It is stated in the Lotus Sūtra, Chapter 11 that it is not so difficult to shoulder a load of hay and stay unburned in the fire of the kalpa of destruction at the end of the world as it is difficult to uphold this sūtra and expound it for even one person after the Buddha’s extinction. What I, Nichiren, have done and consequent persecutions of me fit perfectly in this scriptural statement. It is stated also in the sūtra, Chapter 13, that ignorant people will speak ill of us, abuse us, and threaten us with swords or sticks. The Buddha predicts in the 13th and 23rd chapters of the sūtra that a practicer of the Lotus Sūtra will appear in the fifth 500-year period after the Buddha’s extinction, and he will be spoken ill of, abused, threatened with swords and sticks, exiled or executed by ignorant people. If I were not here, the prediction made by Śākyamuni Buddha, the Buddha of Many Treasures and other Buddhas in all the worlds throughout the universe would be groundless.
Shingon Shoshū Imoku, Differences between the Lotus Sect and Other Sects Such as the True Word Sect, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 123
Sakyamuni Buddha is said to have expounded this sutra at two places and three assemblies. First it was preached at the assembly on Vulture Peak, next at the assembly held in the sky, and last again at the assembly on Vulture Peak. The spiritual significance of the two places and the three assemblies is as follows.
On receiving the teachings of the Buddha, at first we cannot understand them unless they are closely linked with our present actuality. The first preaching of the Lotus Sutra on the earth means that the Buddha first revealed his teachings based on actuality. This is the teaching of wisdom. Next, the preaching of the sutra in the sky, away from the earth, indicates the Buddha as the ideal that takes a step beyond actuality. This is possible through the absolute compassion shown by the Buddha. But his compassionate teaching is meaningless unless we demonstrate it in our actual lives. Therefore, the final preaching of the Lotus Sutra returns to actuality (the earth). As often mentioned in this book, the strange stories in the Lotus Sutra are not descriptions of some dreamlike world but contain well-reasoned spiritual significance.
Toward the end of the [Hotoge] verse passage, the Buddha declares that those who can uphold the Lotus Sūtra in a troubled age following his parinirvāṇa will be praised by all buddhas: they are courageous, persevering, and “are known as those who follow the rules of good conduct.” “The rules of good conduct” here refers to the precepts, the rules of moral discipline to be upheld by Buddhists. In Nichiren’s time, the significance of the precepts was hotly disputed. Hōnen had taught that birth in the Pure Land depends solely upon entrusting oneself to the power of Amitābha Buddha’s vow; whether one keeps or breaks the precepts has no bearing on one’s salvation. Others, such as the monk Eison (1201-1290), held that, precisely because the times were degenerate and adverse, strict observance of the precepts was more essential than ever. Nichiren, following this sūtra passage, maintained that upholding the Lotus Sūtra is itself keeping the precepts. The five characters of the daimoku, the heart of the Lotus Sūtra, he said, form the “all-encompassing wonderful precept” by which all buddhas realize their enlightenment. Nichiren generally endorsed the traditional Buddhist ethic of compassion and generosity, along with its moral principles that discourage such evils as killing, lying, theft, and sexual misconduct. However, he did not see following rules of conduct as a prerequisite to liberation in the age of the Final Dharma. Because the daimoku contains within itself all the countless practices and good acts of all past, present, and future buddhas, he taught, simply to chant it is to uphold the precepts. Nichiren also seems to have believed that this practice would foster upright conduct, for he claimed that “one who chants [the daimoku] as the Lotus Sūtra teaches will not have a crooked mind.
In the concluding verse section of [Chapter 11, Beholding the Stūpa of Treasures], now seated in midair within the jeweled stūpa beside Prabhūtaratna, Śākyamuni Buddha again stresses how difficult it will be to uphold the Lotus Sūtra after his passing, setting forth the analogy of what Nichiren summarized as the “nine easy and six difficult acts.” …
Nichiren read this passage as directly addressing his own circumstances and those of his followers, and he stressed that the sūtra was in fact speaking to them. For example, to a lay nun who had asked him a question about the sūtra, he wrote that her query itself was “a root of great good.” He continued: “Now in this Final Dharma age, those who ask about the meaning of even one phrase or verse of the Lotus Sūtra are rarer than those who can fling Mount Sumeru to the worlds of another quarter … or those who can uphold and preach countless other sūtras, causing the monastics and lay people who hear them to attain the six supernormal powers. The chapter called ‘A Jeweled Stūpa’ in the fourth fascicle of the Lotus Sūtra sets forth the important teaching of the six difficult and nine easy acts. Your posing a question about the Lotus Sūtra is among the six difficult acts. You should know thereby that, if you uphold the sūtra, you will become a buddha in your present body.”
