This is a translation of an installment of a Soka Gakkai Study Department series, published in the November 2023 issue of the Daibyakurenge, the Soka Gakkai’s monthly study journal.
Nichiren Daishonin left Kamakura on the twelfth day of the fifth month in 1274, and moved to Mount Minobu in Hakiri Village in Kai Province.[1] There, on the seventeenth day of the sixth month, in a simple dwelling that had been provided for him, he began his life at Minobu.
Before that, on the seventeenth day of the fifth month, upon reaching the Minobu River near the foot of Mount Minobu, Nichiren sent a letter, “The Way to Minobu,” to Toki Jonin in Shimosa Province.[2]
In it, he wrote:
On the twelfth day we reached Sakawa, on the thirteenth day Takenoshita, on the fourteenth day Kurumagaeshi, on the fifteenth Omiya, on the sixteenth Nambu, and on the seventeenth this place.[3]
Though I am still undecided, because this location in the mountains is for the most part satisfactory to me, it is likely that I will remain here for a while. In the end my lot will no doubt be to wander Japan alone. But if I do stay here I would like it very much if you would visit. (The Writings of Nichiren Daishonin, vol. 2, p. 480)
Judging from the end of this letter, in which he speculates that he may be destined to a wandering lifestyle, Nichiren had yet to decide to stay permanently at Minobu.
Hakiri Rokuro Sanenaga, the local steward in charge of Minobu, had been converted by Nikko[4] and had become a disciple of Nichiren.
Minobu also had geographical advantages for Nichiren. Being moderately distant from Kamakura, the center of the government, it was far enough away that the Kamakura shogunate would likely see him as a recluse no longer requiring their attention. At the same time, Minobu wasn’t too far from many of his followers.
In this letter, Nichiren writes of a famine so severe that not even one serving of rice is for sale and that he and the disciples accompanying him may even starve to death. The situation was so dire that he chose to send those disciples home.
Under these circumstances, Nichiren moved into a simple dwelling built for him at Minobu. From there, he wrote many letters to encourage his followers in various locales. He continued to offer them sincere and thorough inspiration and guidance, so that each could carry through with strong faith and overcome the challenges facing their lives.
Nichiren’s disciples also went to Minobu in person or sent people on their behalf to provide him various items and goods as offerings of sustenance and support. According to “Reply to Ueno,” which he wrote in the seventh month, the lay nun Ueno and her son Nanjo Tokimitsu offered 10 strings of copper coins, two packets of river laver and 20 bundles of ginger (see WND-2, 495). Nichiren expresses his joy at Tokimitsu’s growth and his heartfelt appreciation for the sincerity with which they gave their offerings.
Nichiren’s Writing ‘Choosing the Heart of the Lotus Sutra’
While at Mount Minobu, Nichiren sent his follower Toki Jonin a letter titled “Choosing the Heart of the Lotus Sutra” (see WND-2, 481), which he began composing while still exiled on Sado Island.[5]It is known that there were two drafts of “Choosing the Heart of the Lotus Sutra.” He began writing the first draft while still in exile on Sado Island. It is thought that he produced the second, a revised copy, Mount Minobu.[/ref]
In it, Nichiren addresses the relative merit of the various sutras expounded by Shakyamuni, identifying the Lotus Sutra as being supreme among them.
In addition, regarding the question “for whom was the Lotus Sutra preached?” Nichiren says that the sutra affirms that “the Latter Day of the Law is the crucial period, and within the Latter Day of the Law, Nichiren is the crucial person” (WND-2, 485). In other words, he reveals that the Law was preached for the sake of all living beings in the Latter Day of the Law and above all for himself. He writes in the concluding section:
Question: In these two thousand and more years since the passing of the Buddha, what are these “secret Laws” that were left unrevealed by Nagarjuna, Vasubandhu, T’ien-t’ai, and Dengyo?
