Shakyamuni Buddha was the reformer (aka restorer) of the original wisdom (Dharma) of Vedanta (oneness of the beating heart and the core principle which gives rise to manifested existence) and Nichiren is the reformer (aka restorer) of the original gateway that was harvested by Shakyamuni Buddha now in the later day of the Dharma.  Nichiren embodies the original teacher of the oneness of sowing and harvesting the seeds of Buddhahood.  The meaning which underlies this great truth is the principle that the highest teaching of Buddhism is known as "the perfect and immediate attainment of Buddhahood in one's present form".  This is a truly wonderful thing for all mankind, especially now in this age which is charcaterized by the presence of weapons of "mass destruction".  Political leaders with the nearly "perfect and immediate" capacity to destroy all life with the flick of a deluded thought  directing a finger to press a destruct button. Just as we have evolved our conscious human knowledge in such a negative path then why not assume that nature has also endowed us with the power to awaken the wisdom which can see through to the true nature of one's own mind and the true aspect of life. This development of human wisdom was cultivated over a period of 1,800 years as the wisdom of the Mahayana was made more and more manifest, clear and presently available.  This is the true meaning of the message embedded in the expedient means chapter of the Lotus Sutra.

Nichiren, the votary of the Lotus Sutra and the embodiment of the leader of the primordial Buddha's original  disciples (as defined in the 15th chapter of the Lotus Sutra) states,

"This Myoho Renge Kyo (Sad-Dharma Pundarika Sutram) is a term designating the essential nature of our minds, or more generally speaking the essential nature of the minds of all living beings, the eight petaled white lotus blossom (Buddha nature).  The words of the Budha himself teach us this.  From time without beginning until the present, these bodies of ours have transmigrated through the realm of birth and death in a state of delusion as to the essential nature of the mind that is withn these bodies.  But now that we have encountered the Lotus Sutra and chant the Daimoku that represents the Thus Come One of Original Enlightenment, who possess the three bodies within a single body, the Thus Come One becomes manifest.  IN our present existence we achieve the inner realization and attainment of Buddhahood that is known as the attainment of Buddhahood in one's present form." WND V2 pg 87.  

Nothing offers us with a greater sense of urgency than the knowledge that this is the age of humanity in which both the greatest source of destruction and the quickest way to universal security (speedy access to the Buddha wisdom wihtin our own lives) exist in a manifest state on our planet. All other world religions teach methods whose objectives are to "escape this saha world"; a world which is characterized by suffering.  Here the term suffering indicates "fear of death", the illusion of non-existence.  The Mahayana, which began in earnest with the teachings of the spiritual poet Ashvagosha - who taught that the great pure Dharma is present in the world simultaneously and that the Buddha is always present eternally preaching the pure Dharma - (Oneness of Buddha and Dharma) was then established by his disciple Nagarjuna, who taught that "form is emptiness and emptiness is form", the oneness of the two types of truth, conventional and ultimate truth, the unity or oneness of the four noble truths.   

Speaking of Nagarjuna, certain research suggests that Nagarjuna made himself famous by taking the Buddhist philosophy of the equality of all beings into the Naga tribe, a lowly caste of people cast as "the serpant people" and taught them the wisdom of the Buddha. This would suggest that Nagarajuna was seeking to send a message to the people of his time concerning the practice of human discrimination.

The purpose of these teachings were to reveal that one can attain Buddhahood in ones present form and that one need not undergo countless aeons of austere practices as taught in the Bramin faith vedanta in order to do so. But if we were to consider the nature of causality as we experience it in the manifested realm it would appear that causes are made in the present and that effects are reaped in the future and that the effects we experience in the present derive from causes made at some point in the past in this life as well as past lifetimes. This apparent nature of "past, present and future" as it appears to our minds and how we as human beings then go about producing the history of our lives and the world produce a world of discrimination and uneven outcomes. It is as if we are governed by the effects of the "Big Bang", the unfolding of the existential laws which produce atoms and molecules and the periodic table of atomic elements.  But when we (the scientists among us)  ask ourselves, "well, what existed before the big bang?" there appears to be no reasonable way of describing reality in this state of existence other than to say "a state of potential".  The same mode of thinking of the matter also suggests that there is also no reasonable way of describing our lives after death or before birth either, accept maybe as a potential being latent within our parents gene pool. Yet in Mahayana Buddhisms there is the principle known as the "non-birth and non'death of the phenomena realm" or the true aspect of all phenomena.  Buddhism (and original theoretical vedanta) also teaches a principle known as the "eternal stream of consciousness".  In this regard in the most current thinking of the modern world we find that there is a convergence of thinking which believes that the unified field underlying the four forces of the universe, gravity, electromagnetism, weak nucleic and strong nucleic force is consciousness or the law of knowledge and information itself.

