© 1997 - Nichiren Buddhist International Center

Nichiren Identified with the True Buddha

According to the Lotus sûtra Sâkyamuni Buddha, who was in the Stûpa of Prabhûataratna Buddha, transmitted the Dharma to Visistacâritra Bodhisattva (Jôgyô Bosatsu). Nikkô held that Nichiren was the reincarnation of (Jôgyô Bosatsu. So did his disciple Nichizon (1265-1345), who founded Jôgyô -in Temple in Kyoto, the temple being named after the Bodhisattva. But his disciple Hongaku Nichidai (1309-1369), went so far as to say that Nichiren himself entered the stûpa and received the Dharma directly from Sâkyamuni Buddha. This misinterpretation of the Lotus Sûtra) finally culminated in the creation of the Nichiren-Is-True-Buddha theory by Nichigen.

According to Nichigen, Sâkyamuni Buddha saved people by the teachings of the Lotus Sûtra The Lotus Sûtra) was good only for the people living in the lifetime of Sâkyamuni Buddha. We are now in the Age of Degeneration. The True Dharma, which is applicable to the people of this age, is not the Lotus Sûtra but the word Myôhô Renge Kyô. The word Myôhô Renge Kyô Myôhô Renge Kyô is the seed of Buddhahood to be sown in the minds of people by the Original Buddha. The Nichiren Shôshû holds that only Nichiren sowed the seed of Buddhahood in the minds of people, and therefore, that Nichiren is the Original Buddha, the True Buddha.

Those of the Nichiren Shôshû Sect never refer to Nichiren as "Nichiren Daibosatsu (Great Bodhisattva)" because they hold that Nichiren is the Buddha. We, on the other hand, worship Nichiren as the representative of the Samgha. They replace Nichiren with Nikkô as the representative of the Samgha.

In those days usurpation was frequent. The lower dominated the upper very often. The Emperor Gokomatsu was enthroned in 1382. His father, the Ex-Emperor Goenyû, died in 1393. The Gokomatsu's mother died in 1406. It was believed to be ill-omened to hold an official Imperial funeral twice during the regnal years of an emperor. There was a regulation that, if the Empress Dowager died after the Ex-Emperor during the regnal years of an emperor, a lady of the Imperial family should be installed as the mother-in-law of the emperor, and that the funeral of the natural mother of the emperor should be held unofficially. The Shôgun Ashikaga Yoshimitsu violated this regulation. He appointed his wife, who was not a member of the Imperial family, as the mother-in-law of the Emperor Gokomatsu. Thus, Ashikaga Yoshimitsu became the father-in-law of the emperor. On April 25, 1408, Yoshimitsu held a ceremony of manhood for his second son Yoshitsugu. The ceremony was exactly the same as that performed when one is appointed Crown Prince. If Yoshimitsu had not died three days later, he would have obtained the title of Emperor or Ex-Emperor. He failed in his plot, but Nichigen succeeded in making Nichiren the True Buddha.

Extreme Exclusivism

It was about this time that the Ita-honzon was created by Nichi-u (1409-1482), the ninth Chief Priest of Taisekiji Temple. The Ita-honzon is a Great Mandala engraved on a camphor wood plank. It is claimed that the Great Mandala was written by Nichiren on October 12, 1279. The Ita-honzon has a note that this Great Mandala was given to Yashiro. Nichi-u claimed that this Ita-mandala was the most legitimate Honzon that Nichiren intended to inscribe, and that all the other Mandalas written on paper by Nichiren and the other priests were worthless. Nichiren and Nikkô, however, never wrote the Mandala on a plank. Nikkô prohibited making an Ita-honzon in his Fuji-isseki-monto-zonji-no-koto, claiming that an engraving on a plank would belittle the value of handwriting.

Nichi-u also said that this Ita-honzon was transferred from Yashiro to Taisekiji, therefore making Taisekiji the only temple which preserves the most legitimate Honzon handed down from Nichiren. His claim of orthodoxy offended the other temples founded by Nikkô or his successors.

Kôzôin Nisshin (1508-1576), Chief Priest of Yôbôji Temple of the Nikkô School in Kyoto, made efforts to make peace between the temples belonging to the Nikkô School. Friendship between them seemed to be restored for some time, but after his death the Nikkô School fell into anarchy again. Under the pressure of the Meiji Government, Taisekiji joined the Nichiren Shi! Kômon Ha, which was organized by the temples of the Nikkô School, in 1876. The name of this sect was changed to Hommon Shû in 1899. Later, Taisekiji seceded from the Hommon Shû in 1900, and called itself Nichiren Shû Fuji Ha. The name of the sect was changed to Nichiren Shôshû in 1912. The Hommon Shû was amalgamated into the Nichiren Shû in 1941. Yôbôji of Kyoto, which had been one of the main temples of the Hommon Shû seceded from the Nichiren Shû in 1953, and called itself Nichiren Honshû.

The Nichiren Shôshû was a small organization of about seventy temples before the war. Now the number of temples has rapidly soared up to more than four hundred because of the explosion of the population of the Sôkagakkai, which is or was supporting the Nichiren Shoshu.