Chinese Æsop:

At that time Shariputra said to the Buddha: "World-Honored One, now I have no mere doubts or regrets. In person I have received from the Buddha this prophecy that I will attain anuttara-samyak-sambodhi. These twelve hundred persons here whose minds are free--in the past they remained at the level of learning, and the Buddha constantly taught and converted them, saying, ‘My Law can free you from birth, old age, sickness and death and enable you to last to achieve nirvana.’ These persons, some of whom were still learning and some who had completed their learning, each believing that, because he had shed his views of ‘self,’ and also his views of ‘existing’ and ‘not existing,’ he had attained nirvana. But now from the World-Honored One they hear that they had never heard before, and all have fallen into doubt and perplexity. "Very well, World-Honored One. I beg that for the sake of the four kinds of believers you will explain the causes and conditions and make it possible for