大唐故大德贈司空大辨正廣智不空三藏行狀 1.2.1

1.2.1

皇帝灌頂大師法號不空。 以普賢行願。 傳大菩提心金剛智印。 奉佛教令。 拔濟群品。 持大法寶。 為時而來。 翼贊三朝。 近三十載。 大師本西良府。 北天竺之波羅門族也。 先門早逝。 育于舅氏。 便隨母姓。 初母康氏之未娠也。 有善相者言曰。 爾後畢生菩提薩埵。 言訖不見。 大奇之。 遂沐浴換衣。 斷語持念。 未經三日。 坐而假寐。 夢佛微笑。 雙目光流。 入母人頂。 忽而驚寤。 遍體流汗。 因覺有身。 香燈已後。 夜室如晝。 十二月而生。 生而能言。 風神出凡。 精氣殊眾。 六波羅密。 四無量心。 宛若生知。 非關師授。 唯佛與佛。 乃能究焉。 昔者婆伽梵毘盧遮那。 以金剛頂瑜伽祕密教王真言法印。 付屬金剛手菩薩。 垂近千載。 傳龍猛菩薩。 數百年後。 龍猛傳龍智阿遮梨耶。 後數百年。 龍智傳金剛智阿遮利耶。 金剛智傳今之大師。 雖源一流派分。 蓋數十人而已。 家嫡相繼。 我師承其六焉。 初大師隨外氏觀風大國。 生年十歲。 周遊巡歷武威太原。 十三事大弘教。 祖師道悉談章波羅門語論。 輒背文而諷誦。 剋日而洞悟。 祖師大奇。 他日與授菩提心戒。 引入金剛界大曼茶羅。 驗之擲花。 知有後矣。 十五初落髮。 二十進具戒。 善一切有部律。 曉諸國語。 識異國書。 先翻經常使譯語。 對唐梵之輕重。 酌文義之精華。 討習聲論十二年功六月而畢。 誦文殊願。 一載之限。 再夕而終。 後於祖師處。 哀祈瑜伽五部三密。 求之三載。 未遂夙心。 為法之故。 欲歸天竺。 是日宿于新豐逆旅。 祖師此夜偶然而夢。 京城諸寺佛菩薩像。 悉皆東行。 忽而驚悟。 令疾命還。 及聞迴至。 祖師大喜。 我之法藏。 盡將付汝。 次於他晨。 為與傳授五部之法。 灌頂護摩阿闍梨教。 大日經悉地儀軌。 諸佛頂部眾真言行。 一一傳持。 皆盡其妙。 後數年。 祖師奉詔歸國。 大師隨侍。 至河南府。 祖師示疾而終。 是時開元二十九年仲秋矣。 影塔既成。 以先奉先師遺言。 令往師子國。 至天實初。 到南海郡。 信舶未至。 採訪劉巨鱗。 三請大師。 哀求灌頂。 我師許之。 權於法性寺。 建立道場。 因劉公也。 四眾咸賴。 度人億千。 大師之未往也。 入曼荼羅。 對本尊像。 金剛三密。 以加持。 念誦經行。 未踰旬日。 文殊師利現身。 因誠大願不孤。 夙心已遂。 便率門人含光惠𮗿僧俗三七。 杖錫登舟。 採訪已下。 舉州士庶大會。 陳設香花。 遍于海浦。 蠡梵栝于天涯。 奉送大師。 凡數百里。 初至訶陵國界。 遇大黑風。 眾商惶怖。 作本天法。 [橠-多+(口/一)]之無効稽首膜拜。 哀求大師。 惠𮗿小師。 亦隨慟叫。 大師告曰。 今吾有法。 爾等勿憂。 遂右執五智菩提心杵。 左持般若佛母經。 申作法加持。 誦大隨求。 纔經一遍。 惠𮗿亦怪之。 風優海澄。 師之力也。 後又遇疾風。 大鯨出海。 噴浪若山。 有甚前患。 商人之輩。 甘心輸命。 大師哀愍。 如舊念持。 亦令惠𮗿。 誦娑竭羅龍王經。 未移時剋。 眾難俱弭。 次達海口城。 師子國王。 遣使迎之。 大師見王。 王大悅。 便請大師住宮。 七日供養。 每日常以真金浴斛。 滿貯香水。 王為大師。 躬自澡浴。 次及太子后妃輔相。 如王禮大師。 他日尋普賢阿闍梨等。 奉獻金寶錦繡之屬。 請開十八會金剛頂瑜伽法門毘盧遮那大悲胎藏。 建立壇法。 并許門人含光惠𮗿。 同授五部灌頂。 大師自爾。 覺無常師。 遍更討尋諸真言教。 并諸經論五百餘部。 本三昧諸尊密印。 儀形色像。 壇法標幟。 文義性相。 無不盡源。 他日王作調象戲。 以示國人。 登高望之。 無敢近目。

The Emperor's Consecration Master had the Dharma-name Amoghavajra (Bukong). With the practices and vows of Samantabhadra, he transmitted the Vajra-wisdom seal of the great bodhicitta. Receiving the commands of the Buddha's teaching, he delivered and rescued all beings. Holding the treasure of the Great Dharma, he arrived according to the times. Assisting three imperial reigns for nearly thirty years, the Master was originally from Xiliangfu, of a Brahmin clan of North India. His father died early, and he was raised by his maternal uncle, thereupon taking his mother's surname. Earlier, before his mother, the lady Kang, was pregnant, a physiognomist told her: “Hereafter you will certainly give birth to a bodhisattva.” Having spoken, he disappeared. She marveled greatly at this, and thereupon bathed, changed her clothes, ceased speaking, and maintained mindfulness. Before three days had passed, as she sat dozing, she dreamt of the Buddha smiling, two streams of light pouring from his eyes and entering into her crown. She suddenly awoke with a start, her whole body bathed in sweat, whereupon she realized she was with child. From the time the incense and lamps were lit, the nighttime chamber was bright as day. He was born after twelve months. At birth he could already speak, his bearing transcendent, his vital energy far surpassing the ordinary. The six perfections and the four immeasurable minds were as if known from birth, not depending on instruction from a teacher. Only Buddha and Buddha could completely fathom him. Formerly, the Bhagavān Vairocana entrusted the mantra Dharma-seal of the Vajraśekhara Yoga Secret Sovereign of Teachings to Vajrapāṇi Bodhisattva. After nearly a thousand years, it was transmitted to Nāgārjuna Bodhisattva. Several centuries later, Nāgārjuna transmitted it to the ācārya Nāgabodhi. Several centuries after that, Nāgabodhi transmitted it to the ācārya Vajrabodhi. Vajrabodhi transmitted