廣弘明集 1.19

1.19

傳云。時有沙門迦攝摩滕竺法蘭。位行難測。志存開化。蔡愔使達請滕東行。不守區域隨至雒陽。曉喻物情崇明信本。帝問滕曰。佛法出世何以化不及此。答曰。迦毘羅衛國者。三千大千世界百億日月之中心也。三世諸佛皆在彼生。乃至天龍鬼神有願行者皆生於彼。受佛正化咸得悟道。餘處眾生無緣感佛。佛不往也。佛雖不往。光明及處。或五百年。或一千年。或一千年外。皆有聖人傳佛聲教而化導之。廣說教義文廣故略也。

The account says: At that time, there were the śramaṇas Kāśyapa Mātaṅga and Dharmaratna, whose spiritual rank and practices were fathomless, and whose minds were set on spreading conversion. When the envoy Cai Yin arrived, he invited Mātaṅga to travel east. Not confined to any boundary, he accompanied him to Luoyang, explaining the dispositions of beings and venerating the fundamental truth. The emperor asked Mātaṅga: “Since the Buddha’s Dharma appeared in the world, why did its conversion not reach here?” He answered: “The kingdom of Kapilavastu is the center of the chiliocosm with its billions of suns and moons. All Buddhas of the three periods are born there. Down to the heavenly dragons, ghosts, and spirits who possess vows and practice, all are born there, receiving the Buddha’s true conversion and all attaining awakening. Living beings in other places who lack the conditions to evoke the Buddha do not receive his visit. Although the Buddha does not go there, wherever his light reaches, after five hundred years, or one thousand years, or beyond one thousand years, there are always sages who transmit the sound and teaching of the Buddha to convert and guide them.” As he expounded the doctrines extensively, because the text is long, it is abridged here.