華嚴經傳記 4.14

4.14

In the first year of the Wenming reign era, there was a man of the capital whose surname was Wang, but his personal name is lost. Having neither moral discipline nor having ever cultivated good, he fell ill and died. Led away by two men to the gates of hell, he saw a monk who said he was Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva. He then taught Wang to recite a one-line gāthā, the text of which ran:
'If one wishes to know
All the Buddhas of the three times,
One should contemplate thus:
The mind creates all Tathāgatas.'
After the Bodhisattva imparted the scriptural text, he told him, 'If you can recite this gāthā, it will overturn hell.' Wang memorized and recited it completely. He then entered to see King Yama. The king asked what merits this person had, and he replied, 'I have only upheld a single four-phrase gāthā, just as stated above.' The king thereupon released and pardoned him. When he recited this gāthā, wherever the sound reached, all who were suffering obtained deliverance. Wang revived only after three days. Remembering this gāthā, he spoke of it to various monks; upon verifying the text of the gāthā, they realized it was from the twelfth fascicle of the Avataṃsaka Sūtra, the chapter 'The Clouds of Innumerable Bodhisattvas Assembling in the Palace of the Yāma Heaven to Expound the Dharma'. Wang himself related this to Dharma Master Ding of the Kongguansi, saying that it was indeed so.