續高僧傳 2.11.3

2.11.3

Gaozu heard all of this. He decreed that [Yan]cong transcribe it and bestow it upon the clergy and laity as an everlasting warning. From then on, he focused his thoughts on his accumulation of transgressions, cut off mundane affairs, silenced his mind regarding the snare of words, performed vaipulya repentances, and provided for the poor and sick. Later in life, he took as his constant practice the Indic scriptures he had recited—over four thousand verses, amounting to one hundred and thirty thousand words—chanting them once through every seven days. Moreover, Cong had long participated in translation and had a wonderful grasp of the Indic script. The masters in this land all took the 'bird tracks' [Chinese script] as their authority, but when it came to sounds, characters, glosses, and definitions, they rarely achieved correspondence. He therefore composed the Bianzheng lun (Treatise on Distinguishing the Correct) to bequeath a standard for translation. His text states: / Shi Dao'an, whose fame filled heaven, repeatedly stated: 'Translating from Hu into Qin has five ways of losing the original and three difficulties.' / First: the Hu language is entirely inverted, and making it conform to Qin is the first way of losing the original. / Second: Hu scriptures value plainness, whereas the people of Qin favor literary polish. When transmitting [texts] to satisfy the minds of the masses, without literary polish they will not meet [approval]; this is the second way of losing the original. / Third: Hu scriptures are meticulous. When it comes to praise and chanting, they are earnest and repetitive, [repeating] three or four times without minding the verbosity; to prune and excise this now is the third way of losing the original. / Fourth: in the Hu texts there are expository passages that resemble chaotic phrasing; when one examines what preceded, the text is no different—sometimes a thousand words, sometimes five hundred—and now cutting these out and discarding them is the fourth way of losing the original. / Fifth: after an affair is completed, it is about to touch upon another matter, yet it turns back to recount the former words, and only then speaks of what follows; to remove all of this is the fifth way of losing the original. / However, the mind of the Wisdom Scripture (Prajñāpāramitā) [comes from] the three penetrations; it was expounded by him whose tongue covered his face. The Sage necessarily adapted to the times, and mundane customs change; yet expunging the refined and archaic to accommodate the present day is the first difficulty. / The difference between ignorance and wisdom is as great as heaven, and the Sage cannot be reached by ordinary steps; yet wishing to transmit the subtle words of over a thousand years ago to conform to the degenerate customs beneath a hundred kings is the second difficulty. / When Ānanda brought forth the scriptures, it was not long after the Buddha's [parinirvāṇa]; the venerable Mahākāśyapa had five hundred [arhats] with the six spiritual penetrations examine each other and write each other's words. Now, though a thousand years have passed, people measure and trim them using modern conceptions; those arhats were fearful and cautious like that, while these persons of birth and death are so self-satisfied like this. Is it not that those who know the Dharma are bold? This is the third difficulty. / Incurring these five losses of the original and passing through the three difficulties, how can one not be cautious when translating Hu into Qin? It is merely a matter of transmitting words that do not concern different tongues so that they are understood and integrated. Why should one further be concerned about gains and losses? This is indeed something I have not dared to comprehend. / In my observation of Dharma Master Dao'an, he uniquely possessed divine wisdom and towered with natural genius. A leader among past worthies, he opened the way for later scholars. He revised the scriptural catalogue so that the treasury of Dharma was expounded ever more broadly; he regulated the community's rites so that the jewel of the Saṅgha flourished ever more. How could it be empty praise that he was called the Bodhisattva of the Printed Hand? When he analyzed the difficulties and ease of Indic texts and evaluated the merits and shortcomings of translators, it may be said that he penetrated deep into the obscure and was capable of investigating the profound and hidden. As for the scripts of Tianzhu and the phonological rules of Siddham, when one examines his elegant treatises, he also seemed thoroughly clear about them. In the past, people called that region by the collective name of 'Hu countries'. Although An had far-reaching insight, he had not yet altered conventional phrasing. Hu originally refers to the descendants of the mixed Rong tribes, whereas Brahma (Tianzhu) is the scion of the true sages. Their roots being so utterly disparate, in principle they should not be conflated. Those who are not well-versed often echo each other without thought; seeing a Hu countenance, they immediately call it a Brahma lineage, or being truly a Brahma person, they casually call him of Hu stock. That they do not distinguish the genuine from the spurious is truly lamentable! Although spoken Indic has become corrupt, compared with Hu it is still different. If we change it to 'Brahma