Chinese Literature Part 48

On this hill hazels grow luxuriantly; and there are many lions, tigers, and wolves, so that people should not travel incautiously.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV

~On the Way Returning to Patna~

Fa-Hien returned from here towards Pataliputtra, keeping along the course of the Ganges and descending in the direction of the west. After going ten yojanas he found a vihara, named "The Wilderness"--a place where Buddha had dwelt, and where there are monks now.

Pursuing the same course, and going still to the west, he arrived, after twelve yojanas, at the city of Varanasi in the kingdom of Kasi. Rather more than ten li to the northeast of the city, he found the vihara in the park of "The rishi's Deer-wild." [1] In this park there formerly resided a Pratyeka Buddha, with whom the deer were regularly in the habit of stopping for the night. When the World-honored one was about to attain to perfect Wisdom, the devas sang in the sky, "The son of king Suddhodana, having quitted his family and studied the Path of Wisdom, will now in seven days become Buddha." The Pratyeka Buddha heard their words, and immediately attained to nirvana; and hence this place was named "The Park of the rishi's Deer-wild." After the World-honored one had attained to perfect Wisdom, men built the vihara in it.

Buddha wished to convert Kaundinya and his four companions; but they, being aware of his intention, said to one another, "This Sramana Gotama [2] for six years continued in the practice of painful austerities, eating daily only a single hemp-seed, and one grain of rice, without attaining to the Path of Wisdom; how much less will he do so now that he has entered again among men, and is giving the reins to the indulgence of his body, his speech, and his thoughts! What has he to do with the Path of Wisdom? To-day, when he comes to us, let us be on our guard not to speak with him." At the places where the five men all rose up, and respectfully saluted Buddha, when he came to them; where, sixty paces north from this, he sat with his face to the east, and first turned the wheel of the Law, converting Kaundinya and the four others; where, twenty paces further to the north, he delivered his prophecy concerning Maitreya; and where, at a distance of fifty paces to the south, the dragon Elapattra asked him, "When shall I get free from this naga body?"--at all these places topes were reared, and are still existing.

In the park there are two monasteries, in both of which there are monks residing.

When you go northwest from the vihara of the Deer-wild park for thirteen yojanas, there is a kingdom named Kausambi. Its vihara is named Ghochiravana--a place where Buddha formerly resided. Now, as of old, there is a company of monks there, most of whom are students of the hinayana.

East from this, when you have travelled eight yojanas, is the place where Buddha converted the evil demon. There, and where he walked in meditation and sat at the place which was his regular abode, there have been topes erected. There is also a monastery, which may contain more than a hundred monks.

[Footnote 1: "The rishi," says Eitel, "is a man whose bodily frame has undergone a certain transformation by dint of meditation and asceticism, so that he is, for an indefinite period, exempt from decrepitude, age, and death. As this period is believed to extend far beyond the usual duration of human life, such persons are called, and popularly believed to be, immortals." Rishis are divided into various cla.s.ses; and rishi-ism is spoken of as a seventh path of transrotation, and rishis are referred to as the seventh cla.s.s of sentient beings.]

[Footnote 2: This is the only instance in Fa-hien's text where the Bodhisattva or Buddha is called by the surname "Gotama." For the most part our traveller uses Buddha as a proper name, though it properly means "The Enlightened." He uses also the combinations "Sakya Buddha,"

which means "The Buddha of the Sakya tribe," and "Sakyamuni," which means "The Sakya sage." This last is the most common designation of the Buddha in China. Among other Buddhistic peoples "Gotama" and "Gotama Buddha" are the more frequent designations.]

CHAPTER x.x.xV

~Dakshina, and the Pigeon Monastery~

South from this two hundred yojanas, there is a country named Dakshina, where there is a monastery dedicated to the by-gone Kasyapa Buddha, and which has been hewn out from a large hill of rock. It consists in all of five stories;--the lowest, having the form of an elephant, with five hundred apartments in the rock; the second, having the form of a lion, with four hundred apartments; the third, having the form of a horse, with three hundred apartments; the fourth, having the form of an ox, with two hundred apartments; and the fifth, having the form of a pigeon, with one hundred apartments. At the very top there is a spring, the water of which, always in front of the apartments in the rock, goes round among the rooms, now circling, now curving, till in this way it arrives at the lowest story, having followed the shape of the structure, and flows out there at the door. Everywhere in the apartments of the monks, the rock has been pierced so as to form windows for the admission of light, so that they are all bright, without any being left in darkness. At the four corners of the tiers of apartments, the rock has been hewn so as to form steps for ascending to the top of each. The men of the present day, being of small size, and going up step by step, manage to get to the top; but in a former age they did so at one step.

Because of this, the monastery is called Paravata, that being the Indian name for a pigeon. There are always Arhats residing in it.

The country about is a tract of uncultivated hillocks, without inhabitants. At a very long distance from the hill there are villages, where the people all have bad and erroneous views, and do not know the Sramanas of the Law of Buddha, Brahmanas, or devotees of any of the other and different schools. The people of that country are constantly seeing men on the wing, who come and enter this monastery. On one occasion, when devotees of various countries came to perform their worship at it, the people of those villages said to them, "Why do you not fly? The devotees whom we have seen hereabouts all fly"; and the strangers answered, on the spur of the moment, "Our wings are not yet fully formed."

The kingdom of Dakshina is out of the way, and perilous to traverse.

There are difficulties in connection with the roads; but those who know how to manage such difficulties and wish to proceed should bring with them money and various articles, and give them to the king. He will then send men to escort them. These will, at different stages, pa.s.s them over to others, who will show them the shortest routes. Fa-hien, however, was after all unable to go there; but having received the above accounts from men of the country, he has narrated them.

CHAPTER x.x.xVI

~Fa-Hien's Indian Studies~

From Varanasi the travellers went back east to Pataliputtra. Fa-hien's original object had been to search for copies of the Vinaya. In the various kingdoms of North India, however, he had found one master transmitting orally the rules to another, but no written copies which he could transcribe. He had therefore travelled far and come on to Central India. Here, in the mahayana monastery, he found a copy of the Vinaya, containing the Mahasanghika [1] rules--those which were observed in the first Great Council, while Buddha was still in the world. The original copy was handed down in the Jetavana vihara. As to the other eighteen schools, each one has the views and decisions of its own masters. Those agree with this in the general meaning, but they have small and trivial differences, as when one opens and another shuts. This copy of the rules, however, is the most complete, with the fullest explanations. [2]

He further got a transcript of the rules in six or seven thousand gathas, [3] being the sarvastivadah [4] rules--those which are observed by the communities of monks in the land of Ts'in; which also have all been handed down orally from master to master without being committed to writing. In the community here, moreover, he got the Samyuktabhi-dharma-hridaya-sastra, containing about six or seven thousand gathas; he also got a Sutra of two thousand five hundred gathas; one chapter of the Pari-nirvana-vaipulya Sutra, of about five thousand gathas; and the Mahasanghika Abhidharma.

In consequence of this success in his quest Fa-hien stayed here for three years, learning Sanscrit books and the Sanscrit speech, and writing out, the Vinaya rules. When Tao-ching arrived in the Central Kingdom, and saw the rules observed by the Sramanas, and the dignified demeanor in their societies which he remarked under all occurring circ.u.mstances, he sadly called to mind in what a mutilated and imperfect condition the rules were among the monkish communities in the land of Ts'in, and made the following aspiration: "From this time forth till I come to the state of Buddha, let me not be born in a frontier-land." He remained accordingly in India, and did not return to the land of Han.

Fa-hien, however, whose original purpose had been to secure the introduction of the complete Vinaya rules into the land of Han, returned there alone.

[Footnote 1: Mahasanghika simply means "the Great a.s.sembly," that is, of monks.]

[Footnote 2: It was afterwards translated by Fa-hien into Chinese.]

[Footnote 3: A gatha is a stanza, generally consisting of a few, commonly of two, lines somewhat metrically arranged.]

[Footnote 4: "A branch," says Eitel, "of the great vaibhashika school, a.s.serting the reality of all visible phenomena, and claiming the authority of Rahula."]

CHAPTER x.x.xVII

~Fa-hien's Stay in Champa and Tamalipti~

Following the course of the Ganges, and descending eastward for eighteen yojanas, he found on the southern bank the great kingdom of Champa, with topes reared at the places where Buddha walked in meditation by his vihara, and where he and the three Buddhas, his predecessors, sat. There were monks residing at them all. Continuing his journey east for nearly fifty yojanas, he came to the country of Tamalipti, the capital of which is a seaport. In the country there are twenty-two monasteries, at all of which there are monks residing. The Law of Buddha is also flourishing in it. Here Fa-hien stayed two years, writing out his Sutras, and drawing pictures of images.

After this he embarked in a large merchant-vessel, and went floating over the sea to the southwest. It was the beginning of winter, and the wind was favorable; and, after fourteen days, sailing day and night, they came to the country of Singhala. The people said that it was distant from Tamalipti about seven hundred yojanas.

The kingdom is on a large island, extending from east to west fifty yojanas, and from north to south thirty. Left and right from it there are as many as one hundred small islands, distant from one another ten, twenty, or even two hundred li; but all subject to the large island.

Most of them produce pearls and precious stones of various kinds; there is one which produces the pure and brilliant pearl--an island which would form a square of about ten li. The king employs men to watch and protect it, and requires three out of every ten pearls which the collectors find.

CHAPTER x.x.xVIII

~At Ceylon--Feats of Buddha--His Statue in Jade~

The country originally had no human inhabitants, but was occupied only by spirits and nagas, with which merchants of various countries carried on a trade. When the trafficking was taking place, the spirits did not show themselves. They simply set forth their precious commodities, with labels of the price attached to them; while the merchants made their purchases according to the price; and took the things away.

