Do Aliens Chant “Namu Myoho Renge Kyo” Too? A Reality Check for a Cosmic-Scale Religion

The other day, I was watching a video about religions in the Nichiren Buddhist tradition when a rather intriguing question came up.

“Do aliens chant ‘Namu Myoho Renge Kyo’ too?”

Now that is a question on a grand scale.

Religions in the Nichiren tradition sometimes describe “Namu Myoho Renge Kyo”—a chant expressing devotion to the Lotus Sutra—as connected to the fundamental law of the universe or a universal truth.

If it is the fundamental law of the universe, then naturally it cannot apply only to Earth.

This is where my own question begins: Do aliens living in some faraway galaxy also face a Buddhist altar every morning and chant “Namu Myoho Renge Kyo”?

It is quite a surreal scene to imagine.

Do Aliens Know Chinese Characters?

To begin with, the phrase “Namu Myoho Renge Kyo” itself is deeply dependent on Earth’s history and cultures.

“Namu” comes from an ancient Indian language, while “Myoho Renge Kyo” is the Chinese translation of the Sanskrit title of a Buddhist scripture.

In other words, the phrase could exist only because Buddhism arose in India, its scriptures were translated in China, and Nichiren—a thirteenth-century Japanese Buddhist monk—later promoted it in Japan as a daimoku, or sacred phrase for chanting.

So did aliens go through the same history?

Did the aliens have an India and a China of their own, followed by Kumarajiva—the Buddhist translator whose Chinese version of the Lotus Sutra became highly influential—and finally Nichiren?

Apparently, the aliens’ language also belongs to the same Chinese-character cultural sphere.

For a fundamental law of the universe, it seems remarkably well versed in Earth’s local affairs.

Do Aliens Even Have Mouths?

There is an even more fundamental problem.

There is no reason to assume that aliens can produce sounds the way humans do.

They may not have mouths. They may communicate through light or electrical signals rather than sound. They may even be organisms with no need to communicate with one another at all.

Such beings would be understandably confused if told, “You must chant Namu Myoho Renge Kyo.”

From an alien’s point of view, the first response would be, “Could you start by explaining this organ you call a mouth?”

Then again, the religion might respond flexibly.

“Aliens chant it silently in their minds.”

I see. Then what about aliens without minds?

“Because it is the truth of the universe, their very existence is chanting it.”

At that point, the theory becomes invincible.

A theory that can explain anything anyone throws at it is, viewed from the other side, the same as a theory that explains nothing.

Is It a Universal Truth or an Earth Culture?

There is nothing strange about the possibility that universal laws exist throughout the cosmos.

Gravity and electromagnetism follow essentially the same laws both on Earth and in distant galaxies.

But that does not mean aliens need to know Newton’s name.

Likewise, even if Buddhism has grasped some kind of universal truth, that gives aliens no reason to know the Japanese chant “Namu Myoho Renge Kyo.”

Once those two ideas are confused, the argument immediately becomes absurd.

Claiming to have discovered a universal truth and claiming that the same religion is practiced everywhere in the universe are two entirely different things.

The original video went on to propose the mysterious theory that waves in quantum mechanics match the rhythm of “Namu Myoho Renge Kyo,” but it was far too stupid to repeat here.

Will the Day Come When We Proselytize to Aliens?

If humanity truly makes contact with aliens one day, how will religious communities respond?

Do aliens possess Buddha-nature? Can aliens attain Buddhahood? Is there any need to spread Buddhism to aliens in the first place?

Once you start thinking about it, the questions never end.

But something else concerns me most of all.

What would happen if aliens arrived on Earth and, with their very first words, began chanting “Namu Myoho Renge Kyo” in fluent Japanese?

People involved in Nichiren-affiliated religions would be overjoyed. At last, they would say, the truth of the universe had been proven.

But my first suspicion would be this:

“Are you really an alien? You aren’t someone in a costume planted here by a religious organization, are you?”