A universal law of logic, knowledge and information appears immanent in the universe.  Scientists also say that such laws are every where at all times and they are compatible and complement the nature and workings of our own minds.  Such information informs the structure of say DNA and other replicatable molecules. This is why the Buddha says that when one attains Buddhahood, one's own mind pervades the entire universe.

Gassho

The preaching of the Lotus Sutra represents the last leg of the Buddha's preaching life as it regards the revelations of Buddha wisdom or ultimate truth or transmundane truth, "paramartha".  This last leg concerns the true purpose of the Buddha's life, the true identity of the Buddha's life itself,  and the manner in which the Buddha perceived the causality of his own life, how he acquired the transmundane knowledge, knowledge of nirvana and the eternity of life. Yet for many people even those who have resolved to commit their lives to Buddhist practice the Lotus Sutra is not very well understood or acknowledged in the above manner.  To be sure, many web sites state that the Lotus Sutra is considered the final sermon of the Buddha, the Buddha's highest teaching or the most popular of all Buddhist scriptures in the East Asian world. But these are usually stated as merely an opnion of some but not all Buddhists.

To explain why this teaching is regarded as such we should consider the following.  Buddhism seeks to address the true nature of thought as an antidote to the causes of suffering. Here the term thought also can be substitued for the words phenomena or dharmas.  In this respect the Buddha taught that the cause of suffering is attachment to false dharmas; dilusional thoughts, words and actions which are committed on the basis of such dharmas or thoughts or "dhatus".  Of all thoughts analyzed and broken down to their constituent parts non is more difficult to understand and difficult to comprehend than the "Buddha dhatu" itself, the thought or Dharma which qualifies the correct teacher and teaching as "the Buddha" and Buddhism.  This Dharma is known as the Sad Dharma.

Buddhism seeks to iluminate upon the true nature of the person and the true nature of all things other than the person such that suffering and delusion is eliminated from the subjects life. This trajectory of thought grows ever deeper as the subjects are analyzed.  In the final analysis the principle to be perfectly understood concerns the "true aspect of all dharmas" and the true causality of the Buddha's life. This in itself is the subject of the Lotus Sutra as understood from the standpoint of the Buddha's own inner mind of wisdom. This teaching represents the culmination of the Buddha's philosophy of wisdom. Such is the reason why we find the statement in the 21st chapter of the Lotus Sutra, the chapter wherein the entirety of the Buddha's philosophy is transferred to the Buddha's closest disciples for the sake of all future generations. In this most important of all dialogues recorded in the Buddhist Mahayana sutras the Buddha makes the following all encompassing statement.

"Thereupon the Buddha addressed the great assembly of bodhisattvas,
beginning with Viśiṣṭacāritra:  

“The transcendent powers of the buddhas are as immeasurable, limitless,
and inconceivable as this. Yet if I were to use these transcendent powers
to teach the benefits of this sutra so that it would be entrusted to you for
immeasurable, limitless, hundreds of thousands of myriads of koṭis of incalculable
kalpas, I would not be able to reach the end of these qualities.