Answer: They are the object of devotion of the essential teaching, the sanctuary of the essential teaching, and the five characters of the daimoku of the essential teaching. (WND-2, 488)
Nichiren indicates that the “object of devotion of the essential teaching, the sanctuary of the essential teaching, and the five characters of the daimoku of the essential teaching” constitute the great teaching that must be spread in the Latter Day of the Law. Together, these are known as the Three Great Secret Laws of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo.[6] Nichiren states that he has abandoned approaches to the Buddhist teachings that expand or condense and instead has favored the essence, which are the five characters of Myoho-renge-kyo.[7] He says that Myoho-renge-kyo is the essence because Shakyamuni entrusted the Bodhisattvas of the Earth to spread it for the sake of all people in the Latter Day of the Law.
At the end of the writing, Nichiren discusses the signs indicating that the essential teaching of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo will spread in the Latter Day.
In the first and second months of that year (1274), reports claimed that two suns and two morning stars had appeared in the sky.[8] Nichiren says that these indicate that two kings or two crown princes will appear in one country, a sign of great disorder. Further, he affirms that just as the sutras predict, it is at such a time of conflict that the great Law will spread to restore order to society, bring happiness to the people and establish peace.
He declares that after the nation has experienced this kind of disorder, Bodhisattva Superior Practices and other sages will surely appear and establish the Three Great Secret Laws of the essential teaching, and kosen-rufu will spread throughout the world.
It seems from his statements in “Choosing the Heart of the Lotus Sutra” that Nichiren made Minobu the base for a new phase in his activities with a view toward the long-term spread of the Mystic Law. Ikeda Sensei writes about the purpose of Nichiren’s move to Minobu as follows:
It is evident that the Daishonin had clear objectives and goals in making that move. One of these was to firmly consolidate his teaching for the sake of the widespread propagation of the Law into the eternal future of the Latter Day. Another was to raise full-fledged disciples for kosen-rufu who would carry through with the same vow and dedicated effort as he.
Prior to the Sado Exile, the Daishonin had struggled alone, literally putting his life on the line, to open the way for kosen-rufu. Now, intent on building a foundation for widespread propagation throughout the Latter Day, he sought to encourage his followers to undertake the same struggle as he, so that they could broaden and consolidate the flow of kosen-rufu.[9]
The Expansion of the Mongol Empire
In the tenth month of 1274, Nichiren’s warning of foreign invasion, contained in his treatise “On Establishing the Correct Teaching for the Peace of the Land,” came true when the Mongol Empire sent a military expedition to invade Japan.
Here it might be helpful to consider the relationship between the Mongol Empire and Japan.
Genghis Khan (1165?–1227) established the Mongol Empire in 1206. It encompassed a vast realm formed of lands conquered by the Mongols, originally a nomadic tribe inhabiting the region around the Mongolian Plateau and the Gobi Desert.
The Mongols continue to expand their territory in the east and west, and when Genghis Khan’s grandson Mongke Khan (1209–59) ascended the throne in 1251, he dispatched his brother Kublai (1215–94) to conquer territories in the east and his brother Hulegu (1217?–65) to take more territory in the west. Hulegu defeated the Islamic Abbasid dynasty, causing its downfall, and established the Ilkhanate, a Mongol dynasty centered on the region of present-day Iran.
Kublai succeeded in expanding Mongol dominions in the east. Then, in 1257, Mongke embarked on his own conquest of China’s Southern Song dynasty but died from illness in 1259. The following year, Kublai ascended the throne as the fifth emperor but had to engage in a civil war lasting five years before establishing his rule over the empire. By that time, the Mongol Empire was divided into four vast territories.
Kublai created a new city called Dadu (or Great Capital; present-day Beijing). He established sea and land routes for trading, and as maritime trade advanced, he also built a navy.
With these developments, as “the emperor of the great Mongol Empire,” Kublai sought also to form diplomatic relations with Japan. In August 1266, he addressed an official letter to the “king of Japan” and entrusted its delivery to Goryeo, the kingdom that governed the Korean Peninsula under Mongol rule.
