釋氏稽古略 1.401

1.401

The Twelfth Patriarch, the Mahāsattva Aśvaghoṣa, was a native of Vārāṇasī. He was also named Puṇyadhvaja (Gongsheng, 'Superior Merit'). This was because he possessed past merit, and also because all conditioned and unconditioned merits [in him] were most uniquely superior; hence he was so named. Having received the Dharma, he propagated it in the country of Pāṭaliputra. There was a demon named Kapimala, who had a retinue of three thousand. He displayed various supernatural transformations toward the Patriarch. The Patriarch said, 'Can you exhaust your supernatural powers to transform the ocean of true nature?' The demon said, 'What is meant by the ocean of true nature?' The Patriarch said, 'The ocean of true nature is that upon which the mountains, rivers, and great earth are all established; it is from this that samādhi and the six supernatural knowledges appear.' When Kapimala heard these words, he raised further difficult questions. Knowing that the Patriarch's principle was superior, he then gave rise to faith and, together with his three thousand disciples, sought tonsure. The Patriarch then summoned five hundred arhats to confer the full precepts upon them. Thereupon the Mahāsattva composed numerous treatises and debates. Soon he told him, 'The Tathāgata's treasury of the Great Dharma Eye is now to be transmitted to you. Listen to my verse: "Concealment and manifestation are the fundamental Dharma; / Light and darkness are originally not two. / Now I transmit to you the Dharma of awakening: / It is neither grasping nor abandoning."' Having transmitted it, he entered the Dragon-exertion samādhi, raised his body into the air in the form of a sun-disc, and then returned to his original seat and manifested nirvāṇa. The four assemblies enclosed his true body in a dragon shrine. This corresponded to the era of King Xian of Zhou (Zhengzong ji).