Release from death and second exile
Nichiren’s narrow escape, more unexpected and miraculous than in any preceding cases, impressed Nichiren so deeply that he regarded his life thereafter as a second life-the life after a resurrection. In a later writing [Opening the Eyes, 1272] he expressed this thought as:
“A man called Nichiren was beheaded at Tatsu-no-kuchi, a little after midnight of the twelfth day of the ninth month last year. His soul remained and came here to the island of Sado; it wrote this, in the midst of snow, in the second month of the year following, and leaves it to posterity.”
Another letter, written in 1277 to his beloved warrior-disciple Kingo, shows how gravely he regarded the crisis:
“Over and over I recall to mind that you came following me when I was going to be beheaded, and that you cried and wept, holding the bridle of my horse. How can I forget that as long as I may live? If you should fall to the hells because of your grave sins (accumulated in the past), I would not follow the call of my Lord Sakya, howsoever he might invite me to Buddhahood, but I would surely be in the hell where you are. If I and you are in the hells, Śākya Buddha and the [Lotus Sutra] will surely be there together with us.”
Another letter addressed to the same warrior, written while the crisis was still fresh in his memory, says:
“Tatsu-no-kuchi is the place where Nichiren renounced his life. The place is therefore comparable to a paradise; because all has taken
place for the sake of the Lotus of Truth. … Indeed every place
where Nichiren encounters perils is Buddha’s land. … Surely
when I shall be on Vulture Peak, I shall inform our Lord of your fidelity shown in your readiness to follow me to death.”
The authorities were perplexed what to do. When the day dawned, it was decided that the prisoner should be sent to Echi, a village fifteen miles inland from Tatsu-no-kuchi. When, at noon, he arrived there, he was received very reverently into the mansion of the local chief, and the soldiers of the guard began to listen to what the wonderful man said and preached. Meanwhile, it seems, the government circle were much disturbed by the failure of the execution, and a faction among the officials seems to have raised its voice against those who had urged that Nichiren should be put to death. Late in the following night a special messenger came from Kamakura, ordering that good care be taken of the prisoner. Finally, he was sentenced to exile, and, nearly a month later, he left Echi for the Island of Sado, which was designated as his place of banishment.
The Threatening Mongol Invasion And the Sentence of Death
The arrival of the Mongol envoys and Nichiren's renewed remonstrance 52
Prosecution and sentence of death; the narrow escape and a "resurrection" 54
Release from death and second exile 58
NICHIREN: THE BUDDHIST PROPHET