廣弘明集 17.51

17.51

When the envoys of the three kingdoms of Koguryŏ, Paekche, and Silla were about to return, each requested one relic to erect a stūpa and make offerings in their home country. An imperial edict granted all of them. An edict ordered that a stūpa be erected at Daxingshan Temple in the capital. First, the relics were placed in the grand hall of the Department of State Affairs, and were dispatched at dawn on the second day of the twelfth month. At that time, the sky was clear and bright, the weather harmonious and the wind calm. Jeweled carriages, banners and pennants, fragrant flowers, music, and various offerings filled the streets and avenues. The monastic and lay gentlemen and women numbered beyond knowing how many tens of thousands of millions. Their garments, badges, rows, and positions were composed and orderly. Those from Supreme Pillar of State, Minister of Works, and Prince of Ande Yang Xiong on down all followed on foot to the temple, where they held a great unrestricted assembly and performed rites of repentance. A blue bird became tame among the crowd. Some pulled out their daggers and cast them as donations, falling into the crowd of people without hurting anyone. On the twenty-third day of the first month of the second year of Renshou, relics were again distributed to fifty-one prefectures to establish numinous stūpas. Area commanders-in-chief and prefectural governors on down to county defenders on up were ordered to suspend their regular duties for seven days, invite monks to practice the Way, and encourage the people, when erecting the stūpa mast, to donate ten coins, strictly following the previous format. It was scheduled that on the eighth day of the fourth month at the hour of the horse, all throughout the empire and realm of transformation should simultaneously lower the relics and seal them into stone caskets. The auspicious responses thus elicited are separately recorded as follows: