Śāriputra, who felt like dancing with joy …

From this phrase to the beginning of [the parable of] “the burning house” there are altogether three segments explaining the purport. The first [segment] explains that Śāriputra has achieved understanding within himself and issues outward what he has comprehended. Because his doubts, arisen earlier, were serious, his anxiety and worry were very deep. Now, the first [among the congregation] enlightened to the One Vehicle, he expressed his pleasure, saying that he wanted to dance for joy. Unable to get over his pleasure, he could not help saying so. It is shown here that, by resort to the traces, [the Buddha] exigently draws [the attention of] the congregation of the moment, making the collective sentiment at the time deeply earnest.

In faculties there is [the distinction between] keeness and dullness: it follows that in enlightenment there is [the differences between those who can be awakened] early and [those who can only be awakened] late. [The Buddha] hitherto has made a presentation of the Dharma Blossom in a straightforward way, and those disciples with keen faculties have obtained an understanding of it, [as shown] in the preceding. Those who are dull have not been awakened yet. Thus [the Buddha] will explain it by resort to a parable. li is so profound and unfathomable that it is difficult to grasp it in one encounter. Therefore, [the Buddha] by evervarying adaptation, resorts to worldly things (shih) and images to depict his recondite purport. The worldly things borrowed to be analogized with li are referred to as parable.

I for the first time sat at the place of enlightenment[,]
[And attained enlightenment].
For three weeks afterwards,
I gazed on the tree,
Or walked about, thinking:
“The wisdom I obtained is
The most wonderful and excellent.
The living beings [of the six regions]
Are dull, attached to pleasures,
And blinded by stupidity.
How shall I save them?”

The fact that for the first seven days [the Buddha] “beheld the
Tree,” means that he intended to express his desire to requite the favors [he had received]. That he “walked about” for the intermediate seven days means that as [the future Buddha], while walking around [in meditation], [he] perfected the Tao under the shady trees; these favors thereby must have been requited. For the final seven days, he meditated on how to ferry the multitudinous beings across [to the other shore]. [Then] the Brahmā king begged [the Buddha] to turn the Dharma [wheel]. Perceiving (or stimulated by) (kan) [this request] [the Buddha] gave him transformative instruction.

The Leading Teachers expound the Dharma with expedients
After realizing at the place of enlightenment:
“This is the abode of the Dharma and the position of the Dharma.
The reality of the world is permanently as it is.”

This articulates what was said earlier, [namely, the passage] “know that the dharmas are ever without a nature of their own (svabhāva).” In this way, therefore, they came to “know that [the dharmas] are without a nature of their own.”

The Buddhas, the Most Honorable Bipeds,
Expound the One Vehicle because they know:
“All things are devoid of substantiality.
The seed of Buddhahood comes from dependent origination.”

[This refers to] the doctrine of the [supreme or highest] emptiness suggesting that li is the nondual ultimate.

The Buddha provides the conditions (pratyaya) for li to arise. Now that li is not dual, how can it afford to be threefold? “For this reason they preach the One Vehicle.”

Those who bowed to the image of the Buddha,
Or just joined their hands together towards it,
Or raised only one hand towards it,
Or bent their head a little towards it
And offered the bending to it,
Became able to see innumerable Buddhas one after another.

What is shown in this and following paragraphs is that beings in the time of the past Buddhas planted the good seeds; one tiny part of one kind of good deed after another, they were all accumulated to perfect the Tao.

All those Great Saintly Masters
Who knew the deep desires
Of the gods, men, and other living beings
Of all the worlds,
Revealed the Highest Truth [Prime Meaning]
With various expedients.

li is originally of the unspeakable [nature]. He has borrowed words to speak about it. They are called [expedient] devices (upāya). Again, the two vehicles are employed as [teaching] aids for transforming them (beings). They are called other [expedient] devices. The One Vehicle is so deep that it has to rely on them to be manifested. According to one theory, what was preached [by the Buddha] for forty-nine years belong to expedient devices. The subject of the present preaching, the Dharma Blossom (or Lotus), belongs to “other [expedient] devices.”

Through their consecutive previous existences,
Their small embryos have continued to grow up
To become men of few virtues and merits.

[Hurwitz: That, receiving the frail form of a foetus,
For generation after generation they would constantly grow;]

Being within the delusion of the three realms, they are referred to as frail. Only the Dharma-body (-kāya) is great.

Some bhikṣus who live in a period in which no Buddha lives after my extinction may not believe the Dharma after they attain Arhatship because in that period it will be difficult to meet a person who keeps, reads, and recites this sūtra, and understands the meanings of it. They will be able to understand the Dharma when they meet another Buddha.

[For the interim period] between two Sages, when there is no Sage-Lord, unbelief may prevail. If one lives when a Buddha is present, one is certain to have faith and no doubts. Contemporary men have been taken unwittingly to where the Buddha is present, so there should be no [trace of] unbelief.

“Śāriputra! Some disciples of mine, who think that they are Arhats or Pratyekabuddhas, will not be my disciples or Arhats or Pratyekabuddhas if they do not hear or know that the Buddhas, the Tathāgatas, teach only Bodhisattvas.”

Wishing the Tao to prevail in the world, how can [the Buddha] not explain the distinction between attainment and loss, advising men to do away with [the cause of] loss and to follow [that of] attainment? If one calls oneself an arhat but does not know that the Buddha is [in the world] solely for converting [potential] bodhisattvas, one is not an arhat [in the true sense of the word]. One is then a man of error and loss. When a man is able to keep this sūtra, he can be said to have attained [the arhatship].