法華傳記 5.28

5.28

Xiao Jing, Libationer of the Directorate of Education, was a native of Lingling. When the Liang was destroyed, he entered the Sui. His elder sister was the empress of Emperor Yang. Though raised in nobility and prosperity, his family revered the Buddha-Dharma. During the Daye era, because he personally recited the Lotus Sūtra, he constructed a Prabhūtaratna stupa in accordance with the sūtra text, making it of sandalwood. The stupa was about three feet high, with its upper canopy and lower base, and he also made a wooden image of Prabhūtaratna Buddha. After several years, his elder brother's son Quan was in the residence; rising in the morning, he suddenly saw in the grass of the front courtyard a sandalwood stupa canopy, beneath which was a brass Buddha image. Its craftsmanship differed from that of China, its facial features resembled a Central Asian, and the pupils of its eyes were made of silver, radiating bright light inside, pure as if natural. Astonished, Quan ran to tell Jing. Jing was startled and delighted upon seeing it; taking the canopy, he tried placing it on the Prabhūtaratna stupa, and it fit perfectly, matching as though originally made for it. Jing was overjoyed and encouraged, regarding it as the result of his sincere devotion, and enshrined the Buddha image. Inside the casket were over a hundred grains of śarīra. Jing's daughter, being young as a nun, secretly had doubts, for Central Asian monks had often said: "Śarīras cannot be broken by a hammer." So she took thirty grains and tried to smash them on a stone with an axe, but the śarīras were entirely unmarred. The daughter searched on the ground to pick them up, but found only three or four; all the rest were lost and could not be found anywhere. Soon, in fear, she reported this to Jing. Jing went to look inside the stupa, and the śarīras were all there as before. From that day forth, Jing recited the Lotus Sūtra once daily until the end of his life. In the eleventh year of Zhenguan, he became critically ill, and Empress Xiao together with his younger brothers and nephews came to see him. Jing met with them, had each of them light incense, and thereupon parted with them. He kept only his younger brother, Lord Yu, and his daughter who was a nun, bidding them to light incense and recite the sūtra. Shortly after, he said to the nun: "I wish to depart. Samantabhadra Bodhisattva has come to welcome me, and is in the eastern courtyard. You, Reverend, may go and welcome him." The nun went to welcome him as instructed, but before she returned, Jing said: "Because this courtyard is impure, he is unwilling to come. I shall go to him. May you all abide well!" He then bid farewell to Yu and the others, rose, knelt upright with palms joined, facing squarely to the west, then lay down and passed away. In his testamentary instructions, he ordered that a single cart alone should carry his coffin, dressed only in the clothes he wore; that women must not join the funeral procession; that no wine or meat be offered; and that the pit be dug only deep enough to conceal the coffin. Both court and countryside marveled at his awakening to the Way, and his family revered and carried out his wishes.