From his earliest writings, Nichiren discusses “the daimoku in five or seven characters” as something far more potent than the mere title of a text. The Hokke daimoku shō (On the title of the Lotus), written in 1266, one of his earliest extended discussions of the subject, defines it as “the heart of the eighty-thousand holy teachings and the eye of all the Buddhas.” This theme continues throughout his later writings as well. “People today think that myōhō-renge-kyō is just a name, but that is not so. … [I]t is neither the text nor the meaning but the heart of the entire sūtra.” Here Nichiren drew on the Chinese tradition of title exegesis, in which the entire meaning of a particular sūtra was held to be encompassed by its title. Chih-i, for example, had organized the major portion of the Fahua hsüan-i, his commentary on the Lotus Sūtra, as a discussion of the five characters that comprise the sūtra’s title. (Page 267)