金剛經纂要刊定記 2.10

2.10

As for "responding to requests": when the Buddha first attained the Way, Brahma, Indra, and others requested him to turn the wheel of the Dharma. Thus the Lotus Sūtra says: "At that time the Brahmā kings, the heavenly Indras, the four heavenly kings who protect the world, and Maheśvara, along with the rest of the heavenly hosts, their retinues in the hundreds of thousands of myriads, reverently joined their palms in obeisance and requested me to turn the wheel of the Dharma." The Tathāgata accepted the request in silence. Having accepted their request, beginning in the Deer Park and ending in the Crane Forest, for forty-nine years he expounded the various sūtras and teachings to rescue sentient beings. Thus the Lotus Sūtra says: "Then in Vārāṇasī I turned the wheel of the Dharma of the four truths," and so forth.