doctrine of original enlightenment (hongaku hōmon). According to this doctrine, buddhahood is not a distant goal but the true status of all things: the purpose of practice is not to “attain” buddhahood as a future aim but to realize that one is a buddha inherently. These developments all helped to shape the context in which Nichiren would read the Lotus Sūtra.