studies' (Indic studies), people will know it is not Hu. / I humbly reflect that the rise of Buddhist scriptures originally came from the Western Regions, and the inception of scriptural translation originated from the Eastern Capital (Luoyang). Through successive dynasties it grew increasingly prosperous, down to the present without faltering. For a long time it has been said that through transmission and change, gradual flaws and defects have arisen. Men competitively chase after shallow currents, and few are capable of returning to awakening. When we investigate the precedents, the fault lies with the men of the past. As for the five desires according with sentiment, they are indeed hard to abandon; the austere discipline of the three robes is surely not easy to endure. Severing affection for the physical body left behind by parents to enter the essential gate of the Path, and casting aside natural kin to make pravrajyā one's constant endeavor—these worldly matters that can be overturned have suddenly been overturned; so why, then, when Indic has principles that can be learned, should one not learn it? Furthermore, when beginners start out, they submit themselves to texts and bamboo slips; they are like parrots mimicking speech or like someone imitating the walk of Handan: expending the utmost effort to master a single character, only after reading through many years does their way become broad. Only then can they encompass the present and antiquity and net heaven and earth; their achievements are like hills and their writings like the abyssal sea. The Indic methods of that [land] are the models of the Great Sage; if one roughly grasps the basic grammar and understands the general forms, then if one works with effort, one's comprehension will be without obstruction. Compared to this land, it is certainly not difficult. If the difficult must still be sought, how much more so what is easy! Yet some, internally clinging to self and other, are externally ashamed to inquire, vainly causing this esoteric art to be separated far from the Divine Continent (China). When I contemplate this in silence, I am moved to shed tears of pity. If previously Dharmarakṣa had returned to the Han, Seng Hui had gone to Wu, the likes of Shixing and Fonian, or the later followers of Zhiyan and Baoyun, upon shedding their secular robes had immediately been taught Indic characters, and while partaking in the number of monks had first opened the palm-leaf scriptures, then the correct speech of the Five Indias would have filled and spread through Jambudvīpa, and the wonderful sound of the three turnings [of the wheel] would have flowed together through Cīnasthāna (China). Everyone would understand it together, sparing the labor of translation; every generation would be fully clear, eliminating the errors of the net of doubt. Thereupon, the organ of the tongue would be constantly pure, and the mirror of the mind ever more radiant; relying on this hearing and contemplation, it would forever become their spiritual lineage. / What An expounded broadly opened the profound gate, but its finer subtleties were perhaps not yet exhaustive. Relying further on the authentic texts to help illuminate his remaining traces, when roughly laying out the essential guidelines, there are ten items: first, phonology of characters; second, syntactic prosody; third, questions and answers; fourth, names and meanings; fifth, sūtras and treatises; sixth, songs and hymns; seventh, dhāraṇī efficacy; eighth, chapter titles; ninth, professional study; tenth, variant manuscripts. Each has its characteristics delineated, as fully detailed in the treatise. / Master An also said: 'Among the earlier people who brought forth scriptures, Lokakṣema and An Shigao accurately grasped the Hu originals and are hard to match. Dharmarakṣa and Zhi Qian were skilled at chiseling and carving.' / I humbly reflect that grasping the original brings forth plainness, whereas skilled carving stems from literary embellishment. Formerly it was regarded as chiseling, but now it is certainly not deemed accurate. In the leisure of holding the brush, I venture to discuss it again. The wise worthies of former enlightenment had high renown matching the sages; their wise comprehension burst forth profoundly and their achievements were magnificently initiated. First clearing the mysterious path, they early entered the gate of emptiness; their eloquence did not arise in vain, and the meaning properly harmonized with refinement. Yet when the Buddha's teaching first flowed in, the regional dialects were rarely understood; translating from that into this, there was still fear that it would be hard to understand. This did not hinder later generations from carrying on the work of former philosophers: Indic texts gradually spread, and the true doctrine was slightly expounded; what was proclaimed may ultimately be called clear. Taking advantage of these words, I venture to evaluate the ancient translations. Though the Han clung to the original, one still dares to assess it from afar; though the Wei belongs to the past, one ultimately wishes to investigate it retrospectively. Sometimes verbose, sometimes concise, in principle they were perhaps not fitting; at times rustic, at times ornate, their standards were quite unstable. The Jin and Song valued philosophical discourse, competitively ruining their pure simplicity.