Through the coming and going of the merchants in this way, when they went away, the people of their various countries heard how pleasant the land was, and flocked to it in numbers till it became a great nation.

The climate is temperate and attractive, without any difference of summer and winter. The vegetation is always luxuriant. Cultivation proceeds whenever men think fit: there are no fixed seasons for it.

When Buddha came to this country, wishing to transform the wicked nagas by his supernatural power, he planted one foot at the north of the royal city, and the other on the top of a mountain, [1] the two being fifteen yojanas apart. Over the footprint at the north of the city the king built a large tope, four hundred cubits high, grandly adorned with gold and silver, and finished with a combination of all the precious substances. By the side of the tope he further built a monastery, called the Abhayagiri, where there are now five thousand monks. There is in it a hall of Buddha, adorned with carved and inlaid work of gold and silver, and rich in the seven precious substances, in which there is an image of Buddha in green jade, more than twenty cubits in height, glittering all over with those substances, and having an appearance of solemn dignity which words cannot express. In the palm of the right hand there is a priceless pearl. Several years had now elapsed since Fa-hien left the land of Han; the men with whom he had been in intercourse had all been of regions strange to him; his eyes had not rested on an old and familiar hill or river, plant or tree: his fellow-travellers, moreover, had been separated from him, some by death, and others flowing off in different directions; no face or shadow was now with him but his own, and a constant sadness was in his heart. Suddenly one day, when by the side of this image of jade, he saw a merchant presenting as his offering a fan of white silk; [2] and the tears of sorrow involuntarily filled his eyes and fell down.

A former king of the country had sent to Central India and got a slip of the patra tree, which he planted by the side of the hall of Buddha, where a tree grew up to the height of about two hundred cubits. As it bent on one side towards the southeast, the king, fearing it would fall, propped it with a post eight or nine spans around. The tree began to grow at the very heart of the prop, where it met the trunk; a shoot pierced through the post, and went down to the ground, where it entered and formed roots, that rose to the surface and were about four spans round. Although the post was split in the middle, the outer portions kept hold of the shoot, and people did not remove them. Beneath the tree there has been built a vihara, in which there is an image of Buddha seated, which the monks and commonalty reverence and look up to without ever becoming wearied. In the city there has been reared also the vihara of Buddha's tooth, in which, as well as on the other, the seven precious substances have been employed.

The king practises the Brahmanical purifications, and the sincerity of the faith and reverence of the population inside the city are also great. Since the establishment of government in the kingdom there has been no famine or scarcity, no revolution or disorder. In the treasuries of the monkish communities there are many precious stones, and the priceless manis. One of the kings once entered one of those treasuries, and when he looked all round and saw the priceless pearls, his covetous greed was excited, and he wished to take them to himself by force. In three days, however, he came to himself, and immediately went and bowed his head to the ground in the midst of the monks, to show his repentance of the evil thought. As a sequel to this, he informed the monks of what had been in his mind, and desired them to make a regulation that from that day forth the king should not be allowed to enter the treasury and see what it contained, and that no bhikshu should enter it till after he had been in orders for a period of full forty years.

In the city there are many Vaisya elders and Sabaean merchants, whose houses are stately and beautiful. The lanes and pa.s.sages are kept in good order. At the heads of the four princ.i.p.al streets there have been built preaching halls, where, on the eighth, fourteenth, and fifteenth days of the month, they spread carpets, and set forth a pulpit, while the monks and commonalty from all quarters come together to hear the Law. The people say that in the kingdom there may be altogether sixty thousand monks, who get their food from their common stores. The king, besides, prepares elsewhere in the city a common supply of food for five or six thousand more. When any want, they take their great bowls, and go to the place of distribution, and take as much as the vessels will hold, all returning with them full.

The tooth of Buddha is always brought forth in the middle of the third month. Ten days beforehand the king grandly caparisons a large elephant, on which he mounts a man who can speak distinctly, and is dressed in royal robes, to beat a large drum, and make the following proclamation: "The Bodhisattva, during three Asankhyeya-kalpas, [3] manifested his activity, and did not spare his own life. He gave up kingdom, city, wife, and son; he plucked out his eyes and gave them to another; he cut off a piece of his flesh to ransom the life of a dove; he cut off his head and gave it as an alms; he gave his body to feed a starving tigress; he grudged not his marrow and brains. In many such ways as these did he undergo pain for the sake of all living. And so it was, that, having become Buddha, he continued in the world for forty-five years, preaching his Law, teaching and transforming, so that those who had no rest found rest, and the unconverted were converted. When his connection with the living was completed, he attained to pari-nirvana and died. Since that event, for one thousand four hundred and ninety-seven years, the light of the world has gone out, and all living things have had long-continued sadness. Behold! ten days after this, Buddha's tooth will be brought forth, and taken to the Abhayagiri -vihara. Let all and each, whether monks or laics, who wish to ama.s.s merit for themselves, make the roads smooth and in good condition, grandly adorn the lanes and by-ways, and provide abundant store of flowers and incense to be used as offerings to it."