神僧傳 5.14

5.14

Shi Zhiyi, courtesy name De'an, had the secular surname Chen. He was a native of Yingchuan. His mother, Lady Xu, dreamed of five-colored fragrant smoke swirling into her bosom. When she wished to brush it away, she heard someone say, "A destiny from past lives has lodged here to take birth; good fortune and virtue will arrive of themselves, so why brush it away?" She also dreamed of swallowing a white mouse, and this occurred repeatedly. Mystified, she divined it, and the diviner said, "It is an omen of a white dragon." On the night he was born, the chamber was brilliantly illuminated, and the light ceased only after two nights. Suddenly, two monks knocked on the door and said, "How wonderful! The heavy virtue of this child means he will surely renounce household life!" Having spoken, they vanished. At the age of eighteen, he approached the śramaṇa Faxu of Guoyuan Monastery in Xiangzhou and renounced household life. One day, while explaining the dhyāna gate to purify the ocean of the mind, in the midst of speech and silence he constantly longed for woods and marshes. He then dreamed of myriad layers of crags and cliffs, with the clouds and sun hanging halfway down. Beside them, a boundless azure sea was deep and clear. Below it, he saw a monk waving his hand and stretching out his arm as far as the mountain's foot, pulling Yi up the mountain. Yi related what he had seen in his dream to his disciples, and all said, "This is Mount Tiantai in Kuaiji, a dwelling place of sages and worthies." Previously, a monk from Qingzhou named Dingguang had lived on this mountain for forty years, cultivating both samādhi and wisdom; he was indeed a divine man. Two years before Yi arrived, he announced beforehand to the mountain folk, "A great good spiritual friend will come to join us. You should plant beans to make paste, weave rushes for mats, and build further dwellings to await him." When Yi set out for Tiantai and arrived at the mountain, upon meeting Guang, they expressed their appreciation. Guang said, "Great good spiritual friend, do you remember my waving my hand from the mountain to call you in earlier years?" Yi was astonished and realized that his dream had indeed been verified. Furthermore, the sound of a bell filled the valley, which the assembly found wondrous. Guang said, "The bell summons those with karmic affinity; you may dwell here." Yi then divined a dwelling on a superior site, which was to the north of Guang's residence at Mount Folong and the headwaters of Luoxi. The place was spacious and tranquil, making it easy to seek the truth; the ground was level and the springs clear, so he lingered and lodged there. Suddenly he saw three men in black caps and crimson robes holding a petition and requesting, "You may practice the Way here." Later, at the Huading Peak north of the monastery, Yi practiced solitary, quiet dhūta. A great gale uprooted trees, and thunder roared. Thousands of water demons and mountain spirits appeared in a single form with a hundred shapes, spitting fire and shrieking in terror beyond description. He restrained his mind in tranquil forbearance, serene and composed. He also suffered bodily and mental burning agony as if scorched by fire. Furthermore, he saw his deceased parents resting their heads on his knees, lamenting their suffering and begging for mercy. Yi again relied on the forbearance of the Dharma, unmoved as a mountain. Thus, the visions produced by both harsh and gentle conditions vanished. Suddenly, a divine monk from the Western Regions appeared and told him, "To conquer the enemy and overcome resentment can truly be called courage." Every summer he regularly lectured on the Vimalakīrtinirdeśa. Suddenly, he saw three jewel staircases descend from the sky, down which several tens of Indian monks descended, entered the hall to pay homage, and held censers, circumambulating Yi three times; after a long while, they vanished. He established a vihāra on Mount Yuquan in Dangyang County, and an imperial decree bestowed a temple plaque named Yiyin ("One Sound"). Formerly, that land had been wild and treacherous, infested with violent divine beasts and snakes, but after the monastery was founded, it became delightful and free from anxiety. That spring there was a severe drought, and the people all said the spirits were angry. Yi went to the headwaters of the spring and led the assembly in reciting the sūtras, which induced clouds to rise and rain to pour down, so that the false rumors died out of themselves. Lady Xiao, consort of the Prince of Jin, suffered from a painful illness that physicians were powerless to cure. The Prince dispatched Liu Guyan, Opening the Government, and others with a letter to plead for help, hoping he would save her from the illness. Yi again led his companions to establish a seven-day fast and practice the Golden Light Repentance. On the sixth night, a strange bird suddenly descended, flew into the fasting altar, twisted about and died, and shortly afterward flew away. The grunt of a pig was also heard, witnessed by the entire assembly. Yi said, "Since these signs have appeared, the consort should recover. The bird dying and reviving indicates that after the coffin is covered, she will rise again. The pig grunting from the depths reveals that the blessings of the fast are augmenting each other." On the following day, her illness indeed was cured. On the twenty-fourth day of the eleventh month in the seventeenth year of the Kaihuang era, he sat upright as if in samādhi and passed away before the great stone image on Mount Tiantai, at the age of sixty-seven.