To sum up, in this sutra I have clearly revealed and taught all the teachings of
the Tathāgata, all the transcendent powers of the Tathāgata, all the treasure
houses of the hidden essence of the Tathāgata, and all the profound aspects
of the Tathāgata. For this reason, after the pari nirvāṇa of the Tathāgata, you
should wholeheartedly preserve, recite, explain, and copy it, and practice
according to the teaching. Those who accept, recite, explain, and copy it,
and practice according to the teaching, in whichever land they may be, in a
place where the sutra abides—either in a garden, a forest, under a tree, in a
monk’s chamber, in a layman’s house, in a palace, on a mountain, in a valley,
or in the wilderness—in all of these places they should erect and pay
homage to a monument. Why is this? Because you should know that these
places are the terraces of enlightenment where all the buddhas have attained
highest, complete enlightenment, where all the buddhas have turned the
wheel of the Dharma, and where all the buddhas entered parinirvāṇa.” LS ch21

Thereforfe the Lotus Sutra reveals the Buddha dhatu. The Dharma of the Buddha.  This highest Dharma as taught in the Nichiren school is Nam Myoho Renge Kyo.

In Buddhism there are four main subjects which must be mastered.  The course and subtle selflessness of persons and the coarse and subtle selflessness of dharmas. Another way in which this is stated is to say that the teachings to be mastered consist of the illusions of thought and desire (the selflessness of persons), the illusions innumerable as particles of dust and sand and illusions concerning the true aspect of the Buddha's own life. The Lotus Sutra addresses this last of most important teachings and serves as the final instruction to all Bodhisattvas.  Nichiren, the person who embodies the practices of Bodhisattva Visistacaritra in the later age, otherwise known as the specific manifestation of the devotees of the Sad - Dharma Pundarika Sutra indicates that the fundamental wisdom of the Buddha, the teaching by which all Buddha's attain their status as Buddhas is the eternal devotion to the eternal law, the Sad-Dharma or Lotus Sutra itself, the true entity that is the basis and fruit of all thoughts, dharmas and universal phenomena itself. Nichiren states that the fundamental law hidden in the depth of the Lotus Sutra is the seven character phrase known as Nam Myoho Renge Kyo. 

This teaching is exceedingly profound profound and the proported basis for the universal awakening of all sentient beings.  

Doctrinal proof that the Lotus Sutra expounds the true universal basis of all reality and the law of inner wisdom which illuminates the workings of the inner entity and function of our lives as revealed by the Buddha in that sutra can be found in the thousand year trail of exposition and commentaries on the profound meaning of the Sad-Dharma Pundarika Sutra beginning with the skillfull translations from Sanskrit to Chinese undertaken by Kumarajiva and his disciples.  It was Kumarajiva's translations which gave rise to the most authoritative Mahayana doctrines and the treatises of Nagarajuna and his disciple Aryadeva. These lead to the philosophical developments in Chinese Buddhism and in turn lead to the 8th century Japanese establishment of the Lotus Tendai school of Buddhism. This in turn leads four centuries later to the advent of Nichiren and the establishment of Nichiren BUddhism in the 13th century. 

All of Nichiren's doctrinal foundation, as indicated throughout all of his major writings, treatises and teachings contain the citations of the major sutras and treatises of official Buddhist doctrine and philosophy. Most importantly, Nichiren's own philosophical legacy derives from the threads of the Tien Tai Lotus tradition in China and the teachings of Tien Tai's teacher Yui Su of Mount Nan Yueh, Tien Tai and his disciple Chang Han and the 8th century commentaries of the 6th patriarch of the Tien Tai school, the Great teacher Miao-Lo. It was Miao-lo's direct disciple who trained the Japanese monks dispatched by the Emperor of Japan to obtain the official Chinese doctrines of the Chinese Tien Tai school to be braught back to Japan. 

All this to say,  Nichiren once wrote a letter during his second exile to a fellow exiled priest by the name of Sairen-bo Nichijo while on Sado Island in the fifth month of 1273. This letter has subsequently been given the title "The True Aspect of all Phnomena".  For some reason Sairen-bo was also in exile on Sado Island, where he had been converted by Nichiren in the second month of year. Sairenbo a former Tendai priest, already knew something about “the true aspect of all phenomena”; as I stated above it was a fundamental concept in the Tendai school of Buddhism. He could not, however, satisfactorily come to grips with this concept through T’ien-t’ai’s theory alone, so he asked the Daishonin for an explanation. The True Aspect of All Phenomena is the Daishonin’s reply. In this letter, after the priest asks Nichiren the meaning of the passage in the 2nd chapter of the Lotus Sutra Nichiren responds by stating the following reply.

