All sūtras preached prior to the Lotus Sūtra state that bodhisattvas and ordinary people are able to attain Buddhahood, but never the people of the Two Vehicles. Thinking that they can become Buddhas while the people of the Two Vehicles cannot, wise bodhisattvas and ignorant people throughout the six realms felt happy. The people of the Two Vehicles plunged into grief and thought, “We should not have entered the Buddhist way.” Now in the Lotus Sūtra, they are guaranteed of attaining Buddhahood, so not only the people of the Two Vehicles, but also the people of the nine realms will all become Buddhas. Upon hearing this dharma, bodhisattvas realized their misunderstanding. As stated in the pre-Lotus sūtras, if the people of the Two Vehicles cannot attain Buddhahood, then the Four Great Vows cannot be accomplished. Consequently, bodhisattvas would also be unable to become Buddhas. When it was preached that people of the Two Vehicles were unable to attain Buddhahood, they should not have been left alone in sadness; bodhisattvas should have joined them in grief.

Shōjō Daijō Fumbetsu-shō, The Differences between Hinayana and Mahayana Teachings, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 194-195.

Having never studied other forms of Buddhism I’m always puzzled how followers of pre-Lotus sūtras even approach the Bodhisattva vows knowing that some sentient beings are excluded. What does “Sentient beings are innumerable; I vow to save them all” mean if Śrāvakas and Pratyekabuddhas are excluded?

Nevertheless, if there is a man after the death of the Buddha who breaks the attachment to the false doctrines of the “four tastes and three teachings” of the pre-Lotus sūtras and puts faith in the True Dharma of the Lotus Sūtra, all the virtuous gods and numerous bodhisattvas who sprang up from underground will protect such a practicer of the Lotus Sūtra. Under such protection, this practicer would be able to spread over the world the honzon revealed in the essential section and the five-word daimoku of “myō, hō, ren, ge, and kyō,” the essence of the Lotus Sūtra.

He is just like Never-Despising Bodhisattva, who in the Age of the Semblance Dharma after the death of Powerful Voice King Buddha spread in the land of this Buddha the twenty-four character passage in the Lotus Sūtra (chapter twenty) saying: “I respect you deeply. I do not despise you. Why is it? It is because you all will practice the way of bodhisattvas and will be able to attain Buddhahood.” With such propagation, the Bodhisattva was severely persecuted by all the people in the land, who beat him with sticks and threw stones at him.

Kembustsu Mirai-ki, Testimony to the Prediction of the Buddha, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 174.

Considering this quote approximately 745 years later, one must affirm the accuracy of the prediction: This practicer would be able to [has] spread over the world the honzon revealed in the essential section and the five-word daimoku of “myō, hō, ren, ge, and kyō,” the essence of the Lotus Sūtra.

I imagine Nichiren smiling at finding a man in Sacramento, California, writing about this in 2018.

For those who are incapable of understanding the truth of the “3,000 existences contained in one thought,” Lord Śākyamuni Buddha, with His great compassion, wraps this jewel with the five characters of myō, hō, ren, ge, and kyō and hangs it around the neck of the ignorant in the Latter Age of Degeneration. The four great bodhisattvas will protect such people, just as T’ai-kung-wang and the Duke of Chou assisted the young ruler, King Chen, of the Chou dynasty, or the Four Elders of the Shang-shan attended child Emperor Hui of the Han dynasty in ancient China.

Kanjin Honzon-shō, A Treatise Revealing the Spiritual Contemplation and the Most Venerable One, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 164.

Having finished Kanjin Honzon-shō I want to add some of the notes for future reference.

