神僧傳 8.8

8.8

釋不空。梵名阿目佉跋折羅。華言不空金剛。止行二字略也。本北天竺婆羅門族。幼失所天。隨叔父觀光東國。年十五師事金剛智三藏。初導以梵本悉曇章及聲明論。浹旬已通矣後同弟子舍光慧𧦬（扶件切）等三七人。附崑崙舶離南海。至訶陵國界遇大黑風。眾商惶怖各作本國法。禳之無驗。皆膜拜求哀。乞加救護。慧𧦬等慟哭。空曰。吾今有法。汝等勿憂。遂右手執五股菩提心杵。左手持般若佛母經夾。作法誦大隨求一遍。即時風偃海澄。又遇大鯨出水。噴浪若山。甚於前患。眾商甘心委命。空同前作法。令慧𧦬誦娑竭龍王經。逡巡眾難俱息。既達師子國。王遣使迎之。極備供養。一日王作調象戲。人皆登高望之無敢近者。空口誦手印住於慈定。當衢而立。狂象數頭頓皆踢（徒郎切）趺。舉國奇之。次遊五印度境。屢彰瑞應。至天寶五載還京。是歲終夏愆陽。詔令祈雨。制曰。時不得賒雨不得暴。空奏立孔雀王壇。未盡三日雨已浹洽。帝大悅。後因一日大風卒起。詔空禳止。請銀瓶一枚作法加持。須臾戢靜。忽因池鵝誤觸瓶傾。其風又作急暴過前。勅令再止。隨止隨效。帝乃賜號曰智藏焉。天寶八載許迴本國。乘驛騎五匹至南海郡。有勅再留。至德初鑾駕在靈武風翔。空常密奉表起居。肅宗亦密遣使者求祕密法。洎收京反正之日。事如所料。上元末帝不豫。空以大隨求真言祓除至七過。翼日乃瘳帝愈加殊禮焉。肅宗厭世。代宗即位。恩渥彌厚。又以京師春夏不雨。詔空祈請。如三日內雨是和尚法力。三日已往而霈然者非法力也。空受勅立壇。至第二日大雨云足。一歲復大旱。京兆尹蕭昕詣寺謂為結壇致雨。不空命其徒取樺皮僅尺餘。繢小龍於其上。而以爐香甌水置于前。轉吹震舌呼使呪之。食頃即以繢龍授昕曰。可投此于曲江中。投訖亟還。無冒風雨。昕如言投之。旋有白龍纔尺餘。搖鬣振鱗自水出。俄而龍長數丈。狀如曳素。倏忽亘天。昕鞭馬疾驅未及數十步。雲物凝晦暴雨驟降。比至永崇里第衢中之水已決渠矣。至永泰中香水沐浴東首以臥。比面瞻禮闕庭。以大印身定中而寂。茶毘火滅。收舍利數百粒。其頂骨不燃。中有舍利一顆。半隱半現。勅於本院別起塔焉。初玄宗召術士羅公遠與空角法。同在便殿。羅時時反手搔背。空曰。借尊師如意。時殿上有花石。空揮如意擊碎於其前。羅再三取如意不得。帝意欲起取。空曰。上勿起此影耳。乃舉手示羅。如意復完然在手。又北邙山有巨蛇。樵采者往往見之。矯首若丘陵。夜常承吸露氣。見空人語曰。弟子惡報。和尚如何見度。每欲翻河水陷洛陽城以快所懷也。空為其受歸戒說因果。且曰。汝以瞋心故受今報。那復恚恨乎吾力何及。當師吾言此身必捨矣。後樵子見蛇死㵎下。臭聞數里。又一日風雨不止。坊市有漂溺者。樹木有拔仆者。遽召空止之。空於寺庭中揑泥媼五六溜水作梵言罵之。有頃開霽矣。嘗西蕃大石康三國。帥兵圍西涼府。詔空入。帝御于道場。空秉香爐誦仁王密語二七遍。帝見神兵可五百員在于殿庭。驚問空。空曰。毘沙門天王子領兵救安西。請急設食發遣。四月二十日果奏云。二月十一日城東北三十許里。雲霧間見神兵長偉。鼓角喧鳴山地崩震。蕃部驚潰。彼營中有鼠金色。咋弓弩絃皆絕。城北門樓有光明天王。怒視蕃帥大奔。帝覽奏謝空。因勅諸道城樓置天王像。此其始也。

Shi Bukong (Amoghavajra). His Sanskrit name was Amoghavajra; in the language of China this means 'Infallible Diamond' (Bukong jingang), the two characters being an abbreviation. He was originally of a brahman clan from North Tianzhu. Having lost his father in his youth, he accompanied his uncle on a tour of the Eastern Lands. At the age of fifteen, he served the Tripiṭaka master Vajrabodhi (Jingangzhi) as his teacher. At first [Vajrabodhi] instructed him in the Sanskrit Siddham script and the treatise on phonology (Śabdavidyā); in ten days he had already mastered them. Later, together with twenty-one disciples including Sheguang and Huibian, he boarded a Kunlun merchant ship and departed from the Southern Sea. Reaching the borders of the kingdom of Ho-ling, they encountered a great black gale. The merchants were terrified and each performed the rites of their native lands, but exorcising it proved of no avail. They all prostrated themselves, imploring mercy and begging for deliverance. When Huibian and the others wept bitterly, Bukong said: 'I now have a method; do not worry.' Thereupon, holding a five-pronged bodhicitta vajra in his right hand and a volume of the Prajñāpāramitā-mātṛkā Sūtra in his left hand, he performed the rite and recited the Mahāpratisarā [dhāraṇī] once; instantly the wind subsided and the sea became calm. Again, they encountered a great whale emerging from the water, spouting waves like mountains, worse than the previous peril. The merchants resigned themselves to death. Bukong performed the rite as before and ordered Huibian to recite the Sāgara-nāgarāja Sūtra; in a moment the perils all ceased. After arriving in the Lion Kingdom (Siṃhala), the king sent an envoy to welcome him and provided offerings most abundantly. One day, the king held a sport of taming elephants; people all climbed to high places to watch, none daring to approach. Bukong, reciting with his mouth and forming hand seals (mudrās), dwelt in the samādhi of loving-kindness and stood facing the thoroughfare. Several wild elephants all suddenly knelt down; the entire country marvelled at him. Next he traveled through the regions of the Five