Following today’s recitation of The Sutra of Innumerable Meanings, I offer Nikkyō Niwano’s discussion of the Buddha’s teaching for Bodhisattvas in Chapter 2: Preaching [Dharma Discourse]:

The six worlds continually occur in man’s mind and shift from one to another. This state of mind is called “transmigration within the six worlds” (rokudō rinne). If we have no good teaching and no way of practice, we permanently transmigrate within the six worlds, and our distresses and sufferings will never disappear. Anyone will realize this as soon as he reflects on himself.

The Buddha taught the bodhisattvas as follows: “When you, bodhisattva-mahāsattvas, observe all the living beings who are transmigrating within the six realms of existence, you should raise the mind of compassion and display great mercy so as to relieve them from such realms. First, you must penetrate deeply into all the laws. If you understand them deeply, you can realize naturally what may emerge from them in the future. You can also realize that they remain settled, without changing, for a time. You can also realize that they change. Moreover, you can realize that they eventually vanish. Thus you can observe and know the reasons that good and evil laws emerge. Having finished observing and knowing all four aspects of the laws from beginning to end, next you should observe that none of the laws remains settled for even a moment, but emerges and vanishes anew every moment. After such observations, you can know the capacity, the nature, and the desires that each living being possesses as if you had penetrated each of their minds.”