• Five progressive stages in the practice of the Lotus Sūtra after the death of the Buddha, formulated by T’ien-t’ai in his Hokke mongu: (1) to rejoice on hearing the Lotus Sūtra, (2) to read and recite it, (3) to propagate it , (4) to uphold it and practice the six pāramitā, and (5) to perfect the six pāramitā.
• Six stages in the practice of the Lotus Sūtra formulated by T’ien-t’ai: (1) ri-soku, or the stage at which one had not heard the True Dharma and is ignorant of Buddhism; (2) myōji-soku, the stage at which one hears the name and reads the words of the Lotus Sūtra and begins believing in it; (3) kangyō-soku, the stage at which one begins practicing what he learns; (4) sōji-soku, the stage at which one eliminates the first two of the three categories of illusion; (5) bunshin-soku, the stage at which one attains partial enlightenment ; and (6) kukyō-soku, the highest stage of practice at which one eliminates all illusions and attains perfect enlightenment.
• Five kinds of eyes: (1) eyes of flesh (men); (2) divine eyes of gods; (3) eyes of wisdom of the Two Vehicles (Śrāvaka and Pratyekabuddha); (4) dharma eyes of bodhisattvas; and (5) eyes of Buddhas which can see through all things covering past, present, and future. The eyes of Buddhas also possess all the other four.
• Having a long, wide tongue is one of the Buddha’s physical excellences, considered a sign of words spoken truly.
• 3,000 dust-particle kalpa (sanzen-jindengō) is the immeasurably long period of time described in the seventh (Kejōyu) chapter of the Lotus Sūtra, indicating how much time has passed since Säkyamuni preached the Lotus Sūtra as the 16th son of Daitsūchishō Buddha: “Suppose someone smashed a major world system (consisting of 1,000 X 1,000 X 1,000 worlds) into ink powder. Then he traveled eastward making a dot as small as a particle of dust with that ink powder as he passed 1,000 worlds until the ink powder was exhausted. Then all the worlds he went through were smashed into dust. The number of kalpa which has elapsed since Daitsūchishō Buddha passed away is infinitely larger than the number of particles of the dust thus produced.”
• Gohyaku jindengō: literally the five hundred dust-particle kalpa. It means an inconceivably long period of time as described in the 16th chapter of the Lotus Sūtra indicating how much time has elapsed since Śākyamuni’s original enlightenment: “Suppose someone smashes five hundred billions nayuta, asamkhya worlds into dust, and then takes it all toward the east, dropping one particle each time he passes five hundred billions nayuta, asamkhya worlds. Suppose he continues traveling eastward in this way until he finishes dropping all the particles. Suppose all these worlds reduced to dust. Let one particle represent one kalpa. The time which has passed since I attained Buddhahood surpassed this by one hundred billion nayuta, asamkhya kalpa.”

“The Life Span of the Buddha” chapter says: “Having taken poison, some had lost their senses while others had not. … Seeing this excellent medicine with color and scent both good, those who had not lost their senses took it and recovered from their illness.” This refers to those who received the seed of Buddhahood in the eternal past as preached in “The Life Span of the Buddha,” those who had the opportunity to establish a connection with Buddhist dharma at the time of Great Universal Wisdom Buddha as revealed in the seventh chapter on “The Parable of a Magic City,” and all those bodhisattvas, Two Vehicles (Śrāvakas and Pratyekabuddha), men and gods who received the teaching of the Buddha in the pre-Lotus sūtraas well as the theoretical section of the Lotus Sūtra attain Buddhahood in the preaching of the essential section. It is said in the same chapter:

‘The remainder who had lost their senses were happy to see their father come back and requested him to cure their illness, but they refused to take the medicine their father offered them. Why did they not take it? It was because they had been affected by poison, causing them to lose their senses and think this excellent medicine, in both color and scent, not good at all. …

“Now I have to devise an expedient means so that they may take this medicine,” thought the father. “Now I will leave this excellent medicine here with you. You should take it without worrying about its effectiveness,” instructed the father to his children and he again went abroad. Then he sent a messenger back to his children, telling them that their father had passed away.’

The seventeenth chapter, “Variety of the Merits,” in the essential section of the Lotus Sūtra states, “In the evil age of the latter dharma…,” indicating that the teaching was for the Latter Age of Degeneration.

