[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) › [法華傳記](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2068) › 8.18 # 法華傳記 8.18 法華傳記 8.18 - **Language:** Classical Chinese ### [8.18](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2068.8.18) 梓州郪縣人姚待。以長安四年甲辰夏發願。為亡親自寫四大部經法華維摩各一部藥師經十卷金剛般若經一百卷。寫諸經了。寫般若經。得十四卷。日午時有一鹿。突門而入。立經床前。舉頭舐案訖。便伏床下。家有狗五六箇。見鹿搖尾不敢輒吠。姚待下床抱得。亦不驚懼。為授三歸。跳躑屈脚。放而不去。至先天年中。諸經並畢。皆以帙裹將欲入函。有屠兒李迴好者。不知何故。忽然而來。立於案前。指經而笑合掌而立欲取經。其屠兒口啞耳聾。兩眼俱赤耽酒兇惡。小有此德所寫之經。皆以瓔珞裝軸。唯般若經。飾以檀素。但箇取素軸。明此人於般若有緣。待遂裹以白紙。盛以漆函。屠兒手所持刀。橫經函上。笑而馳去。一去之後。不復再見。莫知所之。隣家夢鹿是待母。屠兒待父。命終之後。各依業受生。其子發願。為二親自寫大乘經。報已定故。頓不能害。且來受化而去。至開元四年。有玄宗觀道士朱法印。極明莊老。往眉州講說歲久乃還。時鄉中學士二十餘人。相就禮問。友人王超曹府。令竪子殺羊一腔。以袋盛肉。煮熟之後。心知其殺但忍。饞不得斷。隨例喫。計食不過四五臠。經于一日。至日映時。欻然壯熱頭痛。支節有若割切。至黃昏際。困篤彌甚。耳聞門外。有喚姚待之聲。心雖不欲出。看不覺身。以出外問有何事。使人黃衣狀若執刀。刺史喚言訖便行。待門外有溪。當去之時。亦不見溪閻。但見平坦大道。兩邊行樹。行可三四里。見一大城城是梓州城。其城複道重樓。白壁朱柱。亦甚秀麗。更問使者。此不是梓州城。使人莫語。城有五重門。其門兩邊各有門室。門門相對。門上各各題額。欲似篆書。不識其字。門數雖多。並無守者。街巷並亦無人。使者入五重門內。有一大廳。廊宇高峻。廳事及門。並無人守。至屏牖後。窺見廳上。有一人著紫。身稍肥大。容色端麗。如此已下使者入。入追姚待到。走入遙拜。怒目厲聲。何因勾率爾。許入殺人於淨處。喫思量莫知其事。俱見其嗔怒。眼中及口。皆有火光。忙怕驚惶。罔知攸指。即分疏曰。比來但持經。不曾殺人。亦不喫人肉。使問持何經。答持法華維摩藥師金剛般若經。著紫之人。聞姚待此說。凞怡微㗛。聞稱大善聲。傍忽有人。著黃衣不見其脚。手把一物。長二尺許。八稜成就。似打鼓槌。高聲唱曰。何於朱道士房喫肉。更不敢諱。便承實喫。喫幾許。報喫五六臠。著紫人問著黃衣人。其人報云。喫四兩八銖。即把筆書槌耳中遙聞。事非本心。且放令去待曹府到曰。推問著紫人。又云。大雲寺佛殿。早修遣成應諾。走出可五六步。廳西頭有一人著枷杻。四道釘䥡請問。姚待廳上人喚姚。功曹迴不稱待名。看所著枷者。乃是屠兒李迴好。著紫人問云。此人讀經寫經虛實。報云。是實。答了迴看。但見空枷在地。不見屠兒。待初入時。廳前及門。不見有人守掌。及其得出。廳兩邊各有數千人。朱紫黃綠。位次各立。亦多女人。擔枷負鎖。或有反縛者。亦有籠頭者。乃於眾中。見待親家翁張楷亦在其中。雖著小枷。而無釘䥡。叩頭令遺家。中造經不得多語。更欲前進。被人約而不許。其中有一人。散要露顯語待忽去。此非語處。迴見其中。乃是待莊邊村人張賢者。抱病連年。水漿不能入口。卿人見者。皆為必死之證。妻子親情。皆備凶具。姚待覺後報其兒。為寫法華等經。不踰半旬。病便得差。得放出屏牆之外。門門皆有人。投刀杖弓槊。儼然備列。投門人不放。待出所生又從廳東走來叫云。我兒無事得放。何以鹿欄不放。令待展臂示之。即宣衣袖。出臂示之。即便得出。及至覺寤。已經一日矣。 > Yao Dai was a native of Qi County in Zi Prefecture. In the summer of the fourth year of the Chang'an reign era (704, a jiachen year), he made a vow to copy four major scriptural works himself for his deceased parents: one copy each of the Lotus Sūtra and the Vimalakīrti-nirdeśa, ten fascicles of the Bhaiṣajyaguru-sūtra, and one hundred fascicles of the Diamond Prajñāpāramitā-sūtra. Having finished copying the other sūtras, when he had copied fourteen fascicles of the Prajñāpāramitā-sūtra, at midday a deer suddenly burst through the door, came in, and stood before the scriptural couch. After raising its head and licking the writing table, it lay down under the couch. There were five or six dogs in the household; seeing the deer, they wagged their tails and did not dare to bark. Yao Dai stepped down from the couch and hugged it, and it was not frightened either. He conferred the three refuges upon it; it skipped, bent its legs, and when released, it would not leave. By the Xiantian reign era (712–713), all the scriptures were completed, wrapped in wrappers, and about to be placed into cases. There was a butcher named Li Huihao who, for unknown reasons, suddenly came, stood before the table, pointed at the scriptures and smiled, then stood with palms joined, wishing to take the scriptures. This butcher was mute and deaf, both of his eyes were completely red, and he was addicted to alcohol and ferocious; yet he had this slight virtue. The scriptures Yao had copied were all mounted on rollers decorated with strings of jewels, while only the Prajñāpāramitā-sūtra was adorned with plain sandalwood. Li took only the plain-rollered one, which showed that this man had a karmic connection with the Prajñāpāramitā. Dai then wrapped it in white paper and placed it in a lacquered case. The butcher laid the knife he was holding across the scriptural case, smiled, and ran off. After he left, he was never seen again, and no one knew where he had gone. A neighbor dreamed that the deer was Dai's mother and the