The Actions of the Votary of the Lotus Sutra

Background

This work is an autobiographical account covering the events of an important period in Nichiren Daishonin’s life—from the time shortly before the Tatsunokuchi Persecution through his two-and-a-half-year exile on Sado Island to his eventual retirement to Mount Minobu. In the course of his struggles over this period of nine years, the Daishonin fulfilled the predictions in the Lotus Sutra concerning its votary and established himself in both word and deed as the Buddha of the Latter Day of the Law.

This letter was written in the second year of Kenji (1276) and addressed to the lay nun Kōnichi, a widow who lived in Awa, the Daishonin’s native province. Her son had earlier converted to the Daishonin’s teachings, and through him she herself became a convert. Some time after her conversion, her son died. But she overcame her deep sorrow and remained a sincere believer in the Daishonin’s Buddhism to the end of her life.

The chronicle of events begins in 1268 when the Mongol empire sent a delegate to Japan to demand that the nation acknowledge fealty to the Mongols. The predictions of foreign invasion made in On Establishing the Correct Teaching for the Peace of the Land had started to come true. The Daishonin once more remonstrated with the Kamakura authorities and religious leaders, but they ignored his repeated warnings and instead struck out against him and his followers. At this point the Daishonin urges his disciples never to yield to persecution but to devote their whole lives to propagating the Mystic Law.

His undaunted struggle incurred further wrath from the regime and from the other religious schools and finally led to the Tatsunokuchi Persecution. Later in his work The Opening of the Eyes, the Daishonin points to that attempt on his life as the immediate cause for him to reveal himself as the Buddha of the Latter Day of the Law. In the passage that follows, the Daishonin speaks of his life on Sado. He expresses joy in the knowledge that he was the only one who fulfilled the prophecy in the Lotus Sutra concerning the votary who is exiled more than once.

After he returned to Kamakura in 1274, he remonstrated with the regime for yet a third time. When the government again spurned his counsel, he left Kamakura to live in the recesses of Mount Minobu, where this letter was written. Just five months later, the Mongol forces attacked Japan. The cause for this, he states, was the nation’s slander of the Lotus Sutra. In conclusion, the Daishonin expresses appreciation to the lay nun Kōnichi for having sent a letter to him at his lonely retreat on Mount Minobu.