[T]he Buddha points out the difficulties that we will have in perfectly receiving and keeping the Lotus Sutra, reading and reciting it, and expounding it. Though we must incessantly strive toward perfect practice, we have already understood some of the difficulties mentioned above. So we need not feel discouraged. The very fact that we actually study this sutra, remember it, and are ready to practice it within the limits of our ability bears witness to the possibility of our accomplishing such a difficult task. We should, rather, encourage each other in our practice in these difficult times so that all the buddhas will rejoice in us.
In the concluding verse section of this chapter, now seated in midair within the jeweled stūpa beside Prabhūtaratna, Śākyamuni Buddha again stresses how difficult it will be to uphold the Lotus Sūtra after his passing, setting forth the analogy of what Nichiren summarized as the “nine easy and six difficult acts.” There is some irony in this term; the “nine easy acts” are virtually impossible. They involve either extraordinary physical feats, such as placing the earth on one’s toe and ascending with it to the heavens of Brahmā, or teaching incalculable numbers of sentient beings by means of provisional teachings, leading them to lesser attainments than buddhahood, such as arhatship or the six supernormal powers. In contrast, the “six difficult acts” all entail the practice of the true teaching, the Lotus Sūtra, in the troubled world after the Buddha’s passing. The six acts are: (1) to teach the Lotus Sūtra; (2) to copy it, or cause others to copy it; (3) to recite it, even for a short while; (4) to teach it to even one other person; (5) to hear and accept it, and inquire about its meaning; and (6) to preserve it. The compilers of the Lotus Sūtra may have sought to ensure the Lotus Sūtra’s survival into the future by showing that the Buddha himself praised the heroism of those who would brave any adversity to uphold it after he was gone from the world.
We have already touched on how, in part under the influence of the esoteric Buddhist teachings, medieval Tendai notions of practice and attainment shifted from a linear model of practice, in which one gradually cultivates merit and wisdom, striving for buddhahood as a future goal, to what one might call a timeless or “mandalic” model, in which buddhahood is revealed in the very act of faith and practice. Medieval Tendai texts sometimes express this conceptual shift with the phrase, “The assembly on Sacred Vulture Peak is still awesomely present and has not yet dispersed.” Just as enlightenment was redefined as accessible in the present, so the assembly of the Lotus Sūtra where the two buddhas sat side by side in the jeweled stūpa came to be represented not as an event in the distant past, but as still ongoing. Some medieval Tendai writings identify this ever-present Lotus assembly with the liberating discernment of the three thousand realms in a single thought-moment, or more specifically, of the buddha realm within oneself.
Now let me talk about the truth and the living Dharma. The appearance of the great stupa serves as a device or reason for bringing together a great assembly of Buddhas and lands but it also serves as a validation of the truth of the Wonderful Dharma of the Lotus Flower Sutra. Many Treasures Buddha demonstrates to us the truth of the underlying Dharma or the truth of the Lotus Sutra does not change. While the actual words or makeup of the Sutra may take on different appearances or different words the truth that underlies it all is unchanging. The two Buddhas sitting beside each other show us that not only the teacher is to be respected but also the truth of the teaching is equally respectable. We are not really devoting ourselves to the teacher but to the truth of the teaching and that is the real basis of our devotion to the Buddha.
Every day we look around us and we see our worlds our lives as being perhaps small and full of suffering or troubles. Yet the image that is presented to us in the ceremony in the air is an expansive one and one of great beauty. Just as the seating of the two Buddhas side by side presents us with a view of the eternity of time, the image of the joined worlds is one of infinite space. So now we have an expansive time element and an expansive space element all in one moment.
When we place ourselves in front of the Honzon as presented in the Lotus Sutra in these chapters we place ourselves outside of our present time and our present space. Again this allows us the opportunity to view our current condition in this life as really one of great reward. How many people everyday participate in such a grand drama?
It is not easy for us to see this as we live out our lives and experience our day-to-day problems. Yet this is the invitation that the Buddha makes to us – to realize that we are not merely some lonely person chanting Odaimoku and practicing the Lotus Sutra, but that we are actually participants in a drama unlike anything that can be contained by either space or time.
Nichiren also drew on the imagery of the jeweled stūpa and the timeless Lotus assembly for the calligraphic mandala that he devised as an object of worship for his followers. It is known as the great mandala (daimandara) or “revered object of worship” (gohonzon). Where many Buddhist mandalas represent pictorially the realms of buddhas and bodhisattvas, Nichiren’s great mandala is written entirely in Chinese characters, along with two Sanskrit glyphs. “Namu Myōhō-renge-kyō” is inscribed vertically down the center of the mandala, flanked by the characters for the names of the two buddhas, Śākyamuni and Prabhūtaratna, just as they sat together in the jeweled stūpa. They in turn are surrounded by the names of representatives of the innumerable bodhisattvas, gods, humans, demons, and others present at the Lotus assembly. As an ensemble, the mandala represents the realm of the primordial buddha, or the “three thousand realms in a single-thought moment in actuality.” By chanting the title with faith in the Lotus Sūtra, Nichiren said, one is able to enter the assembly of the Lotus mandala and participate in the enlightened reality that it depicts.
