慈悲道場懺法 4.17

4.17

Today, members of the assembly sharing this karmic endeavor! Good and evil condition each other just like shadows and echoes; punishments and blessings fall in different places, each having been strictly determined in advance. Fortunately, each of you clearly believes this without harboring any doubts. What is meant by hell? The sūtras state: The pitch-black darkness between the two enclosing mountains of the Great Iron Ring in the trichiliocosm is called hell. The iron city is sixteen million li in length and breadth, with eighty-four thousand compartments within the city. Below, iron forms the ground; above, iron forms a net. Fire burns this city so that inside and out it is blazing red; the fire above penetrates below, and the fire below penetrates above. Their names include: Assembling Darkness, Knife Wheels and Sword Forests, Iron Traps and Thorn Forests, Iron Nets and Iron Caves, Iron Pellets and Sharp Stones, Charcoal Pits and Burning Forests, Tigers, Wolves, and Shrieking, Cauldrons of Boiling Liquid and Ovens of Embers, Mountains of Knives and Trees of Swords, Fire Mills and Fire Cities, Bronze Pillars and Iron Beds, Fire Carts and Fire Wheels, Drinking Molten Bronze and Vomiting Fire, Great Heat and Great Cold, Ripping Tongues and Nailing Bodies, Plowing and Ax Hacking, Weapons of War and Butchering Mutilation, Ash Rivers and Boiling Excrement, Freezing Ice and Mud, Foolish Weeping, Deafness, Blindness, Mutism, and Dumbness, and Iron Hooks and Iron Beaks. There are furthermore the Greater and Lesser Nirayas, and the Avīci Hell. The Buddha said to Ānanda: "Why is it called the Avīci Hell? 'A' means without; 'vīci' means obstruction. 'A' means without; 'vīci' means rescue. Together they mean 'without obstruction and without rescue.' Furthermore, 'A' means without intermission (avīci); 'vīci' means without motion. 'A' means extreme heat; 'vīci' means extreme torment. 'A' means not at leisure; 'vīci' means not abiding; not at leisure and not abiding is named the Avīci Hell. Furthermore, 'A' means great blaze; 'vīci' means fierce heat; fierce fire entering the heart is named the Avīci Hell." The Buddha said to Ānanda: "The Avīci Hell is exactly three hundred and twenty thousand li in length and breadth, with seven tiers of iron walls and seven layers of iron nets. Below are eighteen compartments, completely encircled in seven tiers, all possessing forests of knives. Inside the seven tiers of walls are further forests of swords. The eighteen compartments below each have eighty-four thousand layers. At its four corners are four great bronze dogs, whose bodies are sixteen thousand li in length and height, with eyes like lightning flashes, fangs like sword trees, teeth like knife mountains, and tongues like iron thorns; all the hairs on their bodies emit fierce fire. Their smoke is foul and repulsive, such that no foul substance in the world can serve as an analogy. There are also eighteen hell wardens with heads like rākṣasa heads and mouths like yakṣa mouths, each with sixty-four eyes, their eyes shooting forth iron pellets the size of ten-li carts. Their hooked fangs protrude upward to a height of one hundred and sixty li, and streams of fire from the tips of their fangs burn the iron carts before them, causing each rim of the iron carts' wheels to transform into a hundred million fires, with blades, edges, swords, and halberds all emerging from the blazes. Streams of fire such as these burn the city of Avīci, making the city of Avīci red like molten bronze. On the heads of the hell wardens are eight ox heads; each ox head has eighteen horns, and from the tip of each horn bursts forth a mass of fire. The masses of fire further transform into eighteen fire rims, and the fire rims further turn into great knife wheels as large as cart wheels; wheel after wheel in succession amidst the blazes fills the Avīci Hell. The bronze dogs open their mouths and stick their tongues out onto the ground, their tongues like iron thorns; when their tongues come out, they transform into countless tongues filling the city of Avīci. Inside the seven tiers of walls are seven iron banners; from the tops of the banners fire surges like a boiling spring, its molten iron splashing forth and filling the city of Avīci. In the four gates of Avīci, above the thresholds of the gates, are eighteen cauldrons; boiling bronze wells forth and overflows from the gates, filling the city of Avīci. Between each compartment are eighty-four thousand great iron pythons and serpents, spewing poison and fire, their bodies filling the interior of the city. These serpents roar like thunder in the heavens, raining down great iron pellets that fill the city of Avīci. The agonizing torments in the city number eighty thousand billion thousand; the bitterest of all bitters gather in this city. There are also fifty billion insects, each insect possessing eighty-four thousand beaks; from the tips of their beaks streams of fire fall like rain, filling the city of Avīci. When these insects descend, the fierce fire of Avīci blazes with great fury; its red radiant blazes shine for three million three hundred and sixty thousand li. Surging upward from the Avīci Hell, it strikes the Great Ocean down beneath Mount Wojiao; droplets of seawater as large as cart axles turn into great iron spikes that fill the city of Avīci."