萬松老人評唱天童覺和尚頌古從容庵錄 1.89

1.89

師云。二十七祖初名瓔珞童子。因二十六祖不如蜜多。與東印土堅固王同輦。問童子曰。能憶往事否。對曰。我憶往劫與師同居。師演摩訶般若。我持甚深修多羅。以相代正化故。俟師於此。祖告王曰。此非小聖。大勢至之應身也。王命登輦至宮供養。以至披削。祖取般若修多羅事。命名般若多羅。梁朝以達磨為觀音。西國以祖師為勢至。唯阿彌陀佛至今無下落。良久云。豐干饒舌。後因皇家展會。尊者主席。這老漢顯異惑眾。當時好與掀倒。打斷葛藤。直待問尊者何不看經。果然放不過。這老漢也無大人相。把葫蘆馬杓翻騰一上王便禮拜。識甚痛痒。萬松道。國王貪他一粒米。尊者失却萬年糧。只知鐵脊撑天。不覺腦門著地。若要扶起。除是天童。頌云。

The Master said: The Twenty-seventh Patriarch was originally named the Necklace Youth. Because the Twenty-sixth Patriarch, Puṇyamitra, was sharing a chariot with King Firm of East India, he asked the youth, 'Can you recall past events?' He replied, 'I remember in a past kalpa dwelling together with the Master; the Master expounded the Mahāprajñā, and I upheld the profound sūtras. Because of taking turns in right teaching, I waited for the Master here.' The Patriarch told the king, 'This is no small holy one; he is a responsive body of Mahāsthāmaprāpta.' The king ordered him to mount the chariot and come to the palace for offerings, even to the point of shaving his head. The Patriarch took the matter of the prajñā and sūtras and named him Prajñātāra. The Liang dynasty regarded Bodhidharma as Avalokiteśvara; the Western regions regarded the Patriarch as Mahāsthāmaprāpta. Only Amitābha Buddha has had no whereabouts down to the present. After a long pause he said: Fenggan's loose tongue! Later, on the occasion of an imperial banquet, the Venerable was the guest of honor. This old fellow showed strange behavior to delude the multitude; at that time he should have been knocked down, cutting off the entangling vines. Waiting right until the question 'Why does the Venerable not read the scriptures?'—indeed he could not let it pass. This old fellow also had no features of a great man; overturning the gourd and the ladle in one go, the king then made prostrations. What did he know of pain or itch? Wansong says: The king coveted his single grain of rice; the Venerable lost his ten thousand years of provisions. Only knowing the iron spine props up heaven, he did not realize his forehead was on the ground. If you want to lift him up, none other than Tiantong [can do so]. The verse says: