Here in Chapter Two, [the Buddha] provides a commentary on his own earlier teachings, looking back on the teaching of what he had taught long ago, accounting for it, and almost renouncing it. Central to this retelling is the claim that had befuddled Śāriputra and the other arhats: that the apparent division of the Buddha’s teaching into three vehicles was the Buddha’s “skillful means” that lead ultimately to the one buddha vehicle. In the words of the great Chinese exegete Zhiyi, the Lotus “opens the three vehicles to reveal the one vehicle.” The sūtra’s initial declaration of this teaching appears here in the second chapter and is further elaborated in Chapters Three through Nine by means of parables and other explanations. In Zhiyi’s analysis, these eight chapters together constitute the “main exposition” section of the sutra’s first half or trace teaching (shakumon in Japanese). They may also represent the earliest stratum of the sūtra’s compilation.