it to the present Master. Although descending from a single source its branches divided, there were only several dozen people; the direct lineage succeeded one after the other, and our Master was the sixth in its succession. Initially, the Master followed his maternal relatives to observe the customs of the great empire. At ten years of age, he traveled through Wuwei and Taiyuan. At thirteen, he served [the Master of] Greatly Propagating the Teaching [Vajrabodhi]. When the ancestral master expounded the Siddham primer and the grammatical treatises of the Brahmins, [Amoghavajra] would immediately recite them with his back to the text and understand them thoroughly within a set day. The ancestral master marveled greatly at him. On another day, he bestowed upon him the bodhicitta precepts and led him into the Great Maṇḍala of the Vajradhātu; testing him by having him cast a flower, he knew he would have a great future. At fifteen, he first shaved his hair; at twenty, he received full ordination. He was skilled in the Vinaya of the Sarvāstivāda school, understood the languages of various countries, and recognized the scripts of foreign lands. When the former translation of scriptures was conducted, he was constantly employed to translate spoken words, weighing the relative nuances of Chinese and Sanskrit, and selecting the finest essence of the text and its meaning. Undertaking the study of the science of phonetics, twelve years' labor was completed in six months. Reciting the vows of Mañjuśrī, a task allotted a full year, was finished in two nights. Later, at the ancestral master's place, he piteously pleaded for the five divisions and three mysteries of Yoga; seeking them for three years, he had not yet fulfilled his longtime wish. For the sake of the Dharma, he wished to return to India. On that day, he lodged in an inn at Xinfeng. That night, the ancestral master happened to dream that the statues of buddhas and bodhisattvas in all the monasteries of the capital were all traveling eastward. Suddenly waking with a start, he ordered [messengers] to quickly summon him back. When he heard that [Amoghavajra] had returned, the ancestral master rejoiced greatly: “My treasury of the Dharma, I will entrust entirely to you!” The following morning, he transmitted to him the Dharma of the five divisions, the ācārya teachings of consecration (abhiṣeka) and fire oblation (homa), the siddhi rituals of the Mahāvairocana Sūtra, and the mantra practices of the various uṣṇīṣa deities, transmitting and maintaining them one by one, exhausting all their subtleties. Several years later, the ancestral master received an imperial decree to return to his home country, and the Master accompanied him as his attendant. Arriving at Henanfu, the ancestral master manifested illness and passed away. This was in the mid-autumn of the twenty-ninth year of Kaiyuan. After the commemorative stūpa was completed, following the former master's posthumous instructions commanding him to go to the Lion Kingdom (Siṃhala / Sri Lanka), he reached Nanhai Commandery at the beginning of Tianbao. As the dispatch boat had not yet arrived, the Investigating Commissioner Liu Julin thrice requested the Master, pleading for consecration. Our Master granted it, and temporarily established a bodhimaṇḍala at Faxing Monastery; thanks to Lord Liu, the fourfold assembly all relied upon him, and the people saved numbered in the hundreds of thousands. Before the Master set out, he entered the maṇḍala, faced the icon of the primary deity, and performed empowerment through the three vajra mysteries. While reciting and circumambulating, before ten days had passed, Mañjuśrī manifested his body. Because of this sincerity, his great vow was not in vain, and his longtime wish was fulfilled. He then led his disciples Hanguang, Huilang, and others, twenty-one monastics and laypeople in all, took up his staff, and boarded the ship. From the Investigating Commissioner on down, the gentry and commoners of the entire prefecture assembled in great numbers, arranging incense and flowers everywhere along the sea coast. Conch shells and Sanskrit chants resounded to the ends of the sky as they saw the Master off for several hundred li. First arriving at the borders of the kingdom of Holing, they encountered a great black tempest. All the merchants were terrified and performed their native divine rites, but in their distress to no avail. They bowed their heads and made full prostrations, pleading piteously to the Master. The novice monk Huilang also wept and cried out in fear. The Master declared to them: “Now I possess the Dharma; you all need not worry.” Thereupon, holding in his right hand the five-wisdom bodhicitta vajra and in his left the Prajñāpāramitā-mātā Sūtra, he performed the ritual empowerment and recited the Mahāpratisarā [dhāraṇī]. Having passed through it merely once, Huilang too marveled at it: the wind subsided and the sea became calm—it was through the power of the Master. Later they encountered fierce winds again, and a great whale emerged from the sea, spouting waves like mountains, even worse than the previous peril. The merchants resigned themselves to giving up their lives. The Master took pity on them, recited and maintained mindfulness as before, and also ordered Huilang to recite the Sāgara-nāgarāja Sūtra. Before a moment had passed, all perils were quelled. Next, they arrived at the port city, where the king of the Lion Kingdom dispatched envoys to welcome him. When the Master had an audience with the king, the king was greatly pleased, and invited the Master to reside in the palace and receive offerings for seven days. Each day, using a bath tub of pure gold filled with perfumed water, the king personally bathed the Master. Next, the crown prince, the queens, consorts, and ministers also paid homage to the Master just like the king. On another day, he sought out the ācārya Samantabhadra and others, offering them gifts of gold, jewels, brocades, and silks, and requested the opening of the Vajraśekhara Yoga Dharma-gate of the Eighteen Assemblies and the Mahāvairocana Mahākāruṇika-garbhadhātu, the establishment of the altar rituals, and permission for his disciples Hanguang and Huilang to receive together the consecrations of the five divisions. From then on, the Master realized that [wisdom] has no permanent teacher, and thoroughly searched out all the mantra teachings as well as more than five hundred texts of various sūtras and treatises; the fundamental samādhis and secret mudrās of the various deities, their ritual forms, colors, and images, the emblems of the altar rituals, and the textual meanings, natures, and characteristics—none of which he did not trace to its very source. On another day, the king staged a performance of taming elephants to display to his countrymen; when people mounted high places to view it, none dared look directly at it from close range.