butcher was Dai's father. After their lives ended, each had taken birth according to karma; because their son had made a vow to copy Mahāyāna scriptures himself for his two parents, their retribution was already determined, so they could not harm him all at once, but rather came to receive conversion and then departed. In the fourth year of the Kaiyuan reign era (716), there was a Daoist master named Zhu Fayin of the Xuanzong Abbey who was extremely well-versed in Zhuangzi and Laozi. He had gone to Mei Prefecture to lecture and returned only after a long time. At that time, more than twenty scholars from the township went to him to pay respects and make inquiries. His friend Wang Chao, an official of the prefecture, ordered a boy servant to slaughter a sheep, put the meat in a sack, and boil it until cooked. Though Dai knew in his heart it had been slaughtered, he endured it; his craving could not be severed, so he ate along with the others, consuming by his reckoning no more than four or five pieces of meat. After a day had passed, at sunset, he suddenly developed a high fever and a headache, and his joints felt as if they were being sliced and hacked. By dusk, his illness grew even more critical. His ears heard a voice outside the gate calling Yao Dai's name. Although his mind did not wish to go out, looking at himself, he unknowingly found his body already outside, asking what the matter was. An emissary in yellow robes, appearing as if holding a knife, said, "The prefect calls you," and having spoken, walked on. Outside Dai's gate there was a stream, but when he went, he saw no stream bank at all, only a flat, wide avenue lined on both sides with trees. Walking about three or four li, he saw a great walled city; the city was the city of Zi Prefecture. The city had covered walkways and multi-storied towers, with white walls and vermilion pillars, also exceedingly splendid. When he further asked the emissary, "Is this not the city of Zi Prefecture?" the emissary made no reply. The city had five gates; on both sides of each gate there were gate-chambers, gate facing gate. Each gate had an inscription board above, resembling seal script, but he could not read the characters. Though the gates were numerous, none had guards, and there was also no one in the streets and alleys. The emissary entered through the five gates, where there was a great hall with high and towering halls and corridors; the hall and its doors also had no one guarding them. Reaching behind the screen-window, he peeked inside the hall and saw a person dressed in purple, somewhat plump, with a dignified and beautiful countenance. At this point, the emissary entered and reported that he had brought Yao Dai. Dai hurried in and bowed from afar. With glaring eyes and a stern voice, \[the purple-robed one said,\] "Why were you summoned rashly? You entered to kill a person and ate them in a pure place." Dai thought and knew nothing of such an affair, seeing only his anger, with flames shooting from his eyes and mouth. Terrified and bewildered, he did not know what was being referred to. He immediately explained himself, saying, "Recently I have only upheld the scriptures; I have never killed anyone, nor have I eaten human flesh." The emissary asked what scriptures he upheld. He replied, "I uphold the Lotus, the Vimalakīrti, the Bhaiṣajyaguru, and the Diamond Prajñāpāramitā scriptures." When the person in purple heard Yao Dai speak thus, he smiled amiably, and voices were heard exclaiming, "Excellent!" Suddenly there was someone at his side wearing yellow robes whose feet could not be seen, holding an object in his hand about two feet