In referring … to the passage on the purification of the mind indicated in the “Benefits Obtained” chapter, Nichiren writes that “the true path lies in the realities of this world.” Like Zhiyi, he denied any notion of a two-tiered hierarchy between the realm of deluded beings and the realm of the Buddha’s enlightenment: one entails the experience of suffering, and the other, the experience of inner stability and joy, but the distinction between them lies solely in whether or not one embraces the Lotus Sūtra. Elsewhere, … Nichiren draws on the mutual inclusion of mind and all phenomena to assert that our own actions are what make this world a hell or a buddha land. Here, however, he draws a slightly different inference: there is no buddha-dharma to be achieved apart from one’s everyday reality. One’s ordinary affairs, whatever they maybe, form the arena of practice, and by faith in the Lotus Sūtra, one can bring to bear the wisdom and compassion of the dharma to negotiate all worldly matters.