The heart of this essential section of the Lotus Sūtra, “Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō” (an absolute faith in the five-character title of the Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma), was not transmitted even to the most trusted disciples such as Bodhisattvas Mañjuśrī or Medicine King, and certainly not the lower-ranking bodhisattvas. Instead the Buddha called out numerous bodhisattvas from underground, for whom He expounded it during the preaching of eight chapters following the fifteenth chapter in the essential section of the Lotus Sūtra and entrusted them with the task of spreading it in the Latter Age of Degeneration.

Kanjin Honzon-shō, A Treatise Revealing the Spiritual Contemplation and the Most Verable One, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 148