Obstacles Make Us Stronger

Ikeda Sensei comments on the passages “When I think that … the Buddha prophesied that that person would encounter persecution, I cannot possibly express my joy” and “For anyone born human, what greater joy could there be?” (“The Four Debts of Gratitude,” The Writings of Nichiren Daishonin, vol. 1, pp. 42–43):

This shows how

expansive Nichiren's life was, so much so that he could regard meeting persecution for the sake of the Lotus Sutra as a supreme joy.

On the other hand are the rulers, who had persecuted him despite his complete innocence. Of them, Nichiren says, “I have … encountered a ruler who will enable me to free myself in my present existence from the sufferings of birth and death” (WND-1, 44). He goes so far as to express gratitude to the ruler as someone “to whom I owe the most profound debt of gratitude” (WND-1, 43) for having made it possible to carry out his practice for attaining Buddhahood. Utterly indomitable, he maintains his supreme humanity.

With each persecution, Nichiren became stronger, more formidable. That's because as he struggled, staking his very life, against each act of oppression, he brought forth from within the life force of the Buddha, or Thus Come One.8