佛祖歷代通載 5.67

5.67

（十二）　袁宏漢紀曰。永平十一年。浮屠者佛也。西域天竺有佛道焉。佛者漢言覺。將覺悟群生也。其教以修善慈心為主。不殺生專務清淨。其精者號為沙門漢言息心。蓋息意去欲而歸於無為也。又以為人死精神不滅。隨復受形。生時所行善惡皆有報應。故所貴行善修道。以鍊精神不已。以至無為而得為佛也。佛身長一丈六尺。黃金色項中佩日月光。變化無方無所不入。故能化通萬物而大濟群生。初明帝夢見金人長大項有日月光。以問群臣。或曰。西方有神。其名曰佛。其形長大。因遣使天竺問其道術。圖其形像而還。有經數千萬卷。以虛無為宗。包羅精麁無所不統。善為宏闊遠大之言。所求在一體之內。所明在視聽之外。世俗之人。或以為虛誕。然歸於玄微。深遠難得而測。故王公大人觀死生報應之際。莫不矍然而自失焉。本朝東坡居士曰。此殆中國始知有佛時語也。雖淺近大略具足矣。野人得鹿。正爾煮食之耳。其後賣與市人。遂入公庖中饌之百方。然鹿之所以美。未有絲毫加於煮食時也。袁宏漢紀。論佛世罕見全篇。東坡大全集所載。袁宏論佛說。乃唐章瓌太子注漢書楚王英傳。所引用漢紀者。當以此全篇為正云。

(12) Yuan Hong's Han ji states: In the eleventh year of the Yongping era, the 'Futu' is the Buddha. In the Western Regions, in Tianzhu, there is the Buddha's Dao. 'Fo' in the language of the Han means 'awakened,' intending to awaken all living beings. Its teaching takes the cultivation of goodness and a compassionate mind as paramount; it does not take life and exclusively devotes itself to purity. Those who are adept are called śramaṇas, which in the language of the Han means 'those who calm the mind,' for they calm thoughts, eliminate desires, and return to the unconditioned (asaṃskṛta). Furthermore, they hold that when a person dies, the spirit is not extinguished, and subsequently assumes another form; the good and bad deeds performed during life all have karmic retribution. Therefore, they esteem practicing goodness and cultivating the Dao to ceaselessly refine the spirit, until reaching the unconditioned and becoming a Buddha. The Buddha's body is one zhang and six chi in height, golden in color, with the radiance of the sun and moon suspended behind his neck. His transformations are boundless, penetrating everywhere; thus he can transform and permeate all things, bringing vast salvation to all living beings. Earlier, Emperor Ming dreamed of seeing a golden person of great stature with the radiance of the sun and moon behind his neck. He questioned his assembled ministers about it. Someone said, 'In the west there is a spirit whose name is Buddha, and his form is of great stature.' Thereupon he dispatched envoys to Tianzhu to inquire about his doctrines and arts, and they returned after painting an image of his form. There are tens of millions of scrolls of scriptures; taking emptiness and nothingness as the core principle, they encompass the refined and the coarse, leaving nothing ungoverned. They excel at grand, expansive, and far-reaching words. What they seek lies within one's own being; what they illuminate lies beyond seeing and hearing. Worldly people sometimes regard them as empty and extravagant. Yet they return to what is mysterious and subtle, so profound and distant as to be difficult to fathom. Therefore, when kings, dukes, and great men contemplate the juncture of death, birth, and karmic retribution, none fail to startle and lose their composure. Layman Dongpo of our dynasty said: 'These were probably the words from when China first came to know that there was a Buddha. Though shallow and rudimentary, their broad outline is already complete. When a rustic captures a deer, he simply boils and eats it. Later, when it is sold to city dwellers and enters the public kitchen, it is prepared in a hundred different ways; yet the reason the deer tastes delicious is not increased by a single hair beyond when it was boiled and eaten.' In Yuan Hong's Han ji, complete passages discussing the Buddha are rarely seen in the world. The account of Yuan Hong's discussion of the Buddha recorded in Dongpo's Daquan ji is what was quoted from the Han ji by Crown Prince Zhanghuai of the Tang in his commentary on the biography of King Ying of Chu in the Book of the Han; this complete passage should be taken as authoritative."