佛祖歷代通載 3.62

3.62

(Year 23, jiashen) The Sixth Patriarch was Miccaka, a native of Central India. Having received the Dharma transmission, he traveled and taught until he reached a northern Indian kingdom. Seeing golden auspicious clouds above the battlements of the city wall, he sighed and said, "This is the aura of a man of the Way; there must be a great being who will be my Dharma heir." He then entered the city. Among the market stalls there was a man holding a wine vessel in his hand, who approached him and asked, "From what direction has the Master come, and where do you wish to go?" The Master said, "I come from my own mind, and I wish to go nowhere." The man asked, "Do you recognize the object in my hand?" The Master said, "This is an impure vessel that holds what is clean." He asked, "Does the Master also recognize me?" The Master said, "I do not know, and knowing is not I." He further addressed him, "You try stating your own name, and I will later reveal your original cause." The man then answered by speaking a verse: "From immeasurable kalpas / down to my birth in this kingdom, / my original clan is Bhāradvāja, / and my name is Vasumitra." The Master said, "My teacher Dhītika said that formerly, when the Bhagavān traveled through northern India, he told Ānanda: 'In this kingdom, three hundred years after my extinction, there will be a sage of the Bhāradvāja clan named Vasumitra, who will become the seventh among the Chan patriarchs.' The Bhagavān prophesied of you; you should go forth from household life." He then set down the vessel, bowed to the Master, stood to the side, and said: "I recall that in a past kalpa, I once acted as a dānapati and offered a jeweled seat to a Tathāgata. That Buddha gave me a prophecy, saying: 'During the Bhadrakalpa, within the Dharma of Śākya, you will propagate the supreme teaching.' Now this corresponds to the Master's words; I pray you will grant me liberation." The Master then shaved his head and conferred the complete precepts. He then told him: "The Treasury of the Correct Dharma Eye is now transmitted to you; do not let it be severed." He then spoke a verse: "No mind, and nothing to obtain; / speaking of obtaining is not called Dharma. / If one realizes mind is non-mind, / only then does one comprehend the Dharma of mind after mind." Having spoken the verse, he entered the Lion's Vigorous Sprint samādhi, leaped into the air to the height of seven tāla trees, returned to his original seat, and transformed into fire to cremate himself. Vasumitra gathered the sacred bones, placed them in a seven-jeweled casket, and erected a stūpa, depositing it on the upper tier. This was the fifteenth year of King Xiang, the jiashen year.