佛祖統紀 42.53

42.53

In the third month of the fourteenth year, precious canopies, colored banners, and floral umbrellas were made for the Buddhist relics. The Two Streets were decreed to go to Fengxiang to welcome the Buddha's bone. Along the three hundred li, carriages and horses formed an unbroken line. Ministers who remonstrated went so far as to say that when Emperor Xianzong welcomed the Buddha's bone, he died shortly afterward. The Emperor said: 'If in my lifetime I can obtain the sight of it, I shall have no regrets in death.' On the eighth day of the fourth month, the Buddha's bone arrived, led by imperial guards and the full splendor of public and private music and honor guards, exceeding [the ceremony of] the Southern Suburb. The Emperor presided at the Anfu Gate, descended the tower to welcome and bow to it, and bestowed gold and silk in varying amounts upon monks and elders who had witnessed the Yuanhe reception. The Buddha's bone was kept in the forbidden precinct for three days of offerings, and then received and placed in the two temples of Anguo and Chonghua to allow officials and commoners to pay homage. In the twelfth month, the Buddha's bone was welcomed back to Fengxiang with the same ritual.