歷代三寶紀 4.11

4.11

右五部合一十六卷。中天竺國沙門竺法蘭。少而機悟淹雅博愛多通。禪思毘尼莫不究竟。誦經百餘萬言。學徒千餘人。居不求安常懷弘利。戒軌嚴峻眾莫能闚。聞漢使愔來訊訪漢地佛法。遂有心輕舉。國王不聽。密與騰同來。間行後至。明帝世翻初共騰出四十二章。騰卒。蘭自譯。昔漢武帝穿昆明池。底得灰墨。問東方朔。朔云。可問西域梵人。法蘭既至。時以追問。蘭曰。此是劫燒之灰。朔言有徵。信者甚眾。又秦景使還於月支國得。優填王栴檀像師第四畫樣來至雒陽。帝即勅令圖寫供養。自爾丹素流演迄今。

The five works above, totaling sixteen fascicles, [were translated by] the śramaṇa Zhu Falan from Central Tianzhu. In his youth he was keen and perceptive, refined, broadly benevolent, and versed in many matters; in meditation and Vinaya there was nothing he had not mastered. He recited more than one million words of sūtras and had over a thousand disciples. In dwelling he did not seek ease, constantly cherishing the desire to broadly benefit others. His disciplinary code was strict and solemn, such that the crowd could not fathom it. Hearing that the Han envoy [Cai] Yin had come inquiring after the Buddhadharma for the Han lands, he conceived the desire to set forth without delay. The king of the country would not permit it, so he secretly came together with [Kāśyapa] Mātanga, traveling by indirect routes and arriving later. During the reign of Emperor Ming, he initially produced the Forty-two Sections together with Mātanga. After Mātanga died, Falan translated on his own. Formerly, when Emperor Wu of Han excavated the Kunming Pool, he found black ash at the bottom and asked Dongfang Shuo. Shuo said: "You may ask the Sanskrit people from the Western Regions." When Falan arrived, people of the time subsequently questioned him. Falan said: "This is the ash from the kalpa fire." Shuo's words were thus verified, and those who believed were very numerous. Furthermore, when the envoy Qin Jing returned, he obtained from the country of the Yuezhe the fourth painted copy of King Udayana's sandalwood image and brought it to Luoyang. The emperor then ordered copies to be painted and venerated; from then on, paintings in pigments have been handed down to the present day.