Question - The “Expedient Means” chapter in the first volume of the Lotus Sutra states, “The true aspect of all phenomena [can only be understood and shared between Buddhas. This reality consists of the appearance, nature . . . and] their consistency from beginning to end.” What does this passage mean?

Answer: It means that all beings and environments in the Ten Worlds, from hell, the lowest, to Buddhahood, the highest, are without exception manifestations of Myoho-renge-kyo. If there is an environment, living beings are bound to dwell there. A commentary states, “Living beings and their environments always manifest Myoho-renge-kyo.”1 Another says: “The true aspect invariablymanifests in all phenomena, and all phenomena invariably manifest in the ten factors. The ten factors invariably manifest in the Ten Worlds, and the Ten Worlds invariably manifest in life and its environment.”2

The above pasages make clear that the lives of all living beings inherently possess the Buddha nature or seeds of Buddhahood and this Buddha nature is itself the latent potential for realizing the true aspect of our own lives and the true nature of life and reality.  This fact is the basis which provides the potential that enables all living beings to attain Buddhahood. In other words the very fact that we exist and function as living beings with conscious knowledge of the functions of self and envrionment is itself the manifestation of the law of the great universe and this alone indicates that we possess the Buddha nature within our own being. Science seeks to identify the laws which govern the body in a sort of objective quantifiable and detached way apart from the self that is doing the analyzing.  But this approach is like peeling away at an onion seeking to discover some kind of core at the center of the onion or like deconstructing the atom into subatomic particles only to find that matter and energy are a single entity.  At the core of all matter is energy divided by the speed of light squared.   This is the teaching found at the core of the Lotus Sutra. The core energy of life is transmitted from life to life in an unbroken chain since the infinite past.  The Buddha's enlightenment in the infinite past is based upon this realization.  

Just as all people at the moment of death can recall their entire lifetime of good and evil deeds in a single moment of thought, the Buddha percieves the true aspect of all phenomena / dharmas / thougts / things and events in a single thought moment.  This is the essential quality of the Buddha's wisdom. In this respect the Buddha percieves the true aspect of the life of the universe, the universal law of life itself. This is a wonderous thing and constitutes the actual inner liberation available to all living beings. It is the kind of wisdom wherein the very quntum particles that make up ones own being are thoroughly understood in their remotest primordial origin.

This is the meaning of the following three phrases.

1- The 28 chapter Lotus Sutra constitutes the unpacking of the Buddha true wisdom of self and other and the natural environment.

2- It is the meaning of the principle "three thousand realms in a single moment of thought".

3- It is the meaning of the phrase Nam Myoho Renge Kyo.

The Lotus Sutra encompasses the entire preparation, revelation and transmission of the Buddha's deepest qualities of thought to all disciples. These qualities encompass the deepest insights regarding the true meaning and purpose of life. The fact that the Buddha can now share directly the Buddha wisdom with his true disciples in this sutra indicates that the disciples themselves had reached full maturity and were now able to share equally in the Buddha's wisdom. This is why the Buddha in the second chapter of the Lotus Sutra states,

Many scholars who study Buddhism remain confused about the true meaning behind the various teachings of Buddhism such as the hinayana and mahayana sutras.  The Lotus Sutra is a genuine sutra which depicts the time period and transmission of the correct wisdom of the Buddha between the Buddha and his disciples. Where it not for the existence of such a document recording the transmission of the correct Buddha wisdom between the Buddha and his disciples there would be no actual evidence that the pure Buddha wisdom was transmitted from one life to another life thereby transmitting the Buddha wisdom to future generations. This is known as the transmission of the heritage of the Law.

Most people are unaware of the significance of the fact that in the Lotus Sutra the three kinds of Buddha's make appearance in a single place, right here in the mundane world. This semiotic expression seeks to convey the true qualities of the Buddha's super high consciousness and awareness of the nature of mind and reality: the actual kiind of exalted flesh and blood human being that he was.  The great teacher Tien Tai explains the appearance of the three kinds of Buddha's as representing 1) the objective reality of life and the universe as it is, 2) the subjective state of wisdom regarding this true reality within the person of Shakyamuni Buddha, and 3) the awareness that the Buddha had in his ability to project and transmit his wisdom accurately within the life of all disciples; ie the non-dual mind shared between two or more persons of the Buddha's exalted wisdom.  The Lotus Sutra records such an actual gathering in the Buddha's mode of universal awareness. The purpose of this simili is to project the possibility that such potential can actually manifest when people sincerely practice the Buddha's correct teaching.  This is called the oneness of mentor and disciple and the principle of many in body yet one in mind. Nichiren states tnat this transmission is recorded as the following event.

Thereupon the Buddha addressed the great assembly of bodhisattvas,
beginning with Viśiṣṭacāritra:

“The transcendent powers of the buddhas are as immeasurable, limitless,
and inconceivable as this. Yet if I were to use these transcendent powers
to teach the benefits of this sutra so that it would be entrusted to you for
immeasurable, limitless, hundreds of thousands of myriads of koṭis of incalculable
kalpas, I would not be able to reach the end of these qualities. To
sum up, in this sutra I have clearly revealed and taught all the teachings of
the Tathāgata, all the transcendent powers of the Tathāgata, all the treasure
houses of the hidden essence of the Tathāgata, and all the profound aspects
of the Tathāgata. For this reason, after the pari nirvāṇa of the Tathāgata, you
should wholeheartedly preserve, recite, explain, and copy it, and practice
according to the teaching. Those who accept, recite, explain, and copy it,
and practice according to the teaching, in whichever land they may be, in a
place where the sutra abides—either in a garden, a forest, under a tree, in a
monk’s chamber, in a layman’s house, in a palace, on a mountain, in a valley,
or in the wilderness—in all of these places they should erect and pay
homage to a monument. Why is this? Because you should know that these
places are the terraces of enlightenment where all the buddhas have attained
highest, complete enlightenment, where all the buddhas have turned the
wheel of the Dharma, and where all the buddhas entered parinirvāṇa.”

The above expressions are exceedingly sacred and profound expressions of Buddhist philosophy.  They serve to underscore the principle importance of the Lotus Sutra as the doctrine which records the transmission of the Buddha's Law to all disciples for the sake of the future tranmission of the Buddha's Law of wisdom with correct purity of insight and sheer integrity befitting its importance to the future happiness and security for all mankind.  

The specific person to whom the Buddha confers the transmission of the wisdom of the Lotus Sutra is the Bodhisattva Visistracaritra.  This is known as the one to one or specific transmission. In the very words of the Lotus Sutra, this Bodhisattva is the leader of the Buddha's true disciples, the disciples who make appearance in the 15th chapter when the Buddha reveals his true identity as a being whose enlightemment was obtained in the infinite past. Here the term "infinite past" is meant to convey the correct transcendental quality of the Buddha's inner state of life. In other words, at the time at which the Buddha reveals and transmits his enlightened wisdom to other beings, all beings are those who are "present at that time" and are utterly equal in stature, non-dual in their wisdom and sharing in a heritage of wisdom that is unbroken since the infinite past.  (www.sgilibrary.org/pdf/029_0216.pdf).  In this instance the main point is to fully grasp that the cognitive framework in which this ceremony of transmission is taking place is one in which all relativity of time and space has been transcended. This is why the 21st chapter of the Lotus Sutra is called "The Transcendental Powers of the Thus Come One".

Any school of Buddhism that ignores this most significant of all Buddhist doctrines has lost site of the Buddhas true purpose and teaching, their own point of teaching and practice and has been reduced by the strength of opposing historical forces into a self preserving insitution for its own internal egocentric sake.  This was Nichiren's revolutionary insight derived from the words and wisdom of the Lotus Sutra.

And why do you think that is?

Exactly.