[Pramāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/) › [Indian literature](https://indike.org/pramana/in) › [Buddhist Literature](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha) › [Taishō Tripiṭaka (Chinese Buddhist canon)](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho) › [弘贊法華傳](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2067) › 10.8 # 弘贊法華傳 10.8 弘贊法華傳 10.8 - **Language:** Classical Chinese ### [10.8](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2067.10.8) 嚴恭。字近禮。本泉州人。家富於財。而無兄弟。父母愛恭。言無所違。陳大建初。恭年弱冠。請於父母。願得錢五萬。往揚州市物。父母從之。恭乘船載錢而下。去揚州數十里江中。逢一船載黿。將詣市賣之。恭問知其故。念黿將死。因請贖之。黿主曰。我黿大。頭別千錢乃可。恭問。有幾頭。答有五十。恭曰。我正有錢五萬。願以贖之。黿主喜取錢。付黿而去。恭盡以黿放江中。而空船詣揚州。其黿主別恭。行十餘里。船沒而死。是日。恭父母在家。昏有皂衣客五十人。詣門寄宿。并送錢五萬。付恭父母曰。君兒在揚州。附此錢歸。願依數受也。恭父母怪愕。疑恭死。固審之。客曰。兒無恙。但不須錢。故附歸耳。恭父受之。記是本錢。皆水濕。留客為設食。客止。明旦辭去。後月餘。恭還家。父母大喜。既而問附錢所由。恭言。無之。父母說客形狀。及附錢日月。乃贖黿之日。於是。知五十客皆所贖黿也。父子驚歎。因從家揚州。專勤福業。常讀法花。至見寶塔品。輟經而歎曰。一塔之內。有二如來。分身諸佛。其數不少。我今何為不逢一聖。感慨良久。其夜。忽夢見有梵僧。自稱法脫。語恭云。若寫此經。兼事講說。欲見諸佛。斯事可階。恭因發願造法花百部。未幾之間。忽遇重疾。誓造千部講五百遍。於是。大起房宇。為經之室。莊嚴清淨。供給豐厚。書生常數十人。揚州道俗。共相崇敬。號之為嚴法花。其病既愈。志願彌稱。恭甞一時在經堂北。有一異僧。年可八十。來告恭云。聞君造經。願請一部。又承未有提婆達多品。今留此品。可於寶塔品後安之。貧道。從龜茲國來。今往羅浮山去。得經一部。粗略披尋。仍留金一鉼。重三十斤。用入法花。來歲夏間當附物。又云。向見普賢品內呪。少一句語。宜覓足之。言畢而退。恭尋後看。莫知所在。後有捿霞寺禪師寶恭。送零落法花經五十許卷。使恭成就擬用流通。有一卷第七。是宋元嘉二十九年宋懿所造。校普賢呪。果少婆羅帝三字。是第十六句。自後寫經。仍依足之。恭甞有親知從貸經錢一萬。恭不獲已與之。貸者受錢。以船載歸。中路船傾。所貸之錢落水。而船人不溺。是日。恭入錢庫。見有一萬濕錢。如新出水。恭甚怪之。後見前貸錢人。乃知濕錢是所貸者。至來年夏內。有廬江人侯志。從鄱陽郡下。到宮亭湖。卒遇暴風。宗伴多有被溺。唯志一船。如被持引。橫風截浪。遙到廟所。見有一神形長二丈。被甲帶劍。身坐一人。問志生平所有罪過。無非實錄。志悉款伏。又問。識蔣州造法花經嚴恭以不。我今寄錢一萬。入其功德。汝可付之。語竟便隱。志不知錢之所出。唯記嚴恭姓名。仍值便風。乘船利涉。行止二日。到彼當塗縣。船纔泊岸。忽有一人。自稱姓許。來覓侯志云。在陳之日。曾於會稽。就君市錦四匹。餘直尚少。今欲還君。乃留錢一萬。逼志令受。志憶有交關。不記餘贖。留錢乃去。遂不知所之。志心方曉神錢不二。到江寧縣。訪恭以錢付之。委陳上事。恭倍歡忻。精到愈功。乃發願造三千部。講一千遍。後有江夏郡人李湛。請經一部。還鄉供養。於三山遇風。一舟漂沒。湛身亦沒。經涉五日。新林坊人。忽望水上。有數十鴉鵄。共擁一物。光彩映日。隨流而下。仍輕舸往取。得一漆函。上岸披。經一無霑濕。坊人送上刺史張熙。熙撿經後。乃是嚴恭造經。送還恭舍。勘目即是李湛所請之部。又齊王府人。忘姓名。請經一部還家。過江遭風船沒。財物皆盡。唯身獲存。法花一函。在江半日。隨浪上下。似如緘持。後人接獲尋撿。一無損濕。送還恭舍。勘目知是齊王府人所請之經。又甞至市買紙。適遇少錢。忽見一人。持錢三千。授恭曰。助君買帋。言畢不見。如此非一。隨開皇末。恭死。子孫傳其業。隋季。盜賊至江都。皆相與約。勿入嚴法花里。里人賴之獲全。前後所寫。二千五百餘部。 > Yan Gong, whose courtesy name was Jinli, was originally a man of Quanzhou. His family was wealthy, and he had no brothers. His parents loved Gong and never went against his words. At the beginning of the Dajian era of the Chen dynasty, when Gong had just reached the capping age of twenty, he asked his parents for fifty thousand coins, wishing to go to the market in Yangzhou to buy goods. His parents consented. Gong took a boat laden with the money and headed downstream. When he was several tens of li away from Yangzhou on the river, he met a boat carrying giant softshell turtles, taking them to the market to sell. Gong inquired and learned the reason. Feeling compassion that the turtles were about to die, he asked to ransom them. The turtle owner said, "My turtles are large; they can only be had for one thousand coins apiece." Gong asked, "How many are there?" He answered, "Fifty." Gong said, "I happen to have fifty thousand coins; I wish to ransom them with this." The turtle owner gladly took the money, handed over the turtles, and left. Gong released all the turtles into the river, and took his empty boat to Yangzhou. After parting from Gong, the turtle owner traveled a little over ten li when his boat sank and he died. On that day, Gong's parents were at home. At dusk, fifty guests dressed in black robes came to their gate seeking lodging, and delivered fifty thousand coins to Gong's parents, saying, "Your son is in Yangzhou; he sent this money back with us. Please accept the full amount." Gong's parents were astonished and bewildered, suspecting that Gong had died, and questioned them insistently. The guests said, "Your son is well; he simply did not need the money, so he sent it back, that is all." Gong's father accepted it, noticing that it was the original money, all wet with water. He invited the guests to stay and provided food for them. The guests stayed, and departed the next morning. More than a month later, Gong returned home. His parents were overjoyed. Afterward, they asked the reason for sending the money back. Gong said, "I did no such thing." When his parents described the appearance of the guests and the date the money was delivered, it coincided with the very day he ransomed the turtles. Thereupon, they realized that the fifty guests were all the turtles he had ransomed. Father and son marveled at this. Consequently, moving his household to Yangzhou, he devoted himself diligently to works of merit. He frequently read the Lotus Sūtra. When he reached the Apparition of the Jeweled Stūpa Chapter, he paused reading the sūtra and sighed, saying, "Within a single stūpa, there are two Tathāgatas, and the number of emanation buddhas is not small. Why is it that today I do not meet a single holy one?" He lamented for a long time. That night, he suddenly dreamt of an Indian monk who called himself Fatuo. He spoke to Gong, saying, "If you copy this sūtra and also lecture upon it, if you wish to see the buddhas, this matter can be attained." Gong thereupon made a vow to produce one hundred copies of the Lotus Sūtra. Before long, he suddenly fell gravely ill, whereupon he vowed to produce one thousand copies and lecture on it five hundred times. Thereupon, he built extensive halls and chambers as rooms for the sūtras, making them magnificent, adorned, and pure, and providing abundantly for them. There were usually several tens of scribes there. The monastics and laity of Yangzhou revered him together, calling him "Lotus Yan". After his illness was cured, his aspirations were fulfilled even more. Once, when Gong was to the north of the sūtra hall, an extraordinary monk, about eighty years old, came and told Gong, "Hearing that you produce sūtras, I wish to request one set. Moreover, I understand that you do not yet have the Devadatta Chapter; now I leave this chapter with you, and it may be placed after the Apparition of the Jeweled Stūpa Chapter. This poor monk has come from the kingdom of Kucha and is now heading for Luofu Mountain. Having obtained one set of the sūtra, I have briefly browsed through it, and I leave behind a vase of gold weighing thirty catties to be devoted to the Lotus Sūtra. Next year during the summer, I shall send \[further\] items." He also said, "Just now I saw that the dhāraṇī in the Samantabhadra Chapter lacks one phrase; you should seek to complete it." Having finished speaking, he withdrew. Gong looked after him, but he was nowhere to be found. Later, Dhyāna Master Baogong of Qixia Monastery sent some fifty fragmentary scrolls of the Lotus Sūtra, asking Gong to complete them so they could be put into circulation. There was a seventh scroll, which had been produced by Song Yi in the twenty-ninth year of the Yuanjia era of the Song dynasty. Collating the Samantabhadra dhāraṇī, it indeed lacked the three characters ba-luo-di (varate), which formed the sixteenth phrase. Thereafter, when copying the sūtra, he always completed it accordingly. Gong once had an acquaintance who borrowed ten thousand coins from the sūtra funds. Out of necessity, Gong gave it to him. The borrower received the money and took it home by boat. Halfway there, the boat capsized, and the borrowed money fell into the water, though the people on board did not drown. On that day, Gong entered the treasury and saw ten thousand wet coins, as if freshly pulled from the water. Gong found it very strange. Later, he met the man who had borrowed the money, and realized that the wet coins were the borrowed sum. When the summer of the following year arrived, Hou Zhi, a man of Lujiang, was traveling down from Poyang Commandery to Lake Gongting, when he suddenly encountered a violent gale. Many of his companions were drowned; only Zhi's boat seemed to be held and guided, cutting across the wind and breaking through the waves, until it arrived from afar at a shrine. He saw a deity twenty feet tall, clad in armor and bearing a sword, with one person sitting beside him. He questioned Zhi about all the transgressions of his lifetime, and every one of them was a true record. Zhi submitted and confessed to all of them. The deity further asked, "Do you know Yan Gong of Jiangzhou, who produces the Lotus Sūtra, or not? I now send ten thousand