One day, a lay follower visited me and said, "I took a friend of mine who wanted to listen to a chief priest's sermon. Could you please share him some time?"

I said " No problem." and took them to the guest room.
The visitor said, "I am very honor to meet you, chief priest. I am his ( the lay follower's ) neighbor, and I know he is a nice guy. I always feel happy when I talk with him."

He continued, "He said he goes to Honkunji Temple. I'm also interested in a faith. So today I asked him to take me here today. Chief priest, can I ask some questions?"

"Yes, please go ahead.", I replied.

He asked, "What kind of faith is believed in this temple?"
I answered, "Buddhism. I preach the true Buddhism, especially the Hokke-kyo ( the Lotus Sutra)."
He said, "My family has been prayed to Amida Buddha for generations. But I'm not enthusiastic for the faith. I go to the temple only for the Bon Festival or the equinoctial week festival. I even don't know what Amida Buddha is."
I said, "Don't you? Most of Buddhists pray only because their ancestors had being prayed, like you. Essentially the only one true Buddhism exists, not two or more. It was preached by Shakamuni Buddha 3,000 years ago."
I continued, "Shakamuni Buddha was spiritually awakened at the age of 30. He was awakened that everything in this world is uncertain, on the other hand he found the "certain world" which won't change eternally."

I added, "The Buddha taught us that everything in this world is changing, including this table, chair, house and so on. They will not exist after several thousands years. Of course the human being is not the exception. Please look at yourself in the mirror. You can see your face at this moment. But you must have had a baby's face when you were born. I think there has been a big change. I guarantee you will die in the future. Yes, everything is changing. The Buddha was spiritually awakened that the origin of all our pain comes from the uncertainty of the world. But the Buddha also enlightened that there is a certain unchangeable world in this uncertain world at the same time.

The visitor said, "I got you said, so what Shakamuni Buddha was spiritually awakened was the Amida Buddha, wasn't it?"

I replied, "No, it wasn't. Amida Buddhism was a newly-risen religion at that time. You see, Buddhism is divided into several Sutras according to the period they were preached. Shakamuni Buddha preached some Sutras for more than 50 years. He started with preaching the Kegon-kyo for 21 days, Agon-kyo for 12 years, Houdou-kyo for 16 years, Hannya-kyo for 14 years, and then he preached Hokke-kyo (the Lotus Sutra) for the last 8 years of his life.

Amida Buddha was appeared in the Amida-kyo, the Muryojyu-kyo and the Kanmuryojyu-kyo, which are parts of the Houdou-kyo.

In Japan Saint Hounen established a different sect of Nennbutsu-shu by setting up Amida Buddha for rescuing people from various suffers in 12th century. But Amida Buddha is merely one of the Buddha that Shakamuni Buddha stated in his Sutra.

And also one of the major sect of Buddhism, Singon-syu came from Dainichi-kyo, Kongoucho-kyo and Shishituchi-kyo which also belonged to Houdou-kyo.

Shakamuni Buddha stated the 84,000 Buddha in his Sutras, so plenty of sects were established by setting up their own Buddha.
Originally Nenbutsu (Amida Buddhism) was spread from India, where Shakamuni Buddha preached, to other countries through the Silk Road. Chinese merchants traded with India and they left a different part of the huge number of Sutras as souvenir in each village along the Silk Road. Thus, people lived there began to pray the name of Buddha appeared in the separated Sutra as a guardian deity. This was the beginning of the primitive Buddhism. Like this, parts of the Sutras were spread by trade ships from India to South-Eastern Asia such as Thai or Vietnam. In Japan, Saint Hounen shouldered Amida Buddha in the same way."

The visitor asked, "So you mean there are a lot of Buddhism which were preached by Shakamuni Buddha, don't you?"

"No, I don't mean it at all." I answered. " The Buddha preached the only one true Buddhism. To our great pleasure, Shakamuni Buddha left Nehan-kyo when he hid himself from the Earth in order to hand down to posterity the true Buddhism.

Nehan-kyo, which I didn't refer to before, is also called as a gleaning Sutra."

In this Sutra, the Buddha gave us some supplements, because he thought we might misunderstand his preach. He told a story in this Sutra.

" A king made his retainers bring a big elephant to the palace. He ordered five blind men who had never seen an elephant in their lives to touch it and to describe how it was. One described it was like a big tree. The other described it was like a horse or like a big barrel. Each of them said a different impression because each of them touched a different part of the elephant."

What Shakamuni Buddha wanted to say in this Sutra was "Try to grasp the great mind of the Buddha and not to cling to a part of the huge Sutra of Buddhism."

The man asked me, "Then, what is the Buddha's great mind?"

I answered, " It is the Hokke-kyo(Lotus Sutra)."

" The only purpose of his preach over 50 years and of leaving the huge rolls of Sutras is to preach the Hokke-kyo(Lotus Sutra), the very last one. This was proved by Saint Tendai. He was convinced that the Hokke-kyo(Lotus Sutra) was the ultimate purpose of the Buddha, after reviewing and classifying all the roles of Sutras which had been brought from India to China by Saint Genzo.

The man went on, " So you explained that the Hokke-kyo is the true Buddhism and the Hokke-kyo is the one that the Buddha spiritually awakened. Then the Nenbutsu(Amida Buddha) is also one of the scripture that the Buddha preached for the Hokke-kyo. Can we reckon the Nenbutsu as a part of the Hokke-kyo?"

"No, you can't. The Buddha preached in the "Muryo-gikyo-seppo-hon" as a prelude of the Hokke-kyo. The Buddha stated,

"I was spiritually awakened beneath a linden tree at the age of 30. Since then I have tried to enlighten people, but it has been very tough. The nature of the people had a lot of problems to accept my preach at that time.

So I tried to develop the nature of the people to understand the enlightenment for over 40 years. It was just like a temporary expedient preaching. So the Sutras which I've preached you ever were the kind of tentative Sutras for the true Buddhism that I'd like to start preaching from now on. I'm going to reveal the absolute true Buddhism.

Everybody has to throw away the tentative Sutras immediately and come together under the Hokke-kyo, the Lotus Sutra.

To hold on the tentative Sutras will destroy the pureness of the Hokke-kyo's world."

The man nodded.

"I understand very well. Is it possible for me to be enlightened by the Hokke-kyo now?"

I said,

"Because the Hokke-kyo is a scripture which is preached the Buddha's world, the Certain World which is beyond changing as I said before, it is impossible for us to understand the depth of this Buddha's world by reading.

Though the Buddha disappeared, the Buddha's mercy is still too vast to measure. The Buddha has left us the way to be relieved from suffering eternity.

The Buddha especially considered the people who would be born in "Mappo"(a degenerate age) which would begin 2000 years after the Buddha's disappearance, which is also the age that the state of the people's mind is the worst.

Yes, we live in "Mappo".

At the stage of "Hommon-Happon"(Primordial Eight Chapters), the Buddha showed the infinite Buddha's world in the air. Being apart from his body, the Buddha transformed himself to the state of eternal life.

Then the Buddha granted "Namu-myo-ho-ren-ge-kyu" as the "Satori"(the Buddha's supreme wisdom, by which the Buddha spiritually awakened) to Jyogyo-Bosatsu(a bodhisattva) who also showed eternal life by oral communication, and asked him to propagate "Namu-myo-ho-ren-ge-kyo" in the age of "Mappo."

In the Sutra named "Daisitsu- kyo", there are prophecies describes the age every 500 years after the Buddha's disappearance. Among these, the Buddha foretold that Jyogyo-Bosatsu would appear for relieving the whole people between 2000 and 2500 years after his disappearance.

As the scenario, "Nichiren-Shonin" (Saint Nichiren) would appear in Japan after about 2230 years. He propagated "Namu-myo-ho-ren-ge-kyo" under his self-conscious as "Jyogyo-Bosatsu".

This is the "Hommon Happon Shoken Jyogyo Shoden Honnin Geshu no Namu-myo-ho-ren-ge-kyo". (Namu-myo-ho-ren-ge-kyo" which is expressed in the Primordial Eight Chapters of the "Hommon" stage in the "Hokke-kyo" and is authentically delivered by Jyogyo-Bosatsu.)

This is a wonderful Law.

This Law shows us the absolute the Buddha's help. It is also called the Law for a bad person or the Law for a stupid person.

This Law can change a bad person good.

Lay followers of Honkunji experience the wonderful world of the Buddha. It is also the world of the alive Nirvana.

If you want to listen to the experiences of the Buddha's help, please ask the lay followers of Honkunji any time."

The man said to me,

"Thank you very much, Chief Priest. I suppose that I understand what your faith is. I'd like to be a member of Honkunji after talking with my family, hopefully my family will be, too. Please teach me from now on."

After all he became a lay

follower of Honkunji with his family. They are spending happy lives with various experiences of Buddha's help.

I would like to supplement an episode of the Buddha.

When the Shakamuni Buddha was preaching at Gaya, an audience asked the Shakamuni.

" The Buddha, where is the Pure Land of the Buddha's world?"

The Shakamuni Buddha replied, " Where can we find it apart from here, Gaya?"

It is said that where we are now is exactly where the Buddha lives. According to Hokke-kyo, this world consists of the mind of all lives. If you have a perplex mind, you'll see the perplex world. And if you have a mind of Buddha's, you can see the Buddha's world. The world of the Buddha's appears in front of you.

This is a philosophical theory of the Buddha's supreme wisdom "Ichi-nen San-zen".

(One thought consists of all phenomenon, and one thought affects all activities.)

Therefore, if you have a mind of "Namu-myo-ho-ren-ge-kyo", you'll be in the Buddha's world. Buddha said that this world itself is the Pure Land of the Buddha.

The world is in disturbance today.

However if this Law is propagated over the world, the real peaceful world will appear by the great power of Law which can change both nature and human being righteous.

I really want to tell you the existence of this Law. I am not a kind of a founder of this religion at all. I am just one of the believers.

Otherwise I may say that I am a pioneer of the believers.

Let's do the right thing for the world with joining hands.