神僧傳 3.40

3.40

釋惠瑱。未詳其氏族。住上黨元門寺。奉戒真確禪懺為業。後遇國滅三寶。瑱抱持經像隱于深山。遇賊欲劫初未覺也。忽見一人形長丈餘。美貌髯顏具好衣服乘白馬朱騌。自山頂來徑至瑱前。下馬謂曰。今夜賊至師可急避。瑱居懸崖之下。絕無餘道。疑是山神。乃曰。今佛法毀滅貧道容身無地。故來依役檀越。今有賊來。正可於此取死更何逃竄。神曰。師既遠投弟子。弟子亦能護師。遂失所在。當夜忽降大雪可深丈餘。雪深道隔遂免賊難。後晴路開群賊重來。神遂告山下諸村曰。賊欲劫瑱師汝等急往共救乃。各嚴器仗入山拒擊賊。便驚散。每日恒憑神力安業山阜。不測其終。

Shi Huitian's clan was not known. He resided at Yuanmen Temple in Shangdang, keeping the precepts with absolute sincerity and taking dhyāna and repentance as his occupation. Later, when the state destroyed the Three Jewels, Huitian embraced the sūtras and images and hid in the deep mountains. Bandits came wishing to rob him, but at first he was unaware. Suddenly he saw a person over a zhang tall, with a handsome face and beard, wearing fine clothes, riding a white horse with a red mane, who came straight from the mountain peak to Huitian. Dismounting, he said to him, "Tonight bandits will arrive; Master, you should flee quickly." Huitian lived beneath a sheer cliff where there was no other path. Suspecting he was a mountain spirit, he said, "Now that the Buddha's Dharma is destroyed, this poor monk has no place to shelter his body, so I came to rely on you, patron. Now that bandits are coming, I might as well meet death right here; where else should I flee?" The spirit said, "Since the Master has come from afar to take refuge with your disciple, your disciple can also protect the Master." Thereupon he vanished. That night, heavy snow suddenly fell, more than a zhang deep. Because the snow was deep and the path blocked, he escaped the calamity of the bandits. Later, when the sky cleared and the road opened, the bandits returned. The spirit then warned the villages below the mountain, saying, "Bandits want to rob Master Huitian; you must go quickly to rescue him together!" They each took up weapons, entered the mountain, and fought off the bandits, who were startled and dispersed. Every day he constantly relied on divine power to pursue his practice peacefully in the mountains, and his end was unknown.