眾經撰雜譬喻 2.8

2.8

昔有賈客五百，乘船入海欲求珍寶，值摩竭大魚出頭張口欲食眾生。時日風利而船去如箭，商主語眾人言：「船去大疾可捨帆下汎之。」輒如所言，捨帆下汎，船去輙疾而不可止。商主問船上人言：「汝見何等？」答曰：「我見上有兩日出，日下有白山，中間有黑山。」商主驚言：「此是大魚當奈何哉？我與汝等今遭困厄，入此魚腹無復活理，汝等各隨所事一心求救。」於是眾人各隨所事，一心歸命，求脫此厄。所求愈篤，船去愈疾，須臾不止，當入魚口。於是商主告諸人言：「我有大神號名為佛，汝等各捨所舉，一心稱之！」時五百人俱發大聲，稱：「南無佛！」魚聞佛名，自思惟言：「今日世間乃復有佛，我當何忍復害眾生？」適思惟己即便閉口，水即倒流轉遠魚口，五百賈人一時脫難。此魚前身曾為道人，以微罪故受此魚形，既聞佛聲尋憶宿命，是故思惟善心即生。此明五百賈人但一心念佛，暫稱名號，即得解脫彌天之難，況復受持念佛三昧，令重罪得薄，薄者令滅，足以為驗也。

Once, five hundred merchants boarded a ship and entered the ocean in search of rare jewels. They encountered a great makara fish that poked its head out and opened its mouth, wishing to devour living beings. At that time, the wind blew fierce and the ship shot forward like an arrow. The merchant leader said to the crowd, 'The ship is going too fast; we can let down the sails and lower the drifter.' They did exactly as he said, letting down the sails and lowering the drifter, yet the ship still moved rapidly and could not be stopped. The merchant leader asked the people on board, 'What do you see?' They replied, 'We see two suns rising above, white mountains below the suns, and black mountains in between.' The merchant leader said in alarm, 'This is a great fish! What can we do? We have now met with dire distress; entering this fish's belly, there is no principle by which we may live again. Each of you, according to what you worship, single-mindedly plead for rescue!' Thereupon, the people each, according to what they worshiped, single-mindedly took refuge and sought escape from this distress. The more earnestly they pleaded, the faster the ship went; in an instant, without stopping, it would enter the fish's mouth. Thereupon, the merchant leader told the people, 'I have a great deity whose name is the Buddha. Each of you, cast aside what you have raised up and single-mindedly invoke him!' At that moment, the five hundred people together raised their voices and cried, 'Namo buddhāya!' Hearing the name of the Buddha, the fish thought to itself, 'Today in the world, there is again a Buddha! How can I bear to harm living beings again?' Just as it finished thinking this, it closed its mouth. The water immediately flowed backward, moving away from the fish's mouth, and the five hundred merchants escaped the danger at once. In a previous life, this fish had once been a renunciant; due to a minor offense, it received the body of this fish. Having heard the sound of the Buddha['s name], it immediately remembered its former lives, and because of this contemplation, a wholesome mind arose. This clarifies that the five hundred merchants simply single-mindedly were mindful of the Buddha and briefly invoked his name, and they immediately attained liberation from a disaster as vast as heaven. How much more so for one who receives and upholds the buddhānusmṛti-samādhi, making heavy offenses light and extinguishing light offenses; this suffices as proof.