妙法蓮華經玄義 10.89

10.89

However, the teaching purports of the two sūtras are identical from beginning to end. Just as the *Lotus Sūtra* has three cycles of expounding the Dharma, settling the śrāvakas and bringing them all back to the one reality, and afterwards opens the near and reveals the distant to clarify the affairs of bodhisattvas; the *Nirvāṇa Sūtra* is also like this: first surpassing the three cultivations, settling the śrāvakas, and entering the secret storehouse, and afterwards through the thirty-six questions clarifying the affairs of bodhisattvas. Furthermore, when the *Nirvāṇa Sūtra* was on the verge of extinction, it additionally supported the Tripiṭaka and gave admonitions for the future, so that the dull-witted in the final age would not give rise to nihilistic views regarding the Buddha-Dharma; it extensively opened the principle of permanence to shatter these inversions, causing the Buddha-Dharma to abide long. In matters such as these, their purports differ; but in the fifth [flavor of] ghee, the flavor of Buddha-nature is identical.