This letter was written at Minobu to Nanjō Shichirō Jirō, commonly known as Nanjō Tokimitsu, in the second month, 1282, when Nichiren Daishonin himself was seriously ill. When he was in his teens, Tokimitsu had assumed his deceased father’s duties as steward of the Ueno district, which covered a vast area on one side of Mount Fuji. Particularly during the Atsuhara Persecution, Tokimitsu had made many sacrifices in order to defend the Daishonin’s followers who lived in his domains. For his...

In this reply to Nichinyo, Nichiren Daishonin expresses his gratitude for her offerings to the Gohonzon and explains the significance of the object of devotion. The exact identity of Nichinyo is unclear. She is thought to have been either the wife of Ikegami Munenaka, the older of the Ikegami brothers, or a daughter of the lay priest Matsuno Rokurō Saemon, an earnest believer in Suruga Province. Judging from two letters the Daishonin sent her, she seems to have been a woman of good education...

This letter was written at Ichinosawa on Sado Island in the fifth month, 1273, to Gijō-bō, who had been the Daishonin’s senior at Seichō-ji temple in Awa Province. Nearly a month earlier, Nichiren Daishonin had written The Object of Devotion for Observing the Mind, in which he had explained both the object of devotion in terms of the Law and the correct practice for attaining enlightenment in the Latter Day. This letter briefly restates the profound contents of The Object of Devotion for...

This letter was written at Minobu in the ninth month of 1277 and addressed to Shijō Nakatsukasa Saburō Saemon-no-jō Yorimoto, commonly known as Shijō Kingo, in Kamakura. Sometime around 1274, Shijō Kingo had begun making efforts to convert his lord, who was named Ema, to the Daishonin’s teachings. Lord Ema, however, did not respond positively. Instead, he reduced the size of Kingo’s landholdings and threatened to send him to the remote province of Echigo. Kingo’s colleagues spread scurrilous...

In the first month of the twelfth year of Bun’ei (1275), Nichigen-nyo, the wife of Shijō Kingo, informed Nichiren Daishonin that she had turned p.465thirty-three, an age thought to be unlucky for women, and sent offerings. This letter, dated the twenty-seventh day of the same month, is the Daishonin’s reply. In response to Nichigen-nyo’s apprehensions, he assures her that a woman who embraces the Lotus Sutra surpasses all other people, and that, if her faith is strong, she will certainly be...

This short letter is one of thirty-seven still extant writings addressed by Nichiren Daishonin to his faithful disciple Shijō Kingo. Kingo was under great pressure from his lord, Ema, and other fellow warriors to renounce his support for the Daishonin. This letter was written to encourage Kingo and to strengthen his resolve. https://www.nichirenlibrary.org/en/wnd-1/Content/56

This letter is dated the third day of the ninth month, with no year indicated, though it is believed to be 1275, a year and a half after the Daishonin’s return from exile on Sado Island. It is addressed to the lay nun Sennichi, the wife of Abutsu-bō. The letter is a reply to a question the lay nun has asked about the effects of different degrees of slander against the correct teaching. The Daishonin says, “If a believer’s offense is slight, overlook it, and lead that person to obtain...

Nichiren Daishonin wrote this letter on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month of what is thought to have been 1276. The letter is a reply, it is generally believed, to Toki Jōnin, who had apparently written about a dream in which some danger to the Daishonin and his followers was revealed by the ten demon daughters. After thanking Toki for the offering he had also sent, the Daishonin refers to the Buddhist principle that if one’s mind is strong, the protection of the deities Same Name...

This is a letter of thanks written by Nichiren Daishonin on the fourth day of the fifth month in 1280. The lay nun Myōshin had sent the Daishonin offerings from her home in Suruga Province for the benefit of her deceased husband. The Daishonin assures her that the word myō of the daimoku she chants will act as an emissary and carry news about her and her children to her late husband. Moreover, he explains, the character myō is not only the cluster of all benefits but also the wish-granting...

