龍舒增廣淨土文 4.34

4.34

When Śākyamuni Buddha was in the world, there were an old man and an old woman who used a peck of grain to keep count while reciting Amitābha Buddha's name, wishing to be reborn in the West. The Buddha said: "I have another method that will allow you, with a single utterance of the Buddha's name, to obtain the count of many pecks of grain." He then taught them to recite: "Namo to the thirty-six trillion, one hundred and nineteen thousand, five hundred Amitābha Buddhas of identical name and title in the Western Sukhāvatī." This comes from the Baowang lun. I once tested it against non-glutinous grain: one ge contains one thousand eight hundred grains, so this number corresponds to the count of two thousand dan. Since the Buddha personally taught this to the two elderly people, its merit is known to be extremely vast. If an ignorant person cannot recite it [all], simply reciting [the name] alone is also acceptable. Teaching others the full recitation yields great blessed retribution. Or one may also combine it with chanting the Shorter Amitābha-sūtra or the Larger Amitābha-sūtra or other Buddhist sūtras, dedicating [the merit] according to the quantity, wishing to be born in the West—all are acceptable. The Dhāraṇī for Pulling Out All Karmic Roots and Rebirth in the Pure Land: