佛祖統紀 46.45

46.45

When they were about to place a Daoist cap upon the statue of the stupa of Saṅgha in Sizhou, wind and rain suddenly made the sky pitch-dark, tearing the cap to pieces and dropping it outside the gate. The prefect was greatly terrified on hearing of this. He hurried to the statue and apologized, saying, 'Saṅgha has spiritual efficacy; how could we dare insult him again?' (Duxing zhi) An imperial decree ordered Qianming Monastery abolished to make three out of five monasteries. Palace Attendant Yang Jian proposed abolishing Taiping Xingguo Monastery to make it into inns and civilian dwellings. At first, when demolishing the main hall, they buried the Buddha statue beneath its foundation, its limbs broken to pieces; soon after, Yang Jian fell ill, his chest and abdomen burst open, and he died. (Yijian zhi) An imperial decree ordered the construction of Shenxiao Palaces throughout the empire. The prefectures and commanderies, fearing the expense, mostly replaced the name plaques of great Buddhist monasteries with it. Taiping Commandery was about to demolish Chengtian Monastery. On the first day, the officer directing the laborers and his soldiers fell from a horse and died. On the second day, the master artisan fell from a roof and died. On the third day, a military officer fell from a horse and broke his arm. The ten-year-old son of Director Shi of the Ministry of Rites, who had sponsored the proposal, had his clothes stripped off by an armored spirit in gold and was thrown into the fire chamber of a bathhouse. A spirit's voice was heard saying, 'Shi's line is severed.' In that year, the son died, and Shi died as a traveler in the capital. When Yongdao reached Daozhou, the prefect and his subordinates simultaneously dreamed of a Buddha statue entering the city wearing a cangue. The next day the Master arrived; the prefect, recognizing his wondrous character, ordered that he be treated kindly. Many soldiers and civilians in the city suffered from cold-induced ailments and sought rescue from the Master. The Master had previously received the Indian dhāraṇī method; the sick who drank the water he incanted over or who had their crowns rubbed by him were all cured. Since those who sought his aid became numerous, he made a pond within the military camp to incant over it. In the third month, there was a great flood in the capital. Giant softshell turtles and alligators emerged in the residential compounds, and the imperial ancestral temples and palaces were in extreme peril. An imperial decree commanded Lin Lingsu to lead the Daoists to manage the flood, but after several days there was no result. Thousands of laborers competed to raise staves, wanting to beat him to death, but Lingsu fled and escaped. The emperor was displeased on hearing of this. Suddenly, the Great Sage of Sizhou appeared in the imperial palace, standing still in the air, attended at his sides by Huian and Mokṣa. The emperor burned incense, bowed, and prayed. The Great Sage shook his ringed staff, climbed the city wall, and chanted secret mantras. In a short while, someone in white clothes with a kerchief knelt before him as though receiving precepts and admonitions. The multitudes of ten thousand all witnessed this, suspecting it was a dragon god transformed into human form. Soon after, the waters receded. An imperial decree conferred a six-character title of Master upon the Great Sage Saṅgha. Lingsu again urged the emperor to strip it away, and Hanlin Academician Xu Han was dismissed from his post because his drafting of the decree was overly lavish in praise. In the ninth month, the officials and subordinates of the Censorate submitted a memorial: 'Lin Lingsu is a treacherous and villainous petty man who rashly proposes moving the capital and abolishing Buddhism; his crime warrants execution.' There was no reply. In the tenth month, Lingsu formed factions with the eunuchs and engaged in mutual disputes, and moreover, on the road, he usurped the procession insignia of the Crown Prince. The emperor began to detest him. A notice was posted at Shenxiao Palace: 'Chu Hui’s sins and wickedness are incorrigible; the Sovereign commands that his celestial registry be erased and that he be made an inferior ghost forever.' In the eleventh month, Lingsu was banished back to Wenzhou, and death was bestowed on him on the road. He instructed his disciples to bury him upon returning and to make several decoy tombs. (When Gaozong visited Jiangxin, he turned his former residence into a monastery and dispatched men to open his tomb to inflict mutilation upon his corpse, but because they did not know its location, they desisted.) Thereupon, both within and outside the court, all laid the blame for abolishing Buddhism upon him. Chan Master Faxing Xingchi of Yuyao, when first invited, passed through Shangyu. The magistrate of the county, Mr. Wang, requested that he preach the essentials of the Dharma. The Master mounted the seat and said: 'On his head he wears a black kerchief, on his body he drapes a crane-feather cloak; plainly a fine immortal, yet he knows how to ply the tricks of Caoxi.' The magistrate and the great assembly all tapped their fingers and sighed deeply; at that time, there were those in the assembly who wept incessantly. (The Master was styled Mu'an; he attained the Dharma under the Venerable Daqing of Xiangtian. His family was the Lu clan of Siming, and he was the great-grand-uncle of Zhipan. He occupied the seats of Yongxi, Yunmen, Xuedou, and Husheng, and his name is recorded in the Patriarchal Chart.) Chan Master Huihong of Shimen stayed at Gushan in Xiangxi. Drawing upon the two lineages of Yunmen and Linji, from the Jiayou to the Zhenghe eras, covering a total of eighty-one persons, he compiled the Chanlin sengbao zhuan in thirty volumes. Since Ning Tonghui, the only one to transmit the history of the saṅgha was this Master. Formerly, Chan Master You of Yunju built an egg-shaped stupa to the east of Chan Master Hongjue's stupa, saying, 'For all abbots whose living bodies are not incorrupt, and who yield no relics upon cremation, their bones and stones shall be filled in here.' To the west he built an egg-shaped stupa, saying, 'For all monks who pass away, their bones and stones shall be deposited here.' These were called the Three Stupas. Chan Master Duan of Baiyun said, 'The flourishing of monasteries throughout the realm is due to the power of Dazhi (Baizhang's posthumous title is Dazhi). In the Patriarchal Hall, a statue of Bodhidharma should be set up in the center, the statue of Dazhi facing west, and the statue of the monastery founder facing east. One should not merely set up the founder and neglect the ancestral masters.' Juefan evaluated this, saying, 'The breadth of vision and depth of understanding of Baiyun and Yunju may indeed serve as a model for the realm!' In the eighth month, an imperial decree was issued: 'Previously, because treacherous men proposed changing the titles of the Śākyan clan, this was deeply improper. Those who were formerly ordered to be changed to male and female Virtuous Knights shall be called monks and nuns as before.' In the ninth month, an imperial decree universally restored the monks and nuns of the empire. Yongdao of Daozhou was transferred closer to an adjacent prefecture. (The above are seen scattered in the Guochao huiyao, Benchao tongjian, Daofashi zhuan, and Lin Lingsu zhuan.)