Throughout history, based on a Sinocentric worldview,[10] Chinese rulers had considered the countries surrounding China to be vassal states. In general, such states offered tribute to the Chinese emperor, whom they formally acknowledged as their sovereign.
This had been more or less true of Japan until the Heian period (794–1185), during which it stopped sending envoys to China. After the fall of the Tang dynasty in 907, with Japan taking the position that its emperor was of equal rank to the emperor of China, there were no official diplomatic relations between Japan and China.
In the context of this history, Japan ignored the official letter from the Mongol Empire, which Kublai had named the Yuan dynasty in China, and that sought diplomatic relations with and tribute from Japan.
A statement at the end of the letter reads, “Who would care to appeal to arms?” Seeing this as a threat to use military force should Japan not comply, the Kamakura government sent the Mongol emissaries back without a response and began to prepare for an invasion.
The Mongols sent numerous messengers to Japan, but because the shogunate was wary about their intentions, they never received the response they desired.
(To be continued in an upcoming issue)
The ‘Age of Disciples’
Ikeda Sensei: Wherever he was, Nichiren Daishonin never slackened in his efforts to spread the Law. At the end of “Choosing the Heart of the Lotus Sutra” (WND-2, 481–94), which he wrote immediately after moving to Mount Minobu, the Daishonin sets down his vision for the realization of kosen-rufu. …
The Daishonin expresses great confidence that the time for kosen-rufu will at last arrive. Far from “retiring,” he went on to launch a full-fledged struggle of words in order to lay the foundation for an era in which his teachings would spread far and wide. … [His disciples] initiated activities in their respective communities. … There is no doubt, however, that the disciples were waging an all-out campaign of shakubuku with precisely the same spirit as the Daishonin.
Disciples everywhere were filled with determination to create the foundation for the spread of the Mystic Law through their own strenuous efforts. As they carried on the Daishonin’s “counter-offensive” after the Sado Exile, many dramas of propagation and actual proof of the power of faith unfolded, featuring such devoted disciples as Shijo Kingo, the Ikegami brothers and others. In truth, shakubuku formed the core of the disciples’ Buddhist practice even in the Daishonin’s day.[11]
• • •
By now, the whole country was tense because an invasion by the Mongols seemed inevitable. It was at this time that the religious revolution the Daishonin was advancing entered the next stage of its struggle to achieve the goals of people’s happiness, peace throughout the land and the revitalization of Buddhism in Japan.
In other words, the movement for kosen-rufu had reached a major turning point—the start of a new era when genuine disciples would take up the struggle in earnest. It signaled a time when these disciples would carry on the spirit and practice of the votary of the Lotus Sutra—a time when the spirit to fight for kosen-rufu with the same commitment as the Daishonin flowed vibrantly in the hearts of his disciples. It would fall to each individual disciple to personally triumph as a votary of the Lotus Sutra themselves. The beginning of an age of successors dedicated to carrying on the movement for kosen-rufu is key to the establishment of a people-centered Buddhism in a true sense. This “age of disciples” dawned with the Daishonin’s move to Minobu.[12]
From the September 2024 Living Buddhism
References
- Hakiri Village in Kai Province: Present-day Hakii in Minobu Town, Minami-Koma District, Yamanashi Prefecture and surrounding areas. The name of this location was pronounced “hakiwi” in Nichiren’s time. The pronunciation later changed to “hakiri” and is currently pronounced “hakii.” ↩︎
- Shimosa Province: Present-day northern Chiba Prefecture and surrounding areas. ↩︎
- Thought to have been post stations—places near the main road that provided accommodations for travelers and their horses. Sakawa was in Ashishimo District, Sagami Province (present-day Odawara City, Kanagawa Prefecture). Takenoshita was in Suruga District, Suruga Province (present-day Takenoshita Street, Oyama Town, Sunto District, Shizuoka Prefecture). Kurumagaeshi was in Suruga District, Suruga Province (present-day Sanmaibashi Town, Numazu City, Shizuoka Prefecture). Omiya was in Suruga Province, Fujikamikata (present-day Omiya Town, Fujinomiya City, Shizuoka Prefecture and surrounding areas), Nanbu was in Kai Province (present-day Minamigoma District, Yamanashi Prefecture). ↩︎
- Nikko (1246–1333): Nichiren Daishonin’s direct disciple and successor. ↩︎
- It is known that there were two drafts of “Choosing the Heart of the Lotus Sutra.” He began writing the first draft while still in exile on Sado Island. It is thought that he produced the second, a revised copy, Mount Minobu. ↩︎
- Nichiren revealed the object of devotion of the essential teaching, the sanctuary of the essential teaching and the daimoku of the essential teaching as the concrete way of practicing that fundamental Law for attaining Buddhahood, Nam-myoho-renge-kyo. These are known as the “Three Great Secret Laws.” ↩︎
- Prior to this statement, Nichiren refers to two translators of sutras from Indic languages into Chinese, Hsüan-tsang and Kumarajiva, to explain “Approaches that expand,” “that condense” and “the essence.” He says: “Question: Why do you abandon the expansive or the simplified approach and concentrate only on essentials? Answer: The Tripitaka Master Hsüan-tsang abandoned the simplified approach and favored expansion. Thus, he took the Larger Wisdom Sutra in forty volumes and expanded it into six hundred volumes. The Tripitaka Master Kumārajīva, on the other hand, abandoned the expansive approach and favored simplification. Thus, he took Great Perfection of Wisdom in one thousand volumes and reduced it to one hundred volumes. I, Nichiren, have abandoned both the approach that expands and that which condenses and favor the essence of the matter, which means the five characters of Myoho-renge-kyo that were transmitted to Bodhisattva Superior Practices” (“Choosing the Heart of the Lotus Sutra,” The Writings of Nichiren Daishonin, vol. 2, p. 489). ↩︎
- Nichiren wrote: “This year … on the twenty-third day of the first month … two suns appeared in the west. Some even say that three suns appeared. They also say that on the fifth day of the second month, two morning stars appeared side by side in the east, with a distance of no more than three inches between them.” And after quoting various scriptures he says, “Such calamities affecting the sun and moon are the most evil and portentous of all those listed among the seven disasters, twenty-nine disasters, and countless difficulties described in the sutras” (“Choosing the Heart of the Lotus Sutra,” WND-2, 490). The appearance of “two suns” or “three suns” likely arose from atmospheric phenomena such as light reflected by high-altitude ice crystals. In those days, what appeared to be astronomical anomalies were viewed as warnings of errors committed by rulers. Among the various celestial bodies, people believed that the sun symbolized the ruler and multiple suns symbolized multiple rulers contending for power. ↩︎
- Translated from Japanese. Daisaku Ikeda, “Gosho no sekai” (The World of Nichiren Daishonin’s Writings), in Ikeda Daisaku zenshu (The Complete Works of Daisaku Ikeda), vol. 33 (Tokyo: Seikyo Shimbunsha, 2009), pp. 260–61. ↩︎
- Sinocentrism developed from Confucian political thought on ideal qualities of virtue for rulers. It viewed China’s emperors as preeminent in upholding such codes of morality and propriety. ↩︎
- Translated from Japanese. Daisaku Ikeda, “Gosho no sekai” (The World of Nichiren Daishonin’s Writings), in Ikeda Daisaku zenshu (The Complete Works of Daisaku Ikeda), vol. 33 (Tokyo: Seikyo Shimbunsha, 2009), pp. 138–39. ↩︎
- Translated from Japanese. Daisaku Ikeda, Shori no kyoten: Gosho ni manabu (The Teachings for Victory: Learning from Nichiren’s Writings), vol. 8 (Tokyo: Seikyo Simbunsha, 2014), pp. 30–31. ↩︎
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