Kanjin Honzon-shō, A Treatise Revealing the Spiritual Contemplation and the Most Venerable One, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 156.

I’m both fascinated and chagrined by this revelation that as a member of the Latter Age of Degeneration I’m not among the three groups that did not lose their mind:

• those who received the seed of Buddhahood in the eternal past as preached in “The Life Span of the Buddha,”
• those who had the opportunity to establish a connection with Buddhist dharma at the time of Great Universal Wisdom Buddha as revealed in the seventh chapter on “The Parable of a Magic City,”
• and all those bodhisattvas, Two Vehicles (Śrāvakas and Pratyekabuddha), men and gods who received the teaching of the Buddha in the pre-Lotus sūtras as well as the theoretical section of the Lotus Sūtra attain Buddhahood in the preaching of the essential section.

But I suppose imagining myself as having been exposed to the Lotus Sūtra in life after life since the remotest past begs the question of why exactly it never took. How dumb or perverted would I need to be for it to take literally forever for me to realize Na Mu Myo Ho Ren Ge Kyo?

Finally, let us try to answer your first question (1) whether or not vast virtue of Lord Śākyamuni Buddha exists in our minds. The Sūtra of Infinite Meaning (Muryōgi-kyō), which is regarded as an introductory teaching to the Lotus Sūtra, explains how we attain Buddhahood:

“Suppose there was a prince just born to a king and his queen. Growing up day by day, month by month, year by year, the new prince has reached the age of seven. Though unable to attend the affairs of state, he is respected by his father’s subjects and befriended by children of great kings. He is loved by his royal parents, who find it most enjoyable to chat with him constantly. Why is this? It is because the prince is still young. My good people, he who upholds this Lotus Sūtra is just like this prince. His father is Buddhas; and his mother, this sūtra. Just as the prince was born to the king and his queen, Buddhas and this sūtra are united in one to give birth to the bodhisattva, upholder of this sutra. Suppose, having listened to the Lotus Sūtra, he reads a phrase or a verse of it, or reads it once, twice, ten, one hundred, one thousand, ten thousand times, or one trillion times the grains of sand of the Ganges River—unlimited and infinite number of times. Even if he had not yet obtained the ultimate truth, he would be respected by all the four groups of Buddhists (monks, nuns, laymen, and laywomen) and the eight kinds of gods and semi-gods, protectors of Buddhism. Accompanied by great bodhisattvas, he would always be protected and cared for by Buddhas and completely surrounded by their benevolence. It is because he is a beginner on the way to Buddhahood.”

Then, we come across the following passage in the Sūtra of Meditation on the Universal Sage Bodhisattva (Kan Fugen Bosatsu Gyōbō-kyō), considered to be the conclusion of the Lotus Sūtra: “This Mahayana Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma is the treasure house of all the Buddhas and the eyes of all the Buddhas in all the worlds in the universe in the past, present, and future. It is the seed of Buddhahood giving birth to all the Buddhas in the past, present as well as future. You must put the Mahayana teaching into practice lest the seed of Buddhahood be extinguished.” And also: “This Mahayana sūtra is the eyes of all the Buddhas. It is by means of this Lotus Sūtra that all the Buddhas reach the stage of having Five Eyes. The Buddha with three bodies (Dharma Body, Reward Body, and Accommodative Body) was born from this sūtra. This sūtra is the great seal of enlightenment impressed upon the sea of Nirvana, from which the Buddha with three pure bodies was born. The triple-bodied Buddha, therefore, is the source of happiness for men and gods alike.”

Kanjin Honzon-shō, A Treatise Revealing the Spiritual Contemplation and the Most Venerable One, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 143-144.

This concludes the first of what will be a little more than 14 weeks of study and I am thoroughly enjoying this. I’ve read the writings of Nichiren twice before, but reading today with my daily practice of daily reading a portion of the Lotus Sūtra has enhanced my understanding in ways I had not expected.