宋高僧傳 7.10

7.10

Shi Yanhui was surnamed Sun and was a native of Yangwu County in present-day Dongjing. When he was just of age to wear the bodkin, he heard his father reading the Vajracchedikā-prajñāpāramitā Sūtra; fixing his gaze and listening attentively, he felt a serene joy. Furthermore, when his household provided a vegetarian feast for monks, as the chime stones and Sanskrit chants sounded together, he pressed his palms together with delight beneath the curtains. When he reached fifteen, he followed a master to study the Dharma, travelling to Taiyuan, Jingzhao, and Luoyang to listen and gather instruction, oblivious to weariness. When he came of age, he received the full precepts at Shaoshi Temple on Mount Song; applying himself to the study of the vinaya, he thoroughly penetrated its profound import. Next he sought out sūtras and treatises, probing the profound source in all of them. He said: "The practices of goodness differ, but they converge in governance. Governance is morality, concentration, and wisdom. The workings for entering the noble state are the utmost realization of the nature of these three governances." When he arrived at the capital Luoyang, senior masters all deferred to him. The four assemblies all looked up to his gentleness and clarity; before a mirror he had little sorrow and much joy, and holding a water jar he bore burdens lightly and conducted himself with gravity. Beyond the three robes, his hundred and one requisites were provided only in sufficient measure, with nothing superfluous. What he practiced was compassion and forbearance, never engaging in scheming or seeking. He kept no disciples, toiling only for himself, diligently transforming and guiding others while quietly cultivating himself. For this reason, the people of Nan Yan hailed him as a son of the Buddha. At first he lodged at Mingfu Temple and lectured on the Treatise on the Hundred Dharmas (*Śatadharma-vidyāmukha-śāstra*). The talents from the four seas converged like wind and surged like waves, constantly overflowing by more than a hundred, and many of them were pre-eminent geniuses; they intensively studied in the treatise hall and looked up with reverence to the tenets of the scriptures. Among them were grand scholars of versatile talent, who were consequently divided into the upper and lower 'ten evils'. The term 'ten evils' was akin to the title of the 'Eight Elders'. The upper ten evils thoroughly understood both the nature and marks [of phenomena], loftily raised the Dharma banner, and were unimpeded in establishing and refuting through the three elements of proposition, reason, and example. The lower ten evils encompassed both inner [Buddhist] and outer [secular] learning, chanted poetry, engaged in debate and expounded scriptures with clear voices and nimble speech, and praised with Sanskrit chanting and recited guiding addresses. By classifying them under this title, they reached the pinnacle of ability; to call them 'evil' was an inverse expression, meaning they were supremely good. Such were his disciples. Hui lectured on each of the two treatises, the *Hetuvidyā* and the *Hundred Dharmas*, about a hundred times, producing more than one hundred and fifty disciples, and composed a commentary called the *Huatai*, which circulated widely in the world. On the third day of the eighth month in the autumn of the first year of Qianhua, his physical strength withered away, and he suddenly passed away. His age was seventy-two, and his dharma age fifty-two. The people of Huazhou, longing for his virtue, accompanied his sacred coffin—more than three hundred people of the two assemblies—and returned to bury him beside Yangwu County, where they constructed a small stūpa.