coins to contribute to his merit; you may deliver them to him." Having finished speaking, he disappeared. Zhi did not know where the money was to come from; he only remembered Yan Gong's name. Then, meeting a favorable wind, he sailed smoothly, and after traveling for two days arrived at Dangtu County. Just as his boat moored at the shore, suddenly a man who called himself Xu came seeking Hou Zhi, saying, "During the Chen dynasty, I once purchased four bolts of brocade from you in Kuaiji, and still owed a small balance. Now I wish to repay you." He then left ten thousand coins, pressing Zhi to accept them. Zhi recalled that there had been a transaction, but did not remember any remaining balance. Having left the money, the man departed and his whereabouts were lost. Only then did Zhi understand in his heart that the deity's money and this money were one and the same. Arriving in Jiangning County, he sought out Gong, gave him the money, and related the above events in detail. Gong's joy was doubled, and his devotion and dedication grew even more fervent. Thereupon he made a vow to produce three thousand copies and lecture on it one thousand times. Later, Li Zhan, a man of Jiangxia Commandery, requested a copy of the sūtra to take back to his native place for veneration. At Sanshan he encountered a storm, and his boat was lost; Zhan himself also drowned. After five days had passed, the people of the Xinlin Ward suddenly looked out upon the water and saw several tens of crows and kites gathered around an object, gleaming in the sunlight, drifting downstream with the current. They took a light boat to retrieve it and obtained a lacquered box. Going ashore, they opened it; the sūtra was not moistened at all. The ward people presented it to the Regional Inspector Zhang Xi. When Xi examined the back of the sūtra, he found that it had been produced by Yan Gong. He sent it back to Gong's residence, and upon checking the register, it was precisely the set requested by Li Zhan. Furthermore, a man from the household of the Prince of Qi, whose name has been forgotten, requested a set of the sūtra to take home. Crossing the river, he met a storm and the boat sank; his property was entirely lost, and only his own life was saved. One box of the Lotus Sūtra remained in the river for half a day, bobbing up and down with the waves as if it were being held securely. Later, someone retrieved it, examined it, and found it was neither damaged nor wet. It was returned to Gong's residence, and checking the register revealed that it was the sūtra requested by the man from the Prince of Qi's household. Gong also once went to the market to buy paper, but happened to be short of money. Suddenly, he saw a person holding three thousand coins, who handed them to Gong, saying, "To assist you in buying paper." Having finished speaking, he vanished. Occurrences like this happened more than once. Toward the end of the Kaihuang era of the Sui dynasty, Gong died, and his sons and grandsons carried on his work. At the end of the Sui, when bandits reached Jiangdu, they all made an agreement among themselves: "Do not enter the neighborhood of Lotus Yan." The people of the neighborhood relied on this to be preserved intact. The copies written from first to last totaled over two thousand five hundred sets. > — English (machine translation) (machine translation) - [Previous: 10.7](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2067.10.7) - [Next: 10.9](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2067.10.9) - [Up: 10](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2067.10) ## Translations (1) - [English (machine translation)](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2067~en-mt.10.8) — English, machine translation ## Linked texts (2) - [法華傳記](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2068.8.24) — Classical Chinese - [冥報記](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2082.1.13) — Classical Chinese --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2067.10.8](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2067.10.8) · Pramāṇa