As I contemplate this, if Śākyamuni Buddha had passed away after preaching only forty years or so without preaching the Lotus in the last eight years, who would have given offerings to these respectable people? They would certainly be in the realm of the hungry souls alive.

However, just as the sun in spring melts away the ice and strong winds shake off all the dew, those sūtras preached in some forty years were discredited at once by one statement in the chapter on “Preaching” of the Sūtra of Infinite Meaning: “The truth has not been revealed yet.” Just as the strong wind disperses dark clouds revealing the full moon in the sky and the sun shines in the clear sky, it was made shiningly clear that “the Buddha reveals the truth after preaching the provisional dharma for a long time.” It was stated in the Lotus Sūtra, the spotless mirror, in the indisputable words of the Buddha as clear as the sun and the moon in the sky that men like Śāripūtra and Kāśyapa could obtain Buddhahood and that they would be Flower Light Buddha and Light Buddha respectively in the future. That was the very reason why lay followers among gods and men after the death of the Buddha continued to look up to those Hinayāna sages as if they were Buddhas.

When the water is clear, the moon is bound to be reflected in it. When the wind blows, trees and grasses are bound to bend. So, when there is a practicer of the Lotus Sūtra, those sages such as Śāripūtra and Kāśyapa should come to see him even if it means that they have to overcome such obstacles as great fires or huge rocks. Kāśyapa is said to have begun meditation to wait for the Buddha Maitreya, but this is not the time for him to do so. I wonder why they have not rushed to rescue the practicer of the Lotus when his life is at stake. Are we not during the last 500-year period, at the beginning of the Latter Age of Degeneration?

Kaimoku-shō, Open Your Eyes to the Lotus Teaching, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 63-64