In the fourth month of the ninth year of Bun’ei (1272), Shijō Kingo traveled from Kamakura to Sado Island to visit Nichiren Daishonin. Kingo was a samurai who served the Ema family, a branch of the ruling Hōjō clan. The journey to Sado was a long, arduous one, involving a boat trip across the Sea of Japan, and required that he absent himself from his duties in Kamakura for more than a month. In the fifth month of the same year, soon after Shijō Kingo returned to Kamakura,...

Nichiren Daishonin wrote this letter at Minobu to Nanjō Tokimitsu, the steward of Ueno Village in Suruga Province, in the second month of the fourth year of Kenji (1278). The previous year had been a time of turmoil. A serious drought had devastated crops, and the resulting famine brought countless hardships. In addition, an epidemic had swept the area, causing many deaths. At the same time, the threat of a second invasion by Mongol forces contributed to a general feeling of unease. In...

This letter was written at Minobu in the eleventh month of the fourth year of Kōan (1281) to the lay nun Ueno, the mother of Nanjō Tokimitsu. The Daishonin was sixty years old when he sent this letter acknowledging the offerings she had made to commemorate the anniversary of the death of her father, the lay priest Matsuno Rokurō Saemon. The lay nun Ueno’s husband was Nanjō Hyōe Shichirō, the steward of Ueno Village in Suruga Province. Her name, Ueno, derived from Ueno Village. She had nine...

This letter was written at Minobu in the fifth month of the third year of Kōan (1280). The lay nun Myōichi was a relative of Nisshō, one of Nichiren Daishonin’s six senior disciples, and lived in Kamakura. She was an earnest believer and fairly well educated, but suffered from poor health. Her husband was also a believer, and their fief was confiscated because of their faith. After her husband died, the lay nun was left with two small children, but despite her many difficulties, she remained...

Nichiren Daishonin wrote this letter in the second month of 1280 to NiikeSaemon-no-jō, an official in the Kamakura shogunate. Niike was from NiikeVillage in Iwata District of Tōtōmi Province. He and his wife had been converted to the Daishonin’s teachings by Nikkō and had maintained their faith despite government pressure. First, Nichiren Daishonin tells Niike what great fortune it is to have been born in the Latter Day of the Law with the mission to spread the correct teaching of Buddhism...

In the third month of 1275, about one year before this letter was written, Nichiren Daishonin warned Shijō Kingo, his loyal samurai follower who was an early convert, that as a practitioner of the Lotus Sutra he must be prepared to meet further difficulties and hardships. In the present work, the Daishonin explains the nature of true happiness. It lies, he says, in chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo. Suffering is unavoidable, he adds, encouraging Shijō Kingo to “regard both suffering and joy as...

In the eighth month of 1260, infuriated by Nichiren Daishonin’s refutation of the Pure Land school in his On Establishing the Correct Teaching for the Peace of the Land, a group of Nembutsu followers attacked his dwelling at Nagoe in Kamakura. The Daishonin narrowly escaped and went to the home of his loyal disciple Toki Jōnin in Shimōsa Province. In the spring of 1261, however, he returned to Kamakura and resumed his propagation efforts. On the twelfth day of the fifth month, 1261,...

Nichiren Daishonin wrote this letter at Kamakura in the first year of Kōchō (1261), about two weeks before he was exiled to Itō in Izu. Virtually nothing is known about the recipient, Shiiji Shirō, other than that he lived in the province of Suruga and was acquainted with two of the Daishonin’s leading disciples, Shijō Kingo and Toki Jōnin. The title of this letter is drawn from a passage in the “Medicine King” chapter of the Lotus Sutra that speaks of “a ship in which to cross the water.”...

This letter was written to Toki Jōnin in the seventh year of Kenchō (1255), two years after Nichiren Daishonin established his teaching of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo. At the time of this letter, the Daishonin was thirty-four years old and was living in Kamakura, the seat of the military government. Toki was a staunch follower of the Daishonin who lived in Wakamiya in Shimōsa Province. He received some thirty letters, including Letter from Sado and one of the major treatises, The Object of Devotion...