At that instant the Sahā-World was purified. The ground of the world became lapis lazuli. The world was adorned with jeweled trees. The eight roads were marked off by ropes of gold. The towns, villages, cities, oceans, rivers, mountains, forests and thickets were eliminated. The incense of great treasures was burned; mandārava flowers, strewn over the ground; and jeweled nets and curtains with jeweled bells, hung over the world. The gods and men were removed to other worlds except those who were in the congregation.

The purpose of showing all the dirt and evils removed, gods and men cast away, leading to the point when flowers and incense are offered, is to suggest indirectly that evil certainly can be destroyed and good cultivated.

Śākyamuni Buddha again purified two hundred billion nayuta more worlds of each of the eight quarters [neighboring the expanded world] to seat all the Buddhas of his replicas.

If he wanted to accommodate all the Buddhas, who were emanations of [that Buddha’s] body, he would appropriately prepare and purify the realms [immediately], making it suffice for beings to accept [the Buddha’s original thesis]. [But] why did he conjure them up gradually? The reason for doing this is as follows: [The Buddha] wants to give expression to the thesis that li cannot be reached at once; the coarse should be ground until it is fine; it must be decreased further and further, until it comes to the point of no decrease.

[The Sahā-World and] the four hundred billion nayuta worlds of each of the eight quarters[, which were amalgamated into one Buddha world,]

This is designed to express [the idea] that although there are causes, different in myriad ways, they result in one single effect.