Indias, repeatedly manifesting auspicious responses. In the fifth year of the Tianbao era, he returned to the capital. In that year, the end of summer suffered from drought; an imperial decree ordered him to pray for rain, stating: 'The time must not be delayed, and the rain must not be violent.' Bukong submitted a memorial requesting the establishment of a Mahāmāyūrī-vidyārājñī altar; before three days had passed, copious rain fell everywhere. The emperor was greatly pleased. Later, one day a great wind suddenly arose, and a decree ordered Bukong to avert it. He requested a silver bottle, performed the rite, and empowered it; in a moment it became calm and quiet. Suddenly, a pond goose accidentally knocked the bottle over, and the wind arose again, violent and urgent beyond before. An imperial decree ordered him to stop it again; wherever he stopped it, the effect followed. The emperor thereupon bestowed on him the title 'Zhizang' (Treasury of Wisdom). In the eighth year of the Tianbao era, he was permitted to return to his home country. Riding five postal relay horses, he reached the commandery of Nanhai, where an imperial decree detained him once more. At the beginning of the Zhide era, the imperial carriage was at Lingwu and Fengxiang. Bukong constantly sent secret memorials to inquire after the emperor's health; Emperor Suzong also secretly dispatched envoys to seek the secret Dharmas. When the capital was retaken and the dynasty restored, matters were just as he had anticipated. At the end of the Shangyuan era, when the emperor was indisposed, Bukong cleansed [the illness] with the Mahāpratisarā dhāraṇī up to seven times; the next day [the emperor] recovered, and the emperor accorded him even more extraordinary etiquette. When Suzong passed away, Daizong ascended the throne, and the imperial favors grew even deeper. Furthermore, because no rain had fallen in the capital during spring and summer, an imperial decree ordered Bukong to pray for it, [stating]: 'If it rains within three days, it is the venerable's Dharma power; if it pours after three days, it is not Dharma power.' Bukong received the decree and erected an altar; on the second day, abundant rain fell in sufficiency. In another year there was a great drought again. The Mayor of Jingzhao, Xiao Xin, went to the monastery and asked him to establish an altar to bring rain. Bukong ordered his disciple to take a piece of birch bark just over a foot long and paint a small dragon upon it, placing an incense burner and a bowl of water before it; turning and vibrating his tongue, he blew and summoned it with incantations. In the space of a meal, he handed the painted dragon to Xin, saying: 'You may cast this into the Qujiang River. Once you have cast it, return quickly; do not get caught in the wind and rain.' Xin cast it as instructed. Soon, a white dragon just over a foot long, shaking its mane and fluttering its scales, emerged from the water. In a short while the dragon grew several tens of feet long, resembling drawn plain silk, and instantaneously spanned the sky. Xin whipped his horse and galloped swiftly, but before he had gone several tens of paces, the clouds turned dark and murky, and a violent rain poured down. By the time he reached his residence in the Yongchong Ward, the water in the street had already overflowed the ditches. In the Yongtai era, having bathed in scented water, he lay down with his head to the east. Facing toward the palace courtyard, he passed into quiescence in samādhi with the Great Seal posture. After the cremation fires went out, several hundred grains of relics (śarīra) were collected. His cranial bone did not burn, and inside it was a relic, half hidden and half visible. By imperial decree, a separate stūpa was erected for him in his own courtyard. Earlier, Xuanzang had summoned the occultist Luo Gongyuan to contest methods with Bukong, being together in an informal hall. Luo repeatedly reached behind his back to scratch it. Bukong said: 'Lend this venerable master your ruyi sceptre.' At that time there was a variegated stone in the hall; Bukong swung the ruyi sceptre and smashed it to pieces before him. Luo tried repeatedly to retrieve the ruyi sceptre but could not get it. When the emperor intended to rise and take it, Bukong said: 'Your Majesty, do not rise; this is merely a shadow.' He then raised his hand to show Luo: the ruyi sceptre was once again intact in his hand. Furthermore, on Mount Beimang there was a giant serpent that woodcutters often saw; it raised its head like a hill, and at night it constantly inhaled the dew. Seeing Bukong, it spoke in human speech, saying: 'This disciple suffers an evil retribution. How can the venerable master deliver me? I constantly wish to overturn the river waters to submerge the city of Luoyang to satisfy my grudge.' Bukong conferred the refuges and precepts on it and explained cause and effect to it, saying: 'Because of an angry mind you received your present retribution; how could you harbor resentment again? How could my power avail? If you follow my words, you will surely cast off this body.' Later, woodcutters saw the serpent dead below a ravine, its stench smelling for several leagues. On another day, the wind and rain did not stop; people in the wards and markets were swept away and drowned, and trees were uprooted and blown over. They hastily summoned Bukong to stop it. In the monastery courtyard, Bukong molded five or six clay old women, washed them with water, and scolded them in Sanskrit; before long the sky cleared. Once, the three kingdoms of Tibet, the Arabs (Dashi), and Kang (Samarkand) led troops to besiege the prefecture of Xiliang. An imperial decree summoned Bukong to enter; the emperor was present in the bodhimanda. Bukong held an incense burner and recited the secret words of the Benevolent Kings [Sūtra] twice seven times. The emperor saw divine troops of about five hundred officers in the palace courtyard, and asked Bukong in astonishment. Bukong said: 'The prince of the Heavenly King Vaiśravaṇa is leading troops to rescue Anxi. Please urgently arrange food and dispatch them.' On the twentieth day of the fourth month, a memorial indeed arrived saying: 'On the eleventh day of the second month, about thirty li northeast of the city, towering divine soldiers were seen amidst the clouds and mists; drums and horns sounded loudly, and the mountain and earth collapsed and shook. The barbarian forces fled in terror. In their camp there was a golden rat that chewed through all the bow and crossbow strings. On the north gate tower of the city, there was the Heavenly King of Clear Light, who glared angrily, causing the barbarian commanders to flee in great rout.' The emperor read the memorial and thanked Bukong; he then decreed that statues of the Heavenly King be placed on the gate towers of all circuits; this was the beginning of it.