宋高僧傳 3.34

3.34

Amidst the ocean of undefiled dharmas, the sounding of the tidal roar is wondrous; beneath the words of the dhāraṇī, the writing of Sanskrit letters is extraordinary. Those who have not heard come to hear—hearing the lingering resonance of the Ābhāsvara Heaven; those who have not understood come to understand—understanding that which is expounded by the supreme Dharma. Sages and worthies drink of it as pure wine, while the ordinary and inferior sip of it only as dregs. Indeed, where there is karmic affinity, one encounters it; where there is no Way, one goes against it. That the Qin prison shackled Shilifang was because there was no affinity; that the Han court initially welcomed the white horse was due to supernatural resonance. Listening to their alien cries and inspecting their horizontal writing, though feelings may be sought out, the vocalizations are confounding; though the scripts differ, the meaning is nonetheless identical. Therefore, the Rites of Zhou had the xiangxu interpreters who communicated the languages of the six Man barbarians, the didi who oversaw the seven Rong, the ji who were in charge of the nine Yi, and the yi who knew the eight Di. Why is it that among the officials of the four directions nowadays, only the title "yi" (translator) is prominent? It is suspected that because the Han and later dynasties were largely occupied with affairs in the north, the name "yi" became thoroughly familiar. Furthermore, just as the light carriage emissaries of the Zhou and Qin presented registers recording the local dialects of different states so that the sovereign without stepping outside his courtyard might sit and know the languages of distant and foreign customs—if that is so, the xiangxu knew that which was distant, and the dialect registers knew that which was near. On the whole, it was merely a matter of observing different customs and conveying distant sentiments. Splendid was the Eastern Han, which first translated the Scripture in Forty-two Sections, to which the term fan ("turning over") was subsequently applied. "Turning over" is like turning over embroidered brocade: both the back and the front have patterns, but the patterns merely differ in being reversed left and right. From this, the two terms fan ("render") and yi ("translate") came into use. In the beginning, the Sanskrit guest and the Chinese monk listened to words and guessed at meanings; trying to fit square and round together, metal and stone were hard to harmonize; a bowl was matched with "the world" (loka), and tossing was named "samādhi"; separated by a thousand miles though close at hand, face to face they could hardly communicate. Next, they understood Han speech, and we knew Sanskrit talk; eight or nine out of ten were obtained, yet discrepancies still occurred from time to time—reaching the point where "glaring with angry eyes" was rendered as "gazing at the World-Honoured One," and "the other shore" was rendered as "crossing beyond limitation." Later on, Faxian and Daojin went in person, while Xuanzang and Wukong were fluent in both languages; like a vessel holding the fat of a lion, or a goose extracting milk from water, like the court attendant answering the question of King Wen, or Yang Xiong obtaining writings unmatched through the ages, every seal matched without difference, every sound was distinct yet concordant; this may be called complete perfection. Looking back: Dao'an discussed the "five losses and three difficulties"; Yancong enumerated the "eight prerequisites"; Mingze composed The Ceremonial Protocols for Translating Scriptures; Xuanzang established the "five kinds of terms not to be translated." These are all akin to the general principles of the Zuo Commentary, matching the variable conventions of historians. Now I establish new concepts, formulating six precedents. They are: "translating the characters vs. translating the sounds" as one precedent; "Hu (Central Asian) languages vs. Sanskrit words" as one precedent; "re-translation vs. direct translation" as one precedent; "crude words vs. refined phrases" as one precedent; "elegant Chinese vs. vulgar Chinese" as one precedent; and "direct speech vs. esoteric speech" as one precedent.