淨土論 3.26

3.26

Furthermore, during the Daye reign era of the Sui dynasty, at Qushan in Wenshui County of Bingzhou, there was a village; in the village were an old man and an old woman, with no other sons or daughters. There were three to five people in the household, and they constantly had surplus grain from year to year to sustain themselves. Having a thorough understanding of suffering and emptiness, on the twenty-ninth day of every month they would invite two mountain monks to practice the Way for one night. About sixty households of the entire village would all come to rejoice, listen to the Dharma, and receive the precepts. On the final day of the month they would set out a vegetarian feast; it was routinely like this. Whenever the feast was prepared, the old mother kept clean and prepared it with her own hands. The old father said to the old woman: “Your physical strength is frail and weak; just give verbal directions—why must you labor with your own hands?” The mother replied to the father: “I fear that dying morning or evening, I will not be able to do it again; if I only give verbal directions, it will only be another person's merit.” Whenever she prepared the feast, she always made it herself, continuing without interruption for two or three years; the merits she cultivated and the practice of recitation she dedicated to the Pure Land. On the day of her death, the villagers universally joined together. From the initial watch onward, suddenly a light entered the house, making the lamps and torches invisible, just like broad daylight. Chanting the Buddha's name with one voice, soon afterward they saw numerous bodhisattvas upholding a jeweled canopy, exquisitely adorned, completely covering the central courtyard. The old woman then relinquished her life, with such extraordinary omens as these.