long with eight ridges, resembling a drum mallet. In a loud voice he called out, "Why did you eat meat in the Daoist Master Zhu's room?" Dai dared not conceal it any longer and confessed the truth that he had eaten it. "How much did you eat?" He reported that he had eaten five or six pieces. The person in purple asked the yellow-robed person, who reported, "He ate four ounces and eight zhu." He then took a brush and wrote on the mallet. From afar, \[a voice\] was heard in his ears: "The matter was not his original intent; let him go for now. When Wang Chao arrives, interrogate him." The person in purple also said, "The Buddha hall of Dayun Monastery must be repaired quickly and completed." Dai assented. Walking out about five or six paces, at the west end of the hall there was a person wearing a cangue and manacles, secured with four iron nails. He asked, "Yao Dai?" The person in the hall had called him Yao Gongcao and did not speak Dai's personal name. Looking at the one wearing the cangue, it was none other than the butcher Li Huihao. The person in purple asked, "Is it true or false that this man recited and copied the scriptures?" Dai replied, "It is true." Having answered, he looked back and saw only an empty cangue on the ground, and the butcher was gone. When Dai first entered, he saw no one guarding before the hall or at the gates; but when he came out, on both sides of the hall there were several thousand people, dressed in vermilion, purple, yellow, and green, standing according to their ranks. There were also many women carrying cangues and chains, some with hands bound behind their backs, and some with halters on their heads. Amidst the crowd, he saw his father-in-law Zhang Kai, who was also among them. Though he wore a small cangue, it had no iron nails. He kowtowed and asked Dai to leave word for his family to copy scriptures, and that they must not speak much. Dai wished to go forward further, but was restrained by someone and not allowed. Among them was a person, his waist exposed and bare, who told Dai, "Leave quickly! This is not a place for talking." Looking back at him, it was Zhang Xian, a villager near Dai's estate, who had been bedridden with illness for successive years, unable to swallow food or drink; everyone who saw him considered it a sure sign of death, and his wife, children, and kin had already prepared the funeral paraphernalia. After Yao Dai awoke, he informed Zhang's son to copy the Lotus and other scriptures for him; in less than half a decade, his illness was cured. Having been released outside the screen wall, at every gate there were people with dropped knives, staves, bows, and lances, solemnly lined up in readiness. Those guarding the gates would not let Dai out. His birth mother again came running from the east of the hall, shouting, "My son is cleared and released; why are the deer pens not opening?" She told Dai to extend his arm and show it. He then unfolded his sleeve, put out his arm, and showed it to them, whereupon he was able to leave. By the time he awoke, a full day had already passed. > — English (machine translation) (machine translation) - [Previous: 8.17](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2068.8.17) - [Next: 8.19](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2068.8.19) - [Up: 8](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2068.8) ## Translations (1) - [English (machine translation)](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2068~en-mt.8.18) — English, machine translation --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2068.8.18](https://indike.org/pramana/in.bauddha.taisho.2068.8.18) · Pramāṇa