The Supreme Being; the union of the Truth and his Person
With these thoughts on the truth of mutual revelation, and with a special emphasis on the necessity of a simple and concrete representation of the Supreme Being, Nichiren composed the treatise on “The Spiritual Introspection of the Supreme Being, Revealed for the First Time in the Fifth Five Centuries after the Tathāgata’s Great Decease.” He describes the symbolic representation as follows:
“The august state of the Supreme Being (Svādi-devatā) is this: The Heavenly Shrine is floating in the sky over the Sahā world ruled by the Primeval Master, the Lord Buddha. In the Shrine is seen the Sacred Title of the Lotus of the Perfect Truth, on either side of which are seated the Buddhas Śākyamuni and Prabhūtaratna, and also on the sides, at a greater distance, the four Bodhisattva leaders, the Viśiṣṭacāritra and others. The Bodhisattvas like Mañjuśrī and Maitreya are seated farther down, as attendants of the former, while the innumerable hosts of the Bodhisattvas, enlightened by the manifestations of Buddha, sit around the central group, like a great crowd of people looking up toward the court nobles surrounding the throne.”
In his graphic representation of this scene, Nichiren makes place for all other kinds of beings, men and gods, spirits and demons, all surrounding the central Sacred Title. His idea was to represent adequately, from his point of view, the perfect union of the Truth and the Person, manifested not only in Buddhas and saints, but inherent even in the beings immersed in illusion and vice. The whole was intended to be a visible embodiment of the truth of cosmic existence, as realized in the all-comprehensive conception of “mutual participation” [Ichinen Sanzen] and illuminated by the all-enlightening power of the Truth.”
The universe is the stage of mutual participation and reciprocal interaction, which proceed according to the truths, or laws, of existence. Buddha, in his real entity, is nothing but another name for this cosmos of orderly existence. Seen from this angle, the Truth is fundamental and the Person is secondary; but the Truth and its laws cannot exist nor work without everlasting wisdom, the cosmic soul which is the source of all wisdom, which ordains all laws and causes all beings to exist. This is the personal aspect of the universe and is the real personality of the eternal Buddha. Buddha, the Lord of Truth, as he declares himself to be, in the second chapter of the Lotus, and the eternal Father of the world, as he reveals himself in the sixteenth chapter, is the Father and Master of all beings. This Buddha has appeared, as is made known in the chapter on the Apparition of the Heavenly Shrine, in the person of two Buddhas, Śākyamuni and Prabhūtaratna; and this celestial manifestation was meant to show the efficacy of Buddha’s wisdom to lead all beings alienated from it to the full enlightenment of the universal truths. The basic truth of existence and its everlasting laws are inherent in every being, while the personal manifestations of Buddhahood are working to bring all beings to full consciousness of their own real nature. In other words, all beings, participating in the primeval wisdom of the universe, are developing their proper nature in conjunction with the educative activity of the Buddhas. Taking this view of the cosmic movement, the Supreme Being is nothing but the union of the Truth and the Person, as realized in the person of Buddha and to be realized in each of us.
This union is now graphically represented in the Cycle, or Maṇḍala, in the center of which the Truth stands, surrounded by all kinds of existences. And the Cycle is the means to inspire our spiritual life with the truth of mutual interaction, and to induce us to full participation in the universal harmony. Seen in this light, the object of worship, the Supreme Being is to be sought nowhere but in the innermost recess of every man’s nature, because the final aim of worship is the complete realization of the Supreme Being in ourselves. Ethically speaking, Buddha is our Lord and Father, but metaphysically the Lord and Father is the means of perpetuating Truth and Life, which are to be made actual by us. These two sides are united in the act of religious worship, which is, on the one hand, adoration of the universal Truth embodied in the person of Buddha, and, on the other, the realization, in thought and life, of the Buddha-nature in ourselves. These principles of ethical, metaphysical, and religious teaching were formulated by Nichiren in a further exposition of the conception of the Supreme Being, in the essay on “The Reality as It Is,” written in the fifth month, that is, between the composition of the “Spiritual Introspection” and the revelation of the graphic representation in the Mandala.
The Climax of Nichiren's Life; The Graphic Representation of The Supreme Being
Peace in exile; the object of religious worship 76
The Supreme Being and the doctrine of "mutual participation" 79
The Supreme Being; the union of the Truth and his Person 81
'The Reality as It is' and the personal realization of Buddhahood. 82
The revelation of the Great Maṇḍala and further thoughts on his mission 85
NICHIREN